Tliese passages show that healings, especially in nervous cases, continued in the 2nd cent, and later ; but there are indications that even they were not very frequent, and there is no good evi- <len(re of the other miraculous works of wliich we read in the NT being continued. In the Chtirch Orders we read of the benediction of oil for healing and for the exorcism of candidates for baptism, ami tliese features may probably be due to the lost original of several of the Orders, which may be dated about the beginning of the 3rd century. But here we have passed from tlie stage of miracle to that of ordinary liturgical usage. At tlie end of the 4th cent. Chrysostom Implies that miracles had ceased — and this in the face of the fact that that century saw the rise of miracle-loving hagiography. He says (de Sacerd. iv. 6 [416]) that his contemporaries, though tliey all came together with myriads of prayers and tears, could not do as much as the 'aprons' ((Ti.}j,i.Kivdia) of St. Paul once did (Ac 19'=).
The evidence, then, seems to show that miracles gradually died out, and that after the Apostolic Age they scarcely went beyond ' healing by sug- gestion.' The case is very ditt'erent after the 4th cent. , when lives of the saints and martyrs are full of miracle, and eventually the power of working miracles became a test of saintship, in direct con- trast with the restraint of Holy Scripture, in wliich it is said that ' John did no sign ' (Jn lO'"), and no miracle is ascribed to the great majority of the heroes of the OT. Moreover, most of the ' ecclesi- astical ' miracles are mere prodigies, and can in no sense be called 'signs.' In many cases they are demonstrably the invention of later biographers, and contemporary writers show no knowledge of them. But we cannot apriori deny the possibility of miracles happening in any age of the Christian Church, and it is quite probable that some mighty deeds of later times, notably healings, may have a modicum of truth in them, and may be such as would have been termed uT^ixtla in the NT. (For miracles in the Columban Church see J. Dowden, Celtic Church in Scotland, London, 1894, ch. viii.)
5. ETidential value of NT miracles. — The object of the miracles was to arrest attention (Jn 2^ 3-) ; they were not, however, faith-conipelliJig (Mt 11=", Jn 12"). Since the apostles believed (see above, 3) that even evil men and evil spirits could work miracles, they would not have said that a miracle- worker must be a true teacher. Now a miracle, because of its anomalousness, requires more proof than an ordinary event. The latter, if properly vouched, at once becomes probable ; not so the former, unless it has a certain degree of a priori likelihood. Such we find in the belief in the spiritual world. If we believe in a God who is not aloof from the world, but loves His creatures, it is not improbable that He should, for good cause, intervene. The method of intervention may be unusual, and not in accord with the ordinary course of nature as we know it (cf. Augustine, above, 3) ; but if an unusual event such as the Incarnation happens, it is not improbable that such interven- tions should accompany it. It fono\vs, however, that we cannot rest our argument for the existence of God, or for the truth of Christianity, merely on the fact that miracles happened, and it was a mis- take in the reasoning of the 18th cent, apologists that they to a large extent did so. If for other reasons we believe in the Godhead of our Lord, we can also believe that He worked miracles, and
empowered His disciples to do so — whether for one generation or for longer we need not stop to dis- cuss.
It was never professed that miracles were worked to make those who were without any faith believe. The Risen Christ appeared only to believers, though this does not me.an that the disciples be- lieved merely because they wished to believe ; here their ' hardness of heart ' is of great evidential value. And miracles were only worked when there was a certain amount of faith (Mk 6^ Mt 13^* ; cf. Lk 16^'). Indeed, it is seen that miracles did not make the great impression on the First Age that they would make now. Did they happen now, the impression would be so great that they would be almost faith-compelling, and this is a very good reason for their having ceased. Even the disciples were not so much impressed by the Resurrection that they believed it without any doubt. Some of those who had seen the Risen Lord at first be- lieved, then disbelieved (Mt 28" : ' some doubted '), and only after a time were fully confirmed in the faith. So, again, though the story of the raising of Lazarus made a stir at the time in Jerusalem, it is quite intelligible that the impression did not extend very far or last very long. To say, there- fore, that St. Mark could not have known of the raising of Lazarus because he does not mention it in the account of Jesus' ministry in anotlier part of the country is to import 20th cent, ideas into the narrative of the Apostolic Age.