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28 only original life of Columba is the "Vita" of Abbot Adamnan, written about one hundred years after the saint's death. All that it proves is, that at the time the life was written Columba was believed to have wrought miracles. But there is satisfactory proof that the first gospels were written while many who had seen the events were still alive. The account given by the abbot was all in accordance with the popular belief, and had not, like the earlier Christian records, to encounter the hostile criticism of keen and able opponents. The voice of the Irish dove was a very pleasant one, but all the good words uttered were got from him on whom the spirit alighted as a dove. We have no utterances of his to be compared with the teachings of our Lord and his disciples. Then we have no record of such lives and sacrifices as are described in the letter of Pliny the Younger in 112. Nor have we such corroborations as the Book of Acts, such original productions as the Epistles of Paul, such a mighty result as Christianity with its influence over the world, over its education and its civilization, for the last eighteen hundred years.

Dr. Carpenter quotes Locke as saying that we are to regard the doctrine as proving the miracle rather than the miracle proving the doctrine. Locke believed both the doctrine and the miracle. Dr. Carpenter does not tell us whether he believes either. He does not say whether he looks on the doctrine as proving the miracle. The wisest defenders of Christianity have always combined the two, the lofty teaching and the high morality, with the attested supernatural action. In estimating the validity of even common testimony we combine the character of the witness with the facts to which he deponesdeposes [sic]. We look to his manner of testifying, to the consistency and transparency of his statements, even to the name he has borne among his associates and the motives by which he may have been swayed. So in weighing the evidence we have for Christianity we are entitled to combine the truth testified to with the testimony. We do not choose to separate the record of miracles in Matthew from the Sermon on the Mount. We are prepared to believe that he who uttered those bold and transparently sincere and pure precepts could not have been guilty of deceit. It is clear that Jesus claimed supernatural power. If there be any truth at all in the accounts of him, in fact, if there ever was such a person as Jesus, it is clear that he claimed to work miracles. His claims are found imbedded in the heart of discourses which contain his loftiest ideas, moral and spiritual, far beyond the conception of the evangelists or the early Christian writers. His discourses are, in fact, his greatest miracle. His acts and words are like the warp and woof of his garment, which is woven throughout and cannot be divided.

The doctrines, the precepts, the providential occurrences, the miracles, constitute a system quite as much as the Cosmos does. In this system one part supports another, each helps to bear up the whole, and