MIRACLES No Uiolations OF THE LAVVS OF NATURE Quid non miraculo est cum primum in notitiam venit Plinius Histor. Nat. lib. 7. cap. 1. LONDON Printed for Robert Sollers at the King's Arms and Bible in St. Paul's Church-yard 1683. PREMONITION TO THE CANDID READER IT is the Judgement of most of the ancient Fathers of the Christian Faith and of the most learned Theologues among the Moderns that the Authors of the holy Scriptures when they speak of natural things do not design to instruct men in Physical Speculations and the Science of Natural Philosophy but aim only to excite pious Affections in their breasts and to induce them to the Worship and Veneration of the true God whom they celebrated in their Writings whose Power and Goodness they therefore took all fair Occasions to demonstrate that they might from as well the natural as civil Order of things establish in the Minds of the Readers a right and firm Belief thereof This then being the only End they proposed to themselves they found themselves obliged so to explicate the visible Works of God and the nature of the things they were to relate as that they might not by Novity and Insolency appear too remote and abhorrent from the common Sence and pre-conceiv'd Opinions of the Vulgar to whose narrow Capacity and groveling Wit they were always to condescend yea even to wrest the general Causes and Ends of the whole Creation in favour of the Peoples Prejudices as if all things in the Universe were ordain'd only for the good and benefit of Mankind Nor could it conduce to this their principal purpose to insist upon second Causes or defer much to their Efficacy but rather in all Contingents or Events to recur immediately to God himself the First Cause Author and President of Nature omitting to give any account of that Apparatus and long Series of Causes which Philosophers use to remark in explicating the Phenomena of Nature and which Nature her self uses in their production Whence it is that these pious Writers compendiously refer all things to the immediate Power of God and to his irresistable Will and Command leaving men to learn from the Light of Nature or right Reason which alone is able to teach it that the Power of God and the Power of Nature are one and the same and that all her Laws are his eternal Decrees For their business was not to treat of the Principles of Natural Philosophy as I said before but to convince the unthinking Multitude that God is the Origine of all things that universal Nature is obedient to his Will and that his Providence presides over and governs all things as well natural as bumane which he so disposes and accommodates as to make them conspire to the good and happiness of those who follow Piety and Vertue and to the Punishment of the Impious and Vicious and the Multitude was to be convinced not by leading their Reason with a long Chain of Premisses and Conclusions Theological but by surprizing their Imagination and accommodating Events to their common Opinions however unreasonable in themselves This well consider'd as we are not to admire if we find in the holy Scripture many memorable things related as Miracles which yet notwith standing proceeded from the fixt and immutable Order of Nature and necessarily flowed from a Series of Causes ordain'd according to her eternal Laws that is from God's Decrees so ought we not rashly to accuse any man of Infidelity only because he refuses to believe that those Miracles were effected by the immediate Power of God such as is not only inconsistent with but point blank repugnant to the fundamental Laws and Constitutions of Nature which he in his infinite Wisdom hath made and made so ample and fertil as to extend to the certain production of whatever Events he hath will'd and decreed For first among the many Miracles related to be done in favour of the Israelites there is I think no one that can be apodictically demonstrated to be repugnant to th' establisht Order of Nature and then the Power of God being infinite that of Nature must be so too because one and the same with the Power of God but humane Understanding is finite and consequently incapable to know how far the Laws of Nature extend themselves In a word therefore If by a Miracle in the general you understand nothing else but a certain Work or Effect the Causes of which cannot be explicated by men ignorant of the Principles of natural things I acknowledge many such Miracles to have been done in all Ages and among all Nations Nay more if by a Miracle you mean that the Causes whereof transcend the Capacity even of the most acute and profound Philosopher I will not deny but that among the many things related in the Scripture as Miracles some are found that in this sence also may deserve that name because I do not measure the Power of Nature by the unequal Line of humane Wit But if you will have a Miracle to be such a rare Effect which is absolutely above or which really is all one contrary to the Laws of Nature or which cannot possibly follow from her fixt and immutable Order then I dare not believe that any such Miracle hath ever happen'd in Nature lest I oppose God to God that is admit that God changes his own Decrees which from the Perfection of the divine Nature I know to be impossible If you candid Reader know so too I have already said more than is necessary to the defence of this innocent Discourse