saving miracles in the sea and the wilderness, and in His thunderings and lightnings from Sinai. Elijah, the sole champion of Jehovah, could not have held out against an entire apostate kingdom and people, had he not been able to summon miraculous divine power to his aid, when the nation was to choose between Baal and Jehovah. And could Christ, when He became one of a race which felt its external far more than its internal misery, have opened the hearts of men. for the divine love and grace, if He had not caused its beams to fall sensibly and palpably upon earthly distress, sickness, and death?

Every miracle, therefore, serves the purpose of salvation; on the one hand, in a subjective educational way, by preparing the heart for greater spiritual wonders, and affording a tangible proof of the divine love and righteousness; on the other hand, by counteracting sin and the ruin caused by death, and by preparing the way for the future consummation. God could not, and would not, magically obtrude redemption upon us. It was His will in manifold ways through a miraculous. history to work gradually towards the goal of the world's renewal.

If we fix our attention more closely upon the gradual historical manifestations of the miraculous, we shall see that Christ is the centre of this development, and the second great miracle after the creation. With Him the beginning of a new era is inaugurated, which will attain its consummation when "all things have become new." In Him the power exists for the regeneration of the world, and from Him it goes forth to every creature; in His acts He appears as the divine Liberator of all physical and spiritual life from the thraldom of sin; His resurrection is the foundation and beginning of the glorified world, of that new order of things to which the creation is at length destined to be raised. He is the divine Miracle of love, which was demanded on the one hand by the redeeming love of God, and on the other by the actual condition and the destiny of man. But this takes place in such wise, that in Him "the miraculous appears as His true nature, as a human life of love, leading us through itself to its internal divine source." Hence the resurrection, the greatest miracle

Doiner.

which was accomplished in the person of Jesus, appears entirely natural, and is plainly demanded by His own being; it was not possible that this Holy One should see corruption (Acts ii. 27 ff.). And that which in consequence of His natural moral being is worked in Him through the power of God, is at the same time the object of His own will, which is one with, and mighty through, God. He Himself takes His own life again as He had laid it down (John x. 17, 18).

In

The entire history of miracles is grouped around this central miracle, and stands in internal connection with it, either as a prophecy or as an echo of that which is begun in Him. A glance at this confirms the result just before attained respecting the aim and significance of the miraculous, which we had hinted at in our remarks on the gradual progress of revelation (see p. 97). Before the time of Moses, God performs many miracles, but as yet without human agency. The patriarchs are endowed with the gift of inspiration, but not with that of miracles; on the other hand, visions and theophanies are frequent during this period. Moses is the first who has not only the gift of inspiration, but that of miracles, as a manifestation of his divine mission. Under him, and immediately after him, miracles are frequent, but the theophanies gradually disappear. Again, the judges appear under the influence of inspiration as prophets in deeds, though not in words. Samuel, David, and Solomon, we see inspiration progressing towards the actual realization of the theocratic Church. With the encroaching sway of heathenism, miracles again appear more conspicuously. They are as necessary for the re-establishment of the law as they were at its foundation. Elijah often inflicts destructive blows; Elisha works in a milder, more beneficent manner. The later prophets are pre-eminently men of words, of inspiration, until finally both the gift of miracles and that of inspiration cease. Again, the forerunner of Christ, John the Baptist, appears as inspired, but without miraculous power, so that the miracles of Christ might make a deeper impression (John x. 41). The miracles of Christ, which are almost without exception beneficent miracles of grace, break forth with unparalleled splendour, yet in such a way that on some occasions He performs many signs, which at other times He omits, as we have seen before, because of unbelief, or

because He foresees that they will be without result, and wishes to check the fleshly desire for wonders. To the apostles it is given to work "the signs of an apostle." Then this gift gradually disappears, and a free course is left for the Spirit of Christianity during a period characterized by spiritual miracles.1

Miracles, therefore, like revelation in general, belong to those crises in which the divine kingdom is to make an important advance. They are connected with certain periods and persons, ramely, with the chief promoters of God's kingdom. The time of the foundation and re-establishment of the law by Moses and Elijah, the time of the founding and the first promulgation of the gospel by Christ and His apostles, were decisive epochs of this kind. In the intermediate ages miracles fall into the background. With this the prediction of Scripture exactly agrees, that at the end of time, when the last decisive struggle is being waged between the kingdom of God and the antichristian power of this world, and when Christ returns, there will again be a period of miracles (Luke xxi. 25 ff.).

