Tillotson, Marshal, Dodwell, &c. is, that miracles continued during the three first centuries. Dr. Waterland brings them down to the fourth, Dr. Beriman to the fifth. These unwarily betrayed the Protestant cause into the hands of its enemies: for it was in those primitive ages, particularly in the third, fourth and fifth, those flourishing times of miracles, in which the chief corruptions of Popery, monkery, the worship of relics, invocation of saints, prayers for the dead, superstitious use of images an1 of sacraments were introduced."* "We shall find, after the conversion of the Roman empire, the greater part of their boasted miracles were wrought either by monks, or relics, or the sign of the cross. &c. wherefore, if we admit the miracles, we must admit the rites for the sake of which they were wrought they both rest on the same bottom."+ Every one may see what a resemblance the principles and practice of the fourth century, as they are described by the most eminent fathers of that age, bear to the present rites of the Popish church."‡ "When we reflect

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on the surprising confidence with which the fathers of the fourth age affirmed, as true, what they themselves had forged, or knew to be forged, it is natural to suspect that so bold a defiance of truth could not be acquired or become general at once, but must have been gradually carried to that height by the example of former ages." Such are the grounds on which this shameless declaimer accuses all the most holy and learned men, whom the world has produced during 1800 years, of forgery and a combination to cheat mankind. He does not say a word to show that the combination itself is either probable or possible; all he advances is, that this libel on human nature, is necessary for the support of Protestantism; for he says, and this with evident truth: " By granting the Romanists but a single age of miracles, after the time of the apostles, we shall be entangled in a series of difficulties, whence we can never fairly extricate ourselves, till we allow the same powers also to the present age."|| Methinks I hear some of your society thus asking me, Do you then pretend that church your the miraculous powers at possesses the present day? I answer, that the church never possessed miraculous powers in the sense of most Protestant writers, so as to be able to effect cures or other supernatural events at her mere pleasure for even the apostles could not do this, as we learn from the history of the lunatic child, Mat. xvii. 16: but this I say, that the Catholic church, being always the beloved spouse of Christ, Rev. xxi. 9, and continuing at all times to bring forth + Ibid lxv

* Introd. p. li.

Ibid. p. lxxxİV

+ Introd. p. lxvi.

Ibid. p. xcvi

The

children of heroical sanctity, God fails not in this, any more than in past ages to illustrate ler and them by unquestionable miracles: accordingly in those processes which are constantly going on, at the apostolical See, for the canonization of new saints,* fresh miracles of a recent date continue to be proved with the highest degree of evidence, as I can testify from having perused, on the spot, the official printed account of some of them.† For the further satisfaction of your friends, I will inform them that I have had satisfactory proof that the astonishing catastrophe of Louis XVI. and his queen, in being beheaded on a scaffold, was foretold by a nun of Fougeres, Sœur Nativite, twenty years before it happened, and that the banishment of the French clergy from their country, long before it happened, was predicted by the holy French pilgrim, Benedict Labre, whose miracles caused the conversion of the late Rev. Mr. Thayer, an American clergyman, who being at Rome, witnessed several of them. With respect to miraculous cures of a late date, I have the most respectable attestation of several of them, and I am well acquainted with four or five persons who have experienced them. following facts are respectfully attested, but at much greater length, by the Rev. Thomas Sadler, of Trafford, near Manchester, and the Rev. J. Crathorne, of Gars wood, near Wigan :Joseph Lamb, of Eccles, near Manchester, now twenty-eight years old, on the 12th of August, 1814, fell from a hay-rick, four yards and a half high, by which accident it was conceived the spine of his back was broken. Certain it is, that he could neither walk nor stand without crutches, down to the second of October, and that he described himself as feeling the most exquisite pain in his back. On that day, having prevailed with much difficulty upon his father, who was then a Protestant, to take him in a cart with his wife and two friends, Thos. Cutler and Eliz. Dooley, to Garswood, near Wigan, where the hand of F. Arrowsmith, one of the Catholic priests who suffered death at Lancaster, for the exercise of his religion, in the reign of Charles I. is preserved, and has often caused wonderful cures, he got himself conveyed to the altar rails of the chapel, and there to be signed, on his back, with the sign of the cross, by that hand; when, feeling a

Among the late canonizations are those, in 1807 and 1808, of S. F. CarAcciolo, founder of the Regular Clerks; of St. Angela de Mercis, founless of the Ursuline Nuns, of St. Mary of the Incarnation, Mlle. Acarie, &c. One of the latest beatifications is that of B. Alfonso Liguori, bishop f St. Agata de Goti.

+ One of these, proved in the process of the last mentioned saint, conisted in the cure and restoration of an amputated breast of a woman, whe We at the point of death. from a cancer.

particular sensation and total change in himself, as he expressed it, he exclaimed to his wife, Mary, I can walk; this he did with out any help whatever, walking first into an adjoining room and thence to the cart which conveyed him home. With his debility, his pains also left him, and his back has continued well ever since.* These particulars, as they were respectively witnesses of them, the above named persons, all now living, are ready to declare upon oath. I have attestations of incurable cancers and other disorders being suddenly remedied by the same instrument of God's bounty; but it would be a tedious work to transcribe them, or the other attestations in my possession of a similar nature.

