cepted. The king himself (says the inspired historian) comes
down from the throne, to weep and humble himself. The children
are comprised in the law of fasting, enacted by the prince. Every
one girded with rough hair-cloth, and sprinkled with ashes, shows
signs of a speedy and efficacious sorrow. In fine, so complete is
the reformation of manners, that the prophecy is fulfilled to the
letter, "and Nineve is overturned," (as according to an apposite
thought of St. Chrysostom,) it is no longer that abandoned and
dissolute Nineve, which was held by God in so great abomination :
but a new and holy Nineve, raised by the ministry of a single man
on the ruins of the other, a man replenished with the Spirit of God,
who sanctified and rent the hearts of thousands. This (says our
Saviour to the incredulous Jews) is the miracle which will con-
demn and confound your impenitence. And I say to every Chris-
tian who is hardened in his libertine ways : this is the miracle
which the divine Spirit proposes as the figure of another more aston-
ishing, more beyond the power and reach of man, more capable to
work a conviction in our hearts, and lift them up to God. Give
ear attentively, and without prejudice, to what I shall advance,
and you will readily grant it.
The miracle performed by the preaching of Jonas, was a sign
for the Jews ; but here is for you another, which I look upon as
the miracle of Christianity. Happy should I be, should I be able
to engrave it deeply in your minds ! I mean the conversion, not
of one town or province, but of the whole world, by the preaching
of the gospel, and by the mission of a greater man than Jonas, a
God-man, Christ Jesus : " And behold a greater than Jonas here."
Matt. xii. Let us drop the consideration of his Godhead for a
moment. We examine not at present what he is, but what he
did. To be brief, Christians, he did what we never can sufficiently
comprehend, but what we for ever should seriously consider. Give
me grace, O Lord, to display this matter in the strongest light,
by a recital as affecting, as exact and faithful !
Jesus, the son of Mary, and the reputed son of Joseph, whom
the Jews regarded as the son of a mechanic, " Is not this the car-
penter's son?" (Matt. xiii. ;) undertakes to make a change through-
out the universe, and to substitute for idolatry, superstition and error,
the pure worship of the living God. A design worthy of him ; a vast
an immense design, the success of which I shall lay before you.
ON THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 141
For this end, of whom did he make choice ? Of twelve unpo-
lished, ignorant, weak, unaccomplished disciples, but so filled with
his Spirit, that in a day, in a moment, he endows them with all
the necessary qualifications for this great work. In fact, these
men, so unrefined, (or to use his own expression,) so slow of heart
to believe, by the virtue of the Spirit which he sends them from
heaven, are fired with zeal, and replenished with faith. These
fishermen, these weak men, who were looked upon (says St. Paul)
" as the refuse of the world, the off-scouring of all;" (1 Cor. iv. ;)
well stored with the grace peculiar to their apostleship, share
among them the conquest and reformation of the world. Their
only arms are patience, their only treasure poverty, their only coun-
sel simplicity ; and yet every tiling yields to them. They preach
mysteries incredible to the human understanding, and they are
believed. They declare a gospel diametrically opposite to man's
inclinations, and it is received. They declare it to the great, to
the learned, to the wise of this world, and submission is paid to it.
The great receive the law from the poor, the learned are convinced
by the ignorant, the voluptuous and the sensual are instructed by
these new preachers of the cross, and undergo the burden of mor-
tification and penance. Of all these, is formed a body of Chris-
tians, so holy, so pure, so distinguished for virtues of every kind,
that paganism itself is unable to refrain from paying them a tribute
of admiration.
This is not all : and what I have to add, methinlis, should
appear still more surprising. For, the Christian faith is scarcely
promulgated by the twelve apostles, and spreads its influence, but
it feels the iron rod of persecution from a thousand