It is perfectly true that at the present day all rational men, with few exceptions, concur in rejecting almost the entire mass of ecclesiastical miracles. They do this, however, not because they believe miracles to be impossible, but because they are persuaded that God will not work one on a light or trivial occasion, and because the great mass of such pretended miracles are characterised by marks which are inconsistent with the idea that they have been wrought by God. With our larger acquaintance with the order of nature, we no longer believe that it is possible for miracles to be wrought by any inherent virtue in things themselves, but that if performed at all, it can only be by the direct agency or permission of the Author of Nature. In a word, the general incredibility of the ecclesiastical miracles, and their repugnance to our conception of the mode of the divine acting is the reason why we reject them altogether. It is also unquestionably true that at the present day a great majority even of religious persons would receive with no little incredulity the report of a miracle, while such incredulity would not have existed at a former period. This is due to two causes: first, our increased knowledge of the permanence of the forces of material Nature; and secondly, our belief that supernatural occurrences can only take place by the direct agency and permission of God, and not by means of my supernatural power inherent in particular persons. From this we draw the inference that almost all the alleged ecclesiastical miracles must be rejected as inconsistent with the divine character. We are of opinion, therefore, that a miracle wrought for any other purpose than the attestation of a revelation is not credible; and as from the nature of the case revelations must be rare, we summarily reject all reports of supernatural occurrences as impostures, or the offspring of a heated and undisciplined imagination. Now although this is generally the case, yet it is unquestionable that if a miracle was reported to us with a pre‐eminently strong attestation, no rational person would refuse to give a serious consideration to the evidence merely because the event was supernatural. A reported miracle would doubtless be attended with no inconsiderable degree of antecedent improbability; but if a man with whom we were intimately acquainted, of sound intellect, and high moral character were to allege that he had performed an act which, if real, must have been indisputably miraculous, it would be altogether irrational to reject his assertion summarily as unworthy of consideration merely because in all ages miraculous stories have been extensively believed. The application of such a principle would lead us into the grossest error.