ing to the principles of the human mind, we may, perhaps, be inclined to think, that this universal sense of our weakness, together with our natural trust on the power and goodness of God, is no slight intimation in favour of a Divine Revelation; at least that it adds something to the previous conception of its possibility.

[See Notes and Illustrations, No. 2.]

SECTION III.

Is not the teachable Nature of Man a presumptive Evidence of a Divine Revelation? *.

IF it could be shown that the human mind was furnished with a great variety of innate ideas, and that every individual came into the world with a stock of readyfurnished materials for thinking, then there would exist a considerable presumption against the notion of a Divine Revelation, from the make and constitution of our minds. It might then be argued, that God had made ample provision for each of us, in the suggestions of our own faculties; that as we learnt nothing from each other, but depended exclusively on our own resources, so it was not probable that we should derive our religious information from any other medium than that of our own breasts. Upon such an hypothesis, an external Revelation would not correspond with the fa

* See Part II. Sect. 3.

culties of man, or with the general appearances of nature.

But, upon the contrary, if it be a plain and acknowledged fact, that we derive nearly all our information from others, and that the greatest talents and capacities would lie dormant and inactive, unless called into exercise by communicated knowledge, then it should not be accounted as improbable, that our knowledge of things divine may originally have arisen from external instruction. There would be a foundation for such an opinion in the frame and constitution of our minds, and the entire system of human knowledge would form an illustration of the style and manner in which such a Revelation might possibly have been given. But since a Revelation, unless it were repeated to each individual, (which would destroy and annihilate the course of nature,) must be afterwards supported by the evidence of testimony, it is a still further confirmation of the foregoing argument, to find we are so constituted, that we are naturally disposed to rely on evidence of this description. There is a principle of belief inherent in our nature, inde

pendent and prior to all experience, by which children are disposed to pay an unlimited assent to what is told them by others. And though we learn in after-life to limit our belief, and to proportion our assent to evidence, yet the principle itself remains still inherent in our breasts; and if any man were entirely devoid of it, he could not continue to live and act in the world. His scepticism would first exile him from society, and would afterwards starve him out of nature.

Now, it is on the same principle of belief in testimony, that a written Revelation must depend; and if we had not been furnished originally with this disposition of mind, we should have been incapable of estimating its claims to our regard. But since we have been furnished with this principle, it betokens our fitness and ability to enquire into a Revelation of this description; and when it is connected with our instinctive confidence in the Divine veracity, it ought, perhaps, to be viewed as a still further presumption in favour of its probability.

[See Notes and Illustrations, No. 3.]

SECTION IV.

Upon what kind of Evidence must a Divine Revelation depend? *

THERE seem but two methods by which any revelation could be accomplished. The one is by a change in our internal faculties, the other by a change in the laws of external nature. Had the first been adopted, a miracle would have been worked, though we might not have been conscious of it. It would indeed have been a miracle of a far more violent kind, than any with which we are now acquainted; being a direct interference with the state of our moral and intellectual powers. Whether such a miracle might not have been performed, if it had pleased God, it does not become us positively to determine. But we may be allowed to say, that it appears to be hardly consistent with moral wisdom, and would be at utter variance with all our experience of God's providential dealings with his

creatures.

See Part II. Sect. 4.