3. There is one circumstance related in the history of Elisha which seems to indicate that he was a man of rather gross habits. It is stated, that, when he killed a yoke of oxen for food, he "boiled their flesh with the instruments of the oxen," and gave the people to eat (1 Kings xix. 21). We infer, from this lan guage, that the oxen were thrown into the cooking-vessel whole, without being skinned or cleaned. It most have been rather a rare dish, and a tough one also. 4. We will notice one more remarkable incident in the history of this remarkable prophet. We are told, that, as some men were felling some trees on the banks of the Jordan, one of them, by accident, let his ax fall into the stream. On the case being reported to Elisha, he soon relieved the man of his trouble by throwing a stick into the water, which caused the ax to swim. Here is another specimen of the philosophy of the Christian Bible. Heathen mythology is full of such lawless stories. When the boat in which a Hindoo was rowing capsized, and threw his dinner into the Indus, a fish was accommodating enough to arrest it in its descent, and bring it to the surface, and restore it to the hungry boatman. A very accommodating fish! as much so as the stick! We will now take a view of the moral bearing of the stories of these great "God-chosen" and "God-favored prophets," as one Christian writer styles them. We must assume that God would not suspend the action of those laws which secure order and harmony throughout nature to perform such miracles as these prophets are represented as performing, unless some great and important end was to be accomplished by it. Well, let us see if this was the result; if not, we must assume that these miracles were never performed. According to Dr. Lardner, miracles were always designed to accomplish some great good, and generally to remove the skepticism of unbelievers, and to convince them of the mighty power of God. But we do not find that any such effects were produced by any of the miracles here reported. The performance of Elijah did not convert Ahab nor Jezebel, nor the worshipers of Baal, either to the faith or to a life of practical righteousness; nor did those of Elisha convert Naaman; nor did either of the prophets convert or reform any of the thousands of heathen in the countries through which they traveled. The contemporary kings of Judah and Israel still continued in their ungodly course as before. In a word, nobody was benefited, nobody reformed, and no good effected by any of these miracles, only to a few individuals, which could have been accommodated in the usual way,--by ordinary means. On the other hand, bad feelings were engendered, many lives lost, and much suffering caused by their miraculous proceedings. We must conclude, then, that, so far as any agency of God is claimed in the several cases, these miracles were never performed; and we have the negative testimony of history to prove still further that these miracles