"The surgeons of St. George's make the boy walk who has been lame from his
mother's womb. But have they given life to a single bone or muscle of his
limbs? They have only put them into that position--those circumstances in
which the God-given life in them can have its free and normal play, and
produce the cure which they only assist. I claim that miracle of science,
as I do all future ones, as the inspiration of Him who made the lame
to walk in Judea, not by producing new organs, but by His creative
will--quickening and liberating those which already existed.
"The mesmerist, again, says that he can cure a spirit of infirmity, an
hysteric or paralytic patient, by shedding forth on them his own vital
energy; and, therefore he will have it, that Christ's miracles were but
mesmeric feats. I grant, for the sake of argument, that he possesses
the power which he claims; though I may think his facts too new, too
undigested, often too exaggerated, to claim my certain assent. But, I say,
I take you on your own ground; and, indeed, if man be the image of God, his
vital energy may, for aught I know, be able, like God's, to communicate
some spark of life--But then, what must have been the vital energy of Him
who was the life itself; who was filled without measure with the spirit,
not only of humanity, but with that of God the Lord and Giver of life? Do
but let the Bible tell its own story; grant, for the sake of argument,
the truth of the dogmas which it asserts throughout, and it becomes
a consistent whole.
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