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Among those of my personal acquaintance who have experienced supernatural cures, I will mention Mary Wood, now liv ing at Taunton Lodge, where several other witnesses of the facts I am going to state live with her. On March 15, 1809, Mary Wood, in attempting to open a sash window, pushed her left hand through a pane of glass, which caused a very large and deep transverse wound in the inside of the left arm, and divided the muscles and nearly the whole of the tendons that lead to the hand; from which accident, she not only suffered, at times, the most acute pain, but was from the period I first saw her (March 15) till some time in July, totally deprived of the use of her hand and arm."t What passed between the latter end of July, when, as the surgeon elsewhere says, "he left his patient," having no hopes of restoring her, till the 6th of August, on the night of which she was perfectly and miraculously cured, I shall copy from a letter to me, dated Nov. 19, 1809, by her amanuensis, Miss Maria Hornyold. "The surgeon gave little or no hopes of her ever again having the use of her hand, which, together with the arm, seemed withered and somewhat contracted; only saying, in some years, nature might give her some little use of it, which was considered by he. uperiors as a mere delusive comfort. Despairing of further human. assistance towards her cure, she determined, with the approbation of her said superiors, to have recourse to God, through the intercession of St. Winefrid, by a Novena. Accordingly on the 6th of August she put a piece of moss, from the saint's well, on her arm, continuing recollected and praying, &c.; when, to her great surprise, the next morning she found she could dress hereif, put her arm behind her and to her head, having regained

The Rev. Mr. Sadler's letter to me is dated Aug. 6, 1817.

This account is copied from a letter to Miss F. T. Bird, dated Sept 30, 1809, by Mr. Woodford, an eminent surgeon of Taunton, who attended Mary Wood.

Certain prayers continued during nine days.

the free use and full strength of it. In short, she was perfectly cured!" In this state I myself saw her and examined her hand, a few years afterwards, and in the same state she still continues, it the above named place, with many other highly credible vouchers who are ready respectively to attest these particulars 'On the 16th of the month, the surgeon was sent for; and, being asked his opinion concerning Mary Wood's arm, he gave no hope of a perfect cure, and very little of her ever having even the least use of it; when she being introduced to him and showing him the arm, which he thoroughly examined and tried, he was so affected at the sight and the recital of the manner of the cure, as to shed tears, and exclaim, it was a special interposition of Divine Providence."

I shall say little of the miraculous cure of Winefrid White, a young woman of Wolverhampton, on the 28th of June, 1805 at Holywell, having published a detailed account of it, soon after it happened, which work has been republished in England and in Ireland.* Let it suffice to say; 1st, that the disease was one of the most alarming topical ones which are known, namely, a curvature of the spine, as her physician and surgeon ascertained, who treated it accordingly, by making two great issues, one on each side of the spine, of which the patient's back still bears the marks; 2dly, that, besides the most acute pains, throughout the whole nervous system, and particularly in the brain, this disease of the spine produced a hemiplegia or palsy on one side of the patient, so that when she could feebly crawl with the help of a crutch under her right arm, she was forced to drag her left leg and arm after her, just as if they made no part of her; 3dly, that her disorder was of long continuance, namely, of three years standing; though not in the same degree, till the latter part of that time, and that it was publicly known to all her neighbours and a great many others; 4thly, that having performed the acts of devotion which she felt herself called to undertake, and having bathed in the fountain, she, in one instant of time, on the 28th of June, 1805, found herself freed from all her pains and disabilities, so as to be able to walk, run and jump, like any other young person, and to carry a greater weight with the le.t arm than she could with the right; 5thly, that she has continued in this state these twelve years down to the present time; lastly, that all the above-mentioned circumstances have been ascertained by me in the regular examination of the several witnesses of them; being persons o

By Ceating and Brown, Duke-street, Grosvenor-square, London Coyne, Dublin.

different religions, situations in life and countries, in the places of their respective residence, namely, in Staffordshire, Lancashire, and Wales, the authentic documents of which are contain ed in the work referred to above. Several of the witnesses are still living, as is Winefrid White herself.

I am, &c.

J. M.

DEAR SIR,

LETTER XXIV.

To JAMES BROWN, Esq. &c.

OBJECTIONS ANSWERED.

1 SUBSCRIBE to the objection, which you say has been suggested to you by your learned friend, on the subject of miracles. Namely, I admit that a vast number of incredible and false miracles, as well as other fables, have been forged by some, and believed by other Catholics in every age of the church, including that of the apostles.* I agree with him and you in rejecting the Legenda Aurea of Jacobus de Voragine, the Specu lum of Vincentius Belluacensis, the Saints' Lives of the Patri cian, Metaphrastes, and scores of similar legends, stuffed as they are, with relations of miracles of every description. But, sir, are we to deny the truth of all history, because there are numberless false histories? Are we to question the four evangelists, because there have been several fabricated Gospels? Most certainly not but we must make the best use we can of the discernment and judgment which God has given us, to distinguish false accounts of every kind from those which are true; and we ought, I allow, to make use of double diligence and caution, in examining alleged revelations and events contrary to the general laws of nature.

Your friend's second objection, which impeaches the diligence, integrity and discernment of the cardinals, prelates, and other ecclesiastics at Rome, appointed to examine into the proofs of the miracles there published, shows that he is little acquainted with the subject he talks of. In the first place, then, a juridical examination of each reported miracle must be made in the place where it is said to have happened, and the depositions of the several witnesses must be given upon oath; this ex

* St. Jerom, in rejecting certain current fables concerning St. Paul and St. Thecla, mentions a priest who was deposed by St. John the Evangelist, for inventing similar stories. De Script. Apost.-Pope Gelasius, in the 5th century, condemned several Apochryphal Gospels and Epistles, and legenda of saints, and among the latter the common ones of St. George.