and therefore acquiesce in hope of being rightly understood Of Miracles BY MIRACLES are understood the admirable or wonderful Works of God But because Men following their own natural Reason are wont to doubt whether what is by a Prophet deliver'd for the Command of God be truely the Command of God or not Miracles in the sacred Scriptures are call'd Signs as signifying the Will of God as also in Ethnick Writers for the same Reason they are call'd Ostenta and Portenta as shewing or portending the divine Will concerning Things to come That we may therefore understand what a Miracle is we must observe what Works those are which men generally admire or wonder at The Things then that cause men to admire any Work or remarkable Effect are only two One is if that Work be rare the like whereof they have seldom or never seen done before The other if after thè Work is done they cannot conceive it to have been done by natural Causes but only by the immediate operation of God himself For if we understand the natural Causes of the Fact however rare it be or if we have often seen the like done before though we do not conceive the natural Cause thereof we no longer admire it nor call it a Miracle Quae usu quotidiano novimus frequenti experientia ea neque admiramur neque ad eorum causas investigandas multum excitari solemus
quanquam saepe occultiores sint inventuque difficiliores aliis quae ob raritatem hominum studia animos maximè occupant Thus for example if we should hear an Ox or Horse speak we should call it a Miracle because rare and of which we are not able to imagine a natural Cause Thus also in the generation of Animals every unusual Error or deviation of Nature might be held for a Miracle But if a Man or any other Animal generate his like in specie though we are equally ignorant how this and that is perform'd we do not take it for a Miracle Also if a Man should be transform'd into a Stone 't would be a Miracle because rare but if Wood should be converted into a Stone because such conversion is often seen 't is no Miracle and yet notwithstanding we are as ignorant how God effects that conversion in Wood as how he effects it in a Man The Rain-bow that first appear'd in the Sky was a Miracle because the first that is the like had never been seen before and because it was shewn by God for a Sign to signifie that the World should never again be destroy'd by a Deluge But at this day because Rain-bows are often seen no man looks upon them as Miracles Again many wonderful Works are produced by humane Art yet because after they are effected we come to understand how and by what means we therefore not account them for Miracles For Admiration depends for the most part upon men's Knowledge and Experience so that what seems to be a Miracle to one man seems not to be so to another And unskilful and superstitious men are wont to take for great Miracles those things which the Learned and well experienced do not at all admire Eclipses of the Sun and Moon have in times past been mistaken for supernatural Effects and Prodigies by the Vulgar while learned Astronomers understanding the natural Causes of them have certainly predicted them Also cunning men confederate among themselves closely enquiring into and discovering some secret actions of an unwary and simple man and afterward relating them to him have been held in great admiration as if they had come to the knowledge of those Secrets by supernatural means by divine Revelation at least when the same Confederates have not been able so easily to impose upon wary and prudent persons Admiration then we see is generally greater or less according to the various degrees of Science and observation among men the most ignorant being most prone to wonder and the Causes of Admiration which many times makes a Miracle of what is purely natural we have found to be Rarity and Ignorance II. If this Disquisition be yet a little farther pursued it will soon appear that Superstition also contributes largely to the belief of Miracles For the Minds of men being naturally prone to be agitated betwixt Fear and Hope of the future the two grand Passions that govern humane life thence it comes to pass that they very often fancy a certain extraordinary divine power in all Contingents which are unusual and the natural Causes of which they do not comprehend as if those Contingents certainly proceeded not from the order of Nature but from an immediate operation of God transcending or changing that order and that they presignified some good or evil Fortune to themselves For the Vulgar thinks that the Power and Providence of God is then most apparent when they observe any Event unusual in Nature and contrary to the opinion they have from custom conceiv'd of Nature chiefly if the Event seem to promise any thing of Commodity or Advantage to themselves imagining that the Existence of a supream Being can be by no way better prov'd than by the inversion of the course of Nature which they suppose to happen in all unusual Events Whence it is that common Heads always accuse those Philosophers of Atheism and design to extirpate the belief of God at least of his Providence who endeavour to explicate what they call Miracles by natural Causes and study to understand the Reasons of them erroneously conceiving that God forsooth remains idle while Nature acts in her usual Order and on the