We need not be surprised that extraordinary forces work in such crises. Analogies from natural life sufficiently show that the moments in which a new creature is born into the world are not subject to the ordinary laws of development, but evince a plenitude of peculiar impulses, forces, and forms, which, after the fully accomplished birth, give place to the customary activity of the usual laws of life. It is known, e.g., that the organic functions in the formation of the fœtus proceed according to other laws than those of the perfect organism. The same is true of the birth-hour of the Christian Church. This, as well as every other birth-hour, is subject to other laws than those of the ordinary course. The man who makes ordinary human development the standard for the extraordinary fulness of the Spirit, which appears in that most important epoch of human history, in order to exclude the miraculous, falls into the same error as he who makes the laws of the present

1 With regard to the continuance of miracles after the apostolic age, we have testimonies not only from Tertullian and Origen, who tell us that many in their time were convinced against their will of the truth of Christianity by miraculous visions, but also much later from Theodore of Mopsueste († 429). The latter says: "Many heathen amongst us are being healed by Christians from whatever sicknesses they may have; so abundant are miracles in our midst."

course of nature a standard for the period of the creation. He is guilty of a ὕστερον πρότερον: he places that which is later before that which is earlier, and forgets that the laws of primary development are altogether different from those working in that which already exists.

From this history of the miraculous, and the holy purpose constantly manifested in it, we see in how strict a manner it is governed by divine laws, which render the mere thought of an arbitrary interference impossible. Miracles never have an anomalous disconnected1 character. They are connected with each other, and with the central miracle, Christ; and they belong as necessary members to the entire organism of revelation, working together towards one great end, the salvation and consummation of the world. We neither see the boy Jesus play at miracles with childish caprice, as several of the apocryphal gospels relate, nor does the man Jesus ever arbitrarily or selfishly exert His miraculous power on His own behalf (comp. the history of the temptation). He employs it throughout only in the service of God, as proof of His divine mission, to relieve human need, and for redemptive ends. We may therefore expect miracles to a greater or less extent, according as they are needful, where the condition of the world and of God's kingdom demands them, and where unbelief sets no limits to the divine working (Matt. xiii. 58).

A further rule for the operation of the miraculous is this, that as it is often connected with natural phenomena, so its product takes its place in the existing order of nature without any disturbance of the laws hitherto obtaining; and as respects the form of its appearance, that it is as quiet as possible, without noise or pomp. The internal law for the human workers of miracles is this: their external miraculous power must be connected with inward and spiritual miracles taking place in their hearts. By means of the latter they must be raised into a specially close communion with God, and they may not seek their own honour, but only that of God and Christ. The

1 Strauss (Leben Jesu, S. 148) is of opinion that a God who should now and then work a miracle, sometimes exerting, sometimes discontinuing a certain kind of activity, would be subject to the succession of events in time, and consequently no absolute Being. This purely external and superficial objection completely overlooks the internal connection of miracles with revelation, and the historical development of the divine kingdom.

internal law for men, in whom the miracles of salvation take place, is faith. Faith is the medium of the divine operation; through it man surrenders himself to its effects. On this account such miracles can never be considered as unnatural, nor as contrary to nature. And so it is, too, with the internal miracles of conversion and regeneration. For the recipients of revelation, who are spectators of the miraculous, the law obtains, that though it may facilitate their faith, yet it must never absolutely compel them to believe. Here, also, God respects human freedom. Therefore He never intensifies His miraculous working to such a degree that all objections of a hardened heart would be for ever destroyed. He who will doubt, always can doubt. And finally, for the historical development of the miraculous the law is generally binding, that in proportion as the divine revelation dispenses with sensuous media, its miracles become more spiritual.

Strauss says, "If the friends of the miraculous would explain to us its working laws as clearly as we know the laws which govern the action of steam, we should then consider their arguments as something more than mere talk."

So our opponents wish to know the laws which govern the miraculous. Well, its internal moral laws are those which we have just stated, and they exactly correspond to what we before ascertained to be the internal laws of revelation. But if Strauss means to demand a demonstration of the physical laws which govern the actions of miraculous forces, we answer that this is simply a contradiction in itself. For precisely that which gives the miracle its distinctive character is, that we cannot point out the natural laws and forces working in it, because they are not of a physical or mathematical kind, but supernatural. To exhibit the physical laws of the working of miracles would be to divest them of their miraculous character.

This confirms to us what we have already hinted to be the true distinguishing mark of genuine miracles from those which are either fictitious and apocryphal, or demoniacal. The divine origin of any miracle is apparent, not so much from the extraordinary power manifested in it, as from its moral and religious character,—from the spiritual power and moral truth which are reflected in it and promoted by it. Truly divine miracles appeal not merely to our logical faculty, but to our