A Philosophical Dictionary, Volume 07

by Voltaire

Those who strengthen their reasonings by learning will tell you that the fathers of the Church have frequently declared that miracles were in their days performed no longer. St. Chrysostom says expressly: "The extraordinary gifts of the spirit were bestowed even on the unworthy, because the Church at that time had need of miracles; but now, they are not bestowed even on the worthy, because the Church has need of them no longer." He afterwards declares, that there is no one now who raises the dead, or even who heals the sick.

St. Augustine himself, notwithstanding the miracles of Gervais and Protais, says, in his "City of God": "Why are not such miracles as were wrought formerly wrought now?" and he assigns the same reason as St. Chrysostom for it.

"Cur inquiunt, nunc illa miracula quæ prædicatis facta esse non fiunt? Possem quidem dicere necessaria prius fuisse, quam crederet mundus, ad hoc ut crederet mundus."

It is objected to the philosophers, that St. Augustine, notwithstanding this avowal, mentions nevertheless an old cobbler of Hippo, who, having lost his garment, went to pray in the chapel of the twenty martyrs, and on his return found a fish, in the body of which was a gold ring; and that the cook who dressed the fish said to the cobbler: "See what a present the twenty martyrs have made you!"

To this the philosophers reply, that there is nothing in the event here related in opposition to the laws of nature; that natural philosophy is not contradicted or shocked by a fish's swallowing a gold ring, or a cook's delivering such ring to a cobbler; that, in short, there is no miracle at all in the case.

If these philosophers are reminded that, according to St. Jerome, in his "Life of Paul the Hermit," that hermit had many conversations with satyrs and fauns; that a raven carried to him every day, for thirty years together, half of a loaf for his dinner, and a whole one on the day that St. Anthony went to visit him, they might reply again, that all this is not absolutely inconsistent with natural philosophy; that satyrs and fauns may have existed; and that, at all events, whether the narrative be a recital of facts, or only a story fit for children, it has nothing at all to do with the miracles of our Lord and His apostles. Many good Christians have contested the "History of St. Simeon Stylites," written by Theodoret; many miracles considered authentic by the Greek Church have been called in question by many Latins, just as the Latin miracles have been suspected by the Greek Church. Afterwards, the Protestants appeared on the stage, and treated the miracles of both churches certainly with very little respect or ceremony.

A learned Jesuit, who was long a preacher in the Indies, deplores that neither his colleagues nor himself could ever perform a miracle. Xavier laments, in many of his letters, that he has not the gift of languages. He says, that among the Japanese he is merely like a dumb statue: yet the Jesuits have written that he resuscitated eight persons. That was certainly no trifling matter; but it must be recollected that he resuscitated them six thousand leagues distant. Persons have since been found, who have pretended that the abolition of the Jesuits in France is a much greater miracle than any performed by Xavier and Ignatius.

However that may be, all Christians agree that the miracles of Jesus Christ and the apostles are incontestably true; but that we may certainly be permitted to doubt some stated to have been performed in our own times, and which have not been completely authenticated.

It would certainly, for example, be very desirable, in order to the firm and clear establishment of a miracle, that it should be performed in the presence of the Academy of Sciences of Paris, or the Royal Society of London, and the Faculty of Medicine, assisted by a detachment of guards to keep in due order and distance the populace, who might by their rudeness or indiscretion prevent the operation of the miracle.

A philosopher was once asked what he should say if he saw the sun stand still, that is, if the motion of the earth around that star were to cease; if all the dead were to rise again; and if the mountains were to go and throw themselves together into the sea, all in order to prove some important truth, like that, for instance, of versatile grace? "What should I say?" answered the philosopher; "I should become a Manichæan; I should say that one principle counteracted the performance of another."