contrary that the power of Nature is suspended and the action of all natural Causes arrested or frustrated while God acts Thus they form in their Brains confused Notions of two distinct Powers one of God t'other of Nature which yet they allow to be determined by God but what to understand by either of these Powers and wherein the difference they suppose consists they know not Only this they will tell you that the unusual Works of Nature are Miracles or the Works of God and partly out of blind Devotion i. e. Superstition partly from an itch of opposing wise men that study Natures Laws and Constitutions they please themselves in their Ignorance and think they please God too with their affected Admiration not considering how much they derogate from his infinite Wisdom while they conceive the Laws of Nature by him made and establish'd insufficient to effect all things he hath decreed to produce for the ends in order to which he ordain'd them without variation III. This popular Error seems to derive its Original from the primitive Jews who that they might convince the Ethnicks of their time who adored visible Gods the Sun Moon Earth Water Air c. and shew them that those Gods were weak and inconstant or mutable and under the Command of the invisible God whom themselves worshipped recounted to them the Miracles he had wrought for their sakes as cogent Arguments that all Nature was by his Superintendency and Command directed only to their Commodity and Advantage other Nations the while having not an equal share of his Providence A perswasion so agreeable and grateful to men that to this day they have not ceas'd to feign Miracles in favour of themselves that others might believe them to be more beloved by God and dearer in the eye of his Providence than the rest of Mankind yea more the final Cause for which he at first created and continually directs all things What doth not the folly of the Vulgar arrogate to it self having not so much as one sound conception or thought concerning either God or Nature confounding the eternal Decrees of God with the mutable Placits of men and feigning Nature to be so narrow and limited as that man is the chiefest part of the whole Creation IV. Having from this brief Enquiry learned what is generally understood by the word Miracle what are the Opinions and Prejudices of the Vulgar concerning Miracles and whence those Opinions and Prejudices have proceeded urged as well by zeal for the Glory of God which is never propagated by erroneous conceptions of his Nature Power Wisdom and Providence as by Charity for the unlearned part of Mankind which is always by Ignorance seduced into Superstition I resolve to endeavour by a few plain Reasons to shew the unsoundness yea the
which they can be changed to us at least from the time wherein we conclude upon the Existence of God from them they ought to appear such if we will secure our Conclusion from all possible Doubts for if we could conceive that those Notions might be changed by any Power whatsoever it be then should we doubt of their verity and consequently of that of our Conclusion also namely of God's Existence nor could we ever be certain of any other thing whatever Besides this we know not this or that thing to be according to Nature or repugnant to it unless we can evince the same to be convenient or repugnant to those fundamental Notions or Principles Wherefore if we could conceive any thing in Nature possible to be done by any Power whatever that is repugnant to Nature that thing would be repugnant to those first Notions and so ought to be rejected as absurd or else as was just now intimated we must doubt of the truth of those first Notions and by consequence also of the Being of God and of all other things what ever and howsoever perceiv'd Miracles then if understood to be Works repugnant to the fixt Order of Nature are so far from evincing the Existence of God that on the contrary they would make us doubt of it when without them we might be absolutely certain of the same knowing that all things in Nature follow a fixt and immutable Order But let it be suppos'd that what cannot be explicated by natural Causes is a Miracle which may be understood two ways either as that which hath indeed natural Causes but such as cannot be investigated by humane Understanding or as that which hath no Cause but only the Will of God Now because all things that are done by natural Causes are done also by the sole Power and Will of God we are under a plain necessity of coming to this Conclusion That a Miracle whether it be effected by natural Causes or not is a Work that transcends humane Understanding but from a Work that transcends humane Understanding we can know nothing for whatever we clearly and distinctly understand must come to be understood by us either by it self or by some other thing which we clearly and distinctly understand therefore from a Miracle or Work that transcends our Capacity we can understand neither the Essence of God nor his Existence nor his Providence nor any thing else concerning him or his Minister Nature But on the contrary since we certainly know that all things are determined and decreed by God that the Operations of Nature follow from the Essence of God and that the Laws of Nature are the eternal Decrees and Volitions of God we are obliged absolutely to conclude that we so much the