Take for instance the feeding of the five thousand, near the Lake of Galilee. This is recorded in the earliest Gospel, St. Mark's, and must therefore have been written down very soon after the event, when a large number of the five thousand were still alive. Now is it conceivable that anyone would have ventured to make up such an account, even twenty years afterwards, if nothing of the kind had occurred? And if he had done so, would not his story have been instantly refuted? Or take the case of healing the centurion's servant at Capernaum. This, as before said, belongs to Q, the supposed source common to Matthew and Luke, and admitted by most critics to date from before A.D. 50. And how could such a story have been current within twenty years of the event, if nothing of the kind had occurred? It is also declared that the miracles were much talked about at the time, and caused widespread astonishment. The people _marvelled_ at them, they _wondered_, they were _amazed_, they were _beyond measure astonished_, there had been nothing like them _since the world began_.[348] The miracles were in fact the talk of the whole neighbourhood. And we are told that in consequence several of those which occurred at Jerusalem were at once officially investigated by the Jewish rulers, who made the most searching inquiries about them;[349] and in two instances, at least, publicly admitted them to be true.[350] And this also is not likely to have been asserted, unless it was the case; and not likely to have been the case, if there had been no miracles. [Footnote 348: Matt. 9. 33; 15. 31; Mark 5. 42; 7. 37; John 9. 32.] [Footnote 349: _E.g._, John 9. 13-34; Acts 4. 5-22.] [Footnote 350: John 11. 47; Acts 4. 16.] (2.) _They were publicly appealed to._ Moreover, these public miracles were _publicly appealed to_ by the early Christians. According to the _Acts_, this was done in the very first public address, that at Pentecost, by St. Peter, who reminds his hearers that they had themselves seen the miracles (_even as ye yourselves know_), as well as in one other speech at least.[351] And this is important, because even those critics, who deny the genuineness of the Acts, yet admit that these speeches date from a very early time. And if so, it shows conclusively that some of Christ's immediate followers not only believed themselves that He had worked miracles, but spoke as if their opponents believed it too. [Footnote 351: Acts 2. 22; 10. 38.]