Page:Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire vol 3 (1897).djvu/232

 212 THE DECLINE AND FALL bishop of Hippo designed as a solid and immortal proof of the truth of Christianity. Augustin solemnly declares that he has selected those miracles only which were publicly certified by the persons who were either the objects, or the spectators, of the power of the martyr. Many prodigies were omitted or forgotten ; and Hippo had been less favourably treated than the other cities of the province. And yet the bishop enumerates above seventy miracles, of which three were resurrections from the dead, in the space of two years and within the limits of his own diocese.®^ If we enlarge our view to all the dioceses and all the saints of the Christian world, it will not be easy to calculate the fables and the errors which issued from this inexhaustible source. But we may surely be allowed to observe that a miracle, in that age of superstition and credulity, lost its name and its merit, since it could scarcely be considered as a deviation from the ordinary and established laws of nature. HI. Kevivai III. The innumerable miracles of which the tombs of the martyrs were the perpetual theatre revealed to the pious believer the actual state and constitution of the invisible world ; and his religious speculations appeared to be founded on the firm basis of fact and experience. Whatever might be the condition of vulgar souls, in the long interval between the dissolution and the resurrection of their bodies, it was evident that the superior spirits of the saints and martjTS did not consume that portion of their existence in silent and inglorious sleep. ^^ It was evident (without presuming to determine the place of their habitation or the nature of their felicity) that they enjoyed the lively and active consciousness of their happiness, their virtue, and their powers ; and that they had already secured the possession of their eternal reward. The enlargement of their intellectual faculties surpassed the measure of the human imagination ; since it was proved by experience that they were capable of hearing and understanding the various petitions of their numerous votaries ; who, in the same moment of time, but in the most distant parts of the Avorld, invoked the name and assistance of 87 See Augustin, de Civitat. Dei, 1. xxii. c. 22, and the Appendix, which contains two books of St. Stephen's miracles, by Evodius, bishop of Uzalis. Freculphus (apud Basnage, Hist, des Juifs, torn. viii. p. 249) has preserved a Gallic or Spanish proverb, "Whoever pretends to have read all the miracles of St. Stephen, he lies ". ^ Burnet (de Statu Mortuorum, p. 56-84) collects the opinions of the fathers, as far as they assert the sleep, or repose, of human souls till the day of judgment. He aftervvards exposes (p. 91, &c.) the inconveniencies which must arise, if they possessed a more active and sensible existence.