better know God and his Will by how much the better we know natural things and more clearly understand how they depend upon their first Cause and how they operate according to the eternal Laws of Nature Wherefore by reason of our Understanding those Works that we clearly and distinctly understand are with much more right to be call'd the Works of God and to be referr'd to his Will than those we do not at all understand although they strongly exercise the Imagination and ravish men into admiration of them forasmuch as only those Works of Nature which we clearly and distinctly understand render the knowledge of God more sublime and most clearly shew his Will and Decrees They therefore that when they do not understand a thing have recourse to the Will of God talk impertinently shew more of Bigotry than Wit and ridiculously profess their Ignorance VIII Moreover could we conclude any thing from Miracles yet we could never thence conclude of the Existence of God For since a Miracle is a Work limited and never implies any but a certain and limited Power most certain and evident it is that from such an Effect we cannot rightly infer the Existence of a Cause whose Power is infinite but at most of a Cause whose Power is greater I say at most because from many Causes concurring there may follow some Work whose Force and Power is indeed less than the Power of all its Causes put together but far greater than the Power of any one of them taken singularly But because the Laws of Nature as I have already shewn extend themselves to infinite things and are conceiv'd by us under a certain semblance of Eternity and Nature according to them proceeds in a certain and immutable Order those very Laws do in some measure indicate to us the Infinity Eternity and Immutability of God I conclude therefore that by Miracles we cannot know God and his Existence and his Providence but that these may be far better concluded from the fixt and immutable Order of Nature In this Conclusion I speak of a Miracle as understood to be nothing else but a Work that transcends humane Understanding or is believ'd to do so For if it were supposed to destroy the Order of Nature or to interrupt it or to be repugnant to it then certainly it could not only give us no knowledge of God but on the contrary would take from us all the knowledge we naturally have and make us doubt of God and of all other things Nor do I here acknowledge any difference betwixt a Work contrary to Nature and a Work above Nature that is as some are pleas'd to speak a Work not in truth repugnant to Nature but which cannot be produced or effected by her Power alone For since a Miracle is done Non extra naturam sed in ipsa natura though it be held to be supra naturam yet still must it interrupt the Order of Nature which we conceive to be from the Decrees of God fixt and immutable If therefore any thing should be done in Nature that should not follow from her Laws it would necessarily be repugnant to the Order which God hath by the universal Laws of Nature establish'd in the Universe and consequently the belief of it would make us doubt of all things else and lead us into Atheism And thus if I be not grosly mistaken in the force of the Reasons here alledged I have sufficiently demonstrated what in the second place I intended and from the same Reasons I take liberty to conclude de novo that a Miracle against Nature or above Nature is a meer absurdity and therefore that by a Miracle in holy Scripture nothing else can rightly be understood but such a Work of Nature which either really transcends humane Understanding or is believ'd to do so IX Nevertheless for more assurance of the truth of this new Doctrine I think my self concern'd to confirm that part of it which affirms that from Miracles we cannot know God This I humbly conceive may be done by having recourse to the Authority of the holy Scriptures themselves For though they no where ex professo and plainly teach that Position viz. that God is not made known to us by Miracles
prove must be by consequence deduced from some Histories of the Scripture which are casually related prolixly and with many Circumstances Of which I will produce a few as Examples of the rest In the first Book of Samuel chap. 9. and vers 15 16. it is related that God reveal'd to Samuel that he would send Saul to him and yet God sent him not expresly as men are wont to send Messengers on purpose to others but this Mission of Saul by God was nothing but the very Order of Nature For Saul was in quest of Asses which he had lost as is related in the same Chapter and now deliberating to return home without them by the counsel of his Servant he diverts his Journey to the Prophet Samuel to know from him where he might find his Asses nor can it be collected from the whole Narration that he had any other Mandate from God besides this Series of natural Causes or Order of Nature to address himself to Samuel In Psalm 105. v. 24. 