cause they are designed rather to inform the understanding than to touch the heart, and are rather addressed to reason than to the feelings; let it be considered that they cannot fail to produce the best spiritual effect, if they tend to remove confused notions on the most important of all subjects, and to set in a clear light that on which our eternal hopes dependthe incarnation of God the Son.

When the wonders which the sacred writings affirm to have been performed by the power of God, are viewed in reference to the great truth that He was manifest in the flesh, we shall cease to be astonished at their supernatural character, and shall regard them as nothing more than the appropriate harbingers of "the mystery which hath been hid from ages and generations, but was in the fulness of time made manifest, viz. Christ Jesus, and the hope of everlasting glory through him." (Coloss. i. 26.) The working of miracles alone cannot be regarded as the test of a divine commission. For there

are instances of wonders performed in opposition to the truth of God, which are so extraordinary in their nature as scarcely to be distinguished from those by which the Almighty commissioned his servants to manifest his power. Of this we have a remarkable instance in the imitations with which the magicians of Egypt mocked many of the Mosaic wonders. If the subversion of the laws of nature were alone to be regarded as a sufficient indication by the Lord's hand of those who were his, and who acted by his appointment, there might be some difficulty in deciding between the source of the miraculous powers of Moses and that of the wonders of Jannes and Jambres who withstood him, or between St. Paul and Elymas the sorcerer, until the blindness of the latter attested the authority of the apostle of the living God. To Him, who is the Lord of nature, all its hidden things are manifest, and its powers are submissive; and an entire change in its order, or a partial subversion of its ordi

nary laws, though, at first sight, they seem to us most wonderful, almost cease to appear so, when they are regarded as acts of the Great Being who spanned the heavens, who divided the light from the darkness, and who set bounds to the floods of ocean. The daily rising and setting of the sun, and the ebb and flow of the sea, are no less indications of the Almighty's power and presence, than was the standing still of the sun upon Gibeon, and of the moon in the valley of Ajalon, or the Red Sea becoming a wall on either side, so as to permit the children of Israel to pass through it in safety. We are accustomed to view the former class of events without wonder, as belonging to the ordinary course of nature, while we regard the latter as strikingly indicative of Almighty interposition. But to God they are equal. He who formed the sun at first, impels our earth round it, that we may enjoy its heat and light; and there was really no greater exercise of his might when he stopped the earth for a 6

few hours in its course, or made the sun appear to stand still in order to give a sign to his people. He who first collected the floods of the deep, continues to supply them, and to direct their tides; and the exercise of his power was not in reality greater, when He caused those floods to stand up in a heap, and the depths to be congealed in the heart of the

sea.

But the absolute control over nature, which, when viewed in relation to the Godhead, cannot justly excite our wonder, affords ground for speculation when we see it exerted by the enemies of the Deity, and in opposition to what we believe to be his will. The miracles of Moses were

in

consequence of power delegated to him by his Divine Master in vindication of his glory. But what shall we say when we perceive a portion of the same power to have been possessed by the opposers of God's truth? How came Jannes and Jambres, or the witch of Endor, or Elymas the sorcerer, to be able to exert an authority over

nature, which we justly regard as subject to God's supreme rule? There is reason to believe that Satan, as prince of the power of the air, possesses a great subordinate authority over the world. This he appears to have enjoyed, with fewer restrictions on its exercise, before the advent of Christ; but it has continued, and will continue, in a measure, until the Spirit of Evil be finally bound with everlasting chains in the blackness of darkness. The supernatural powers which have been exerted by wicked persons in the furtherance of bad designs may be supposed to have immediately sprung from Satan, the father of lies and delusion; and this idea is confirmed by the remarkable decrease of such appearances, since life and immortality were brought to light by Christ our Lord. The oracles of the demon gods of ancient mythology are silent; devils no longer possess and torment the bodies of men; the wonders of sorcerers and soothsayers are fallen into discredit, and any remaining pretensions to such