Miracles

Miracles are like angels who have sometimes been visible to men, who would much more willingly have introduced them to an acquaintance with the laws and society of heaven, than have filled them with fear and consternation. They are insulated examples of laws as boundless as the universe, and by the manner in which we are affected by them, prove how much we have to learn, and how utterly incompetent we are to judge of the ways of God, from that reason which is founded on our own limited and fallacious observation. The resurrection of our Lord must have been a very different miracle to the angels at the sepulchre, from what it was to Mary. They saw it from the other side of the grave, with a knowledge of the nature of that death which they had themselves experienced; she saw an insulated fact, not at all coincident with her views on the subject of which it was an illustration. They saw the use and design of that which had been accomplished; she saw the sepulchre and the linen clothes lying. As they gazed intensely at the same subject, the veil of heaven was withdrawn, and they beheld each other, face to face. She was filled with fear; they with love and compassion. If Mary were to persist in judging of this subject from her own reason; from a knowledge of those laws with which she was previously acquainted; how could her views ever become angelic? How could the dark cloud of admiration be ever filled with the rich light of the rising sun?

Man alone, of all created things, appears on his own account to want the full measure of his happiness; because he alone has left the order of his creation. He stands, even at the present period, half convinced of the reality of the future state. It is the design of revelation to restore to him that moral condition in which he will possess as necessarily the consciousness of immortality, as the brute does that of existence; for a consciousness of existence, together with that of union with God, is a consciousness of eternal life. Let us come to the Bible, then, with no hopes of arbitrary reward, and no fears of arbitrary punishment; but let us come to it, as to that, which, if followed aright, will produce a condition of mind of which happiness will be the natural and necessary consequence.

It is often said that the Bible has nothing to do with metaphysics or the sciences. An individual, whatever be his condition, always retains, to a certain extent, a consciousness of his moral and intellectual character; and the more this character is exalted, the more minute and discriminating will be this consciousness. Who is it that formed the human mind, and who is here endeavoring to restore it to its true order? The Bible has the mind for its subject, that condition of mind which has heaven for its object, and the Father of mind for its author. Has it nothing to do with metaphysics? It has indeed nothing to do with that metaphysics which we shall leave with our bodies in the graves; but of that which will shine with more and more brilliancy, as the passage is opened, not through distant regions of space, but through the secret part of our own souls to the presence of God, it is the very life and being. Can omniscience contemplate the happiness of the mind, without regard to its nature? Were we disposed to improve the condition of the savage, what course should we pursue? Should we not endeavor to change his habits of mind and body, by teaching him the arts of civilization, instructing him in the sciences, and gradually introducing him to that portion of social order which is here attained? And are not all these most intimately connected with our own condition of mind? Are they not merely the expression of its countenance? In the same way is it the endeavor of the Divine Mind in the Bible to restore all to his own image and likeness; and to say that the Bible has nothing to do with metaphysics, is to say that the present condition of the mind has nothing to do with what it should be, and that present metaphysics have nothing to do with religion.

It is said that the Bible has nothing to do with the sciences. It is true that it does not teach them directly; but it is gradually unfolding a condition of mind, out of which the sciences will spring as naturally, as the leaves and blossoms from the tree that bears them. It is the same power which acts simultaneously to develop the soul itself, and to develop nature—to form the mind and the mould which is destined to receive it. As we behold the external face of the world, our souls will hold communion with its spirit; and we shall seem to extend our consciousness beyond the narrow limits of our own bodies, to the living objects that surround us. The mind will enter into nature by the secret path of him who forms her; and can be no longer ignorant of her laws, when it is a witness of her creation.

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