't is said that God changed the mind of the Egyptians so that they hated the Children of Israel and yet that this mutation also was wholly natural appears from Exod. chap. 1. where an account is given of the Reason and that no light one neither why the Egyptians reduced the Israelites to Servitude viz. lest the Israelites being grown too numerous and mighty should in case of War joyn with their Enemies and over-power them In Genes 9. v. 13. God saith to Noah that he would give the Rainbow in the Clouds for a Sign which action of God was no other but a certain refraction and reflexion of the Rays of the Sun which they suffer'd in the small drops of Water whereof the Cloud consisted So that the Phenomenon it self was then as now a natural Meteor only the Signality was new In Psalm 147. v. 18. the natural action and warmth of the Wind by which the Hoar-frost and Snow are thawed and melted is call'd the Word of God and so are the Wind and Cold also in vers 15. In like manner Wind and Fire are call'd in Psal. 104. vers 4. God's Angels and Ministers All which places with many other of the like importance frequently occurring in sacred Writ most clearly shew that the Decree Command Saying and Word of God signifie nothing else but the Action and Order of Nature and therefore it is not to be doubted but that all the Miracles recounted in the Scripture came to pass naturally and yet notwithstanding are duely referr'd to God because his Power and the Power of Nature are one and the same and because it is not the design of the Scripture to explain Events by their natural Causes but only to relate those which surprize the Imagination and that also in such a method and style which serves more familiarly and easily to excite Admiration and consequently Devotion in the Minds of the Vulgar If therefore in the Scripture there be found some Things or Facts whose Causes we understand not and which seem to have been done besides or contrary to the Order of Nature they ought not to amuse us nor to hinder us from believing that what hath really hapned hapned naturally Which is yet farther confirmed by this that in Miracles were found many Circumstances though not always noted in the Narrations chiefly when they are described in a Poetick style the Circumstances I say of Miracles shew clearly that they require natural Causes For instance to infest the Egyptians with Scabs it was requisite Moses should sprinkle Ashes of the Furnace upward into the Air Exod. 9. v. 8. Locusts also at the natural Command of God namely by an East-wind blowing strongly a whole day and a night came up and cover'd the Land of Egypt and left it again being carried away by as mighty a West-wind Exod. 10. v. 14 19. By the same Command of God namely an East-wind that blew most strongly the whole night the Red Sea gave way to the Israelites Exod 14. v. 21. The same may be inferr'd also from the manner of the Prophet Elisha's raising up the Shunamites Son that perhaps only seem'd to be dead For Elisha thought it necessary to lay his Body upon the Childs Body to put his Mouth upon his Mouth his Eyes upon his Eyes his Hands upon his Hands and to stretch himself often in that posture and all this to excite Heat and Motion in the vital Parts of the Child and Sternutation in his Brain until the Child open'd his Eyes first and then neez'd seven times More Examples of this kind might easily be brought hither out of the Books of the Old Testament were not these already alledged sufficient to evince that various Circumstances and natural Actions are requir'd to the production of Miracles and consequently that they are all effected by God according to the Order of Nature not by interrupting or perverting it I see not therefore why it may not be lawful for us to believe that though the Circumstances of Miracles be not always deliver'd in the Narrations of them nor their natural Causes assign'd yet they were not effected without them The same is constant also from Exod. 14. v. 27. where 't is only related in short that at the bare beck of Moses and the stretching forth of his Hand the Sea flowed back upon the Egyptian Host without the least mention of any Wind that might impel the Waters and yet in the Canticle or Song of Moses chap. 15. v. 10. 't is said expresly this Miracle was perform'd by God's blowing with a most violent Wind upon the Sea XI Here some perhaps will object that we find in the Scripture very many things which seem absolutely incapable of Solution by any natural Causes whatsoever as that the Sins of men could cause Famine and their Prayers bring down Rain and cause Fertility of the Earth and that Faith could restore Sight to the Blind and others equally strange But this Objection I have I think prevented where I asserted that it is not the design or scope of the Scripture to teach the knowledge of things by their next Causes but only to relate them in that Order or Method and in those Phrases by which it may most efficaciously move men and chiefly the Vulgar to Devotion and Reverence toward God for which Reason it many times speaks of natural things yea even of God himself very improperly as aiming to affect and occupy the Imagination of men not to convince their Reason For should the Scripture relate the Fall and Devastation of any Empire Kingdom or Commonwealth as politick Historians are wont to do assigning all the remote concurrent and proxime Causes thereof the Narration would not at all affect and commove the common People who yet are apt to be strongly surpriz'd and as it were charm'd into Admiration and Devotion when the whole Revolution is described in Strains and Figures of Poesie and referr'd only to the immediate Power and Decree of God
