Another very distinctive feature in the New Testament accounts is displayed in the character of the wonders there recorded. Indeed, this distinguishing element is found in all the miraculous narratives of the Bible. If it be true that the ancient writers or redactors of Scripture have employed the legends of other nations to illustrate their works, it must be conceded that they have immensely improved, and made a much better use of them. The story of the creation of the world, of the primeval paradise, and of the deluge, may be only myths common to several nations, but somehow, while all other writers just lose themselves in these myths, the Hebrews alone have laid hold of them to enforce the sublimest views ever formulated in human speech concerning the origin of the world and of man. The narratives of the Old Testament are evidently not constructed to startle the reader with portents, but to disclose the providential dealings of a holy and merciful God with man to enlighten and save him. The Gospels in like manner are not written to record miraculous occurrences, nor are miracles introduced to glorify Christ: they are simply referred to as incidents in His ministry. When we compare the prodigies ascribed to Buddha during the many changes of his pre-existence, or during his ministry, with the miracles of the Gospels, they are like the rough casts in clay or wood made by a rude or childish people contrasted with the perfect productions of nature in the world of animals or of men. They may endure comparison with the portents found in the Apocryphal books, or in the Lives of the Saints, but placed side by side with the Gospel miracles they serve only to illustrate the difference between what is artificial and grotesque, and what is original and natural. There is a marked sobriety in the Gospel accounts totally lacking in the Buddhist legends. The latter serve no other end but to exalt and magnify Buddha,[169] but the Gospel miracles are all founded in some great human necessity which they are intended to supply. The Buddhist marvels are simply produced to startle us, the Christian are recorded as signs to instruct us. What a gulf separates the conception of Buddha leaping high in air amid the sounding of the bells of the heavens and the plaudits of all the gods, just to prove that he was Buddha, from the account of Christ’s refusal to work a miracle to win the adherence of the crowd, or give the sign from heaven to vanquish Sadducean unbelief! The Gospel miracles are few after all, but they all flow from and are in harmony with the original idea of Christ as Messiah which is assumed in all the Gospels. The mighty works done by Him are all such as might be expected to be done in a world like this by the Son of a heavenly Father. The cure of all manner of disease, the exorcism of all the evil spirits that have afflicted humanity, the victory over death, the control of all the forces of nature, were all in the scope of one who came hither to