The apostles of our Lord were invested with miraculous powers: “God also bearing them witness, both with signs and wonders, and with divers miracles and gifts of the Holy Ghost, according to his own will,” Heb. ii. 4. As the apostles asserted a direct and unequivocal claim to miraculous powers, and as these are declared in the New Testament to have been exerted by them, falsehood, if proved, would destroy the veracity of their writings, and the validity of all the doctrines and precepts they contained. But, let the case be duly weighed, and it will be seen, that, to support their pretensions by artifice and chicanery, was absolutely impossible. A few might be deceived, an empire could not be; and great must be the infatuation of supposing that a few obscure men could blind the eyes of the people among whom they lived. In the face of the utmost hostility, in the midst of the greatest perils, in defiance of cruel persecutions, and with the crucifixion of their Lord before their eyes, they could not have claimed the exercise of miraculous powers if they had not been actually possessed. Had they resembled the Romanists, to whom we have referred, would it have been possible to escape detection? It is worthy of special remark, that more than one account is given us in sacred history of the messengers of God entering into collision with those who pretended to supernatural power. Thus a memorable contest took place between Moses and the magicians of Pharaoh’s court. Different opinions are entertained as to the means by which the latter performed their feats, some contending that they were mere tricks, and others that evil spirits were in active operation. On this controverted question we do not enter; it is sufficient for the present purpose to remark, that the superiority of the servants of Jehovah was placed beyond all dispute. The rod of Aaron swallowed up the rods of the magicians; at the plague of flies and the murrain on the cattle, they were compelled to say, “This is the finger of God;” and at length they “could not stand before Moses because of the boils, for the boils were upon the magicians and all the Egyptians,” Exod. ix. 11.