absurdity of their Doctrine who teach that in every Miracle God acts by a power distinct from and superior to that of Nature which is the universal Law by him ordain'd and fixt for government of his Creatures V. To effect this I perswade my self I need do no more but convince the judicious Reader of the verity of these four things 1. That nothing in the World happens or comes to pass contrary to Nature but that Nature keeps an eternal fixt and immutable Order 2. That from Miracles we cannot come to understand and certainly know either the Essence or Existence or Providence of God but that all these may far better be collected from the fixt and immutable Order of Nature 3. That the holy Scripture it self by the Decrees and Volitions and consequently the Providence of God understands nothing else but the very same Order of Nature which necessarily follows from his eternal Laws 4. That most men have erred in the manner of interpreting the Miracles recorded in the holy Scriptures For these things being well prov'd I see not what can remain to frustrate my present Design VI. As for the FIRST therefore viz. that all Events happen according to the eternal Order of Nature this may easily be inferr'd even from hence that whatsoever God wills or determines involves eternal necessity and truth For since the Intellect of God is not distinguish'd from his Will and therefore to say that God wills any thing is all one with saying that he understands that very thing by the same necessity which follows from the divine Nature and Perfection it is a genuine and inevitable consequence that for God to understand any thing as it is is for him to will or decree the same as it is But since nothing is necessarily true but only from the divine Decree hence it most clearly follows that the universal Laws of Nature are the meer Decrees of God which follow from the necessity and perfection of the divine Nature If therefore any thing should be contingent in Nature that should be repugnant to her eternal Laws the same would be repugnant also to the divine Decree Intellect and Nature or if any man should affirm that God does any thing contrary to the Laws of Nature he would be compell'd to grant also that God acts contrary to his own Nature than which nothing can be more absurd The same may be farther proved also by this that the power of Nature is no other but the power and vertue of God and the power of God no other but the very Essence of God and certainly that must be eternally the same or immutable Nothing therefore can be contingent in Nature that is repugnant to her universal Laws nay that is not convenient or agreeable to them or follows not from them For whatsoever is done is done by the Will and eternal Decree of God i. e. is done according to the Laws and Rules which involve eternal necessity and truth and which though they be not all known to us are perpetually without the least omission or deviation strictly observ'd by Nature Nor does any sound Reason urge us to ascribe a limited power and vertue to her or to think that her Laws are fit only for some certain Events and not for all For since the vertue and power of Nature is the same with the vertue and power of God and her Laws and Rules his Decrees as was just now prov'd we are obliged to believe that the power of Nature is infinite and her Laws so made as to extend their force to all things conceiv'd by the divine Understanding Otherwise we could not avoid running into that dangerous Error of the Multitude that God hath created Nature so impotent and given her Laws and Rules so barren as that he is compell'd sometimes to help her by new Ordinances and supplies of Vertue in order to her Support and Conservation and that things may succeed according to his Intention and Design An Error than which nothing is more alien from Reason nothing more unworthy the Majesty of the divine Nature Now from these Positions that in Nature nothing can happen or come to pass which does not follow from her Laws and that her Laws extend themselves to all things conceiv'd by the divine Understanding and in fine that Nature keeps a fixt and immutable Order from these undeniable Truths I say it most clearly follows that the name of a Miracle cannot be otherwise understood than respectively to the opinions of men and that a Miracle signifies nothing else but a Work the natural Cause of which we are not able to explicate by the example of another usually observ'd by us at least he is not able to explicate who writes or relates the Miracle I might say that a Miracle is that of which we are not able by the light of Nature to explain the Cause from the Principles we understand of natural things but because Miracles have been wrought Ad captum Vulgi to convince the Vulgar which was wholly ignorant of the Principles of natural things certain it is the Ancients took that for a Miracle which they could not explain in the same manner by which the Vulgar is wont to explain natural things namely by recurring to Memory so as to recal to mind another like thing which they are wont to imagine without admiration For the Vulgar always think they then sufficiently understand any thing when they do not admire it Nor doth it appear that either the Ancients in their Times or any of their Successors since even down to ours have had any other Criterion or Rule whereby to discern Miracles from other Contingents i. e. insolite or rare Events from usual besides this here mention'd viz that these seem'd capable of Explication from the known Principles of natural things but those not according to the judgement of the Vulgar And therefore we are not forbidden to think that in the sacred Writings themselves many things are related as Miracles of which sufficient Causes may be given from the known Principles of natural Philosophy and that too without any the least derogation from either the Glory of God or the Authority of the Writers or from the scope or end for which the things were done and written as I design to prove when I shall have conducted the Reader to the 4 th and last Head of this brief Discourse which concerns the Interpretation of Miracles For now the Clew of my Method brings us to the VII SECOND Position viz. That from Miracles neither the Essence nor the Existence nor the Providence of God can be understood by us but on the contrary that all these may be better perceiv'd from the fixt and invariable Order of Nature which to demonstrate I thus proceed Forasmuch as the Existence of God is not per se known to us it ought to be necessarily concluded from Notions whose verity is so evident firm and impregnable that no power can be given or conceiv'd by
in Nature which is repugnant to her eternal Laws or which is impossible to follow from them and therefore I think it unreasonable to impute such Doctrine to the Scripture To these Arguments be pleas'd to subjoyn some of our precedent Reasons viz. that Miracles require Causes and Circumstances that they necessarily proceed from the divine Decree that is as we have shewn even from the Scripture from the Laws of Nature and her establisht Order and in fine that Miracles may be wrought also by Seducers and Impostors as is plain from Deut. 13. and Mat. 24. v. 24. and then I presume you will perceive it to be genuinely consequent from all these Premisses that Miracles have been natural things and ought so to be explicated as to seem neither new that I may use Solomon's word nor repugnant to Nature And that you may the more easily so explicate them I have set down some certain Rules taken from the Scripture it self But though I say that the Scripture teaches these things yet I do not mean that it teaches them as Precepts or Documents necessary to Salvation but only that the Prophets embraced them as we do and therefore it is free for every man to think of them according as he shall judge it most conducive to his devoting himself to the Worship of God and the Exercise of Religion with his whole mind Which agrees exactly with the Sentiment of that wise and grave Author Josephus exprest in the conclusion of his 2 d. Book of Antiquities in these words Nullus verò discredat verbo miraculi si antiquis hominibus malitia privatis via salut is liquet per mare fact a sive voluntate Dei sive sponte revelata dum eis qui cum Alexandro Rege Macedoniae fuerunt olim antiquit us à resistentibus Pamphilicum mare divisum sit cum aliud iter non esset transitum praebuit iis volente Deo per eum Persarum destruere imperium hoc confitentur omnes qui act us Alexandri scripserunt De his itaque sicut placuerit unicuique existimet In which Josephus modestly declares his Judgement of Miracles I add also that of Valesius a pious man and profound Philosopher who in sacrae Philosophiae cap. 57. in Psal. 77. having asserted that the Manna wherewith God fed the Israelites in the Desart though different in some qualities from other sorts of Manna described by Physicians was yet produced secundum leges naturae wisely subjoyns this Defence of himself Neque enim elevo Dei concuâ—sum cum naturales rerum causas investigo sed laudo insinitam ej us sapientiam qui it a omnia disponit ut etiam quae portentosissima sunt vide antur bona ex parte secundum naturalem rerum ordinem evenisse Sanctus Augustinus in Epistola 7. quae est ad Marcellinum Si ratio contra divinarum Scripturarum autoritatem redditur quamvis acuta sit fallit verisimilitudine nam vera esse non potest rursum si manifestissimae certaeque rationi velut Scripturarum sanctarum objicitur autoritas non intelligit qui hoc facit non Scripturarum illarum sensum ad quem penetrare non potest sed suum potius objicit veritati nec quod in eis sed quod in seipso velut pro iis invenit opponit Burnetius in Telluris Theoria sacra lib. 1. cap. ult Ut in deducendis rerum originibus non temerè recurrendum est ad Primam Causam ita nec in explicandis effect is singularibus ad Miracula Hoc omnes agnoscunt atque etiam frustrà ac temerè eò recurri cum res aliundè per causas naturales satis explicari potest Satis autem explicatur aliquod Phaenomenon eujus rationes redduntur adaequatae idque juxta analogiam Naturae ita scilicet ut caetera Natura eidem explicationi consentiat suffragetur Dr. Sprat in his Hist. of the Royal Society pag. 360. It is a dangerous Mistake into which many good men fall that we neglect the Dominion of God over the World if we do not discover in every Turn of humane Actions many supernatural Providences and miraculous Events Whereas it is enough for the Honour of his Government that he guides the whole Creation in its wonted Course of Causes and Effects as it makes as much to the Reputation of a Princes Wisdom that he can rule his Subjects peaceably by his known and standing Laws as that he is often forc'd to make use of extraordinary Justice to punish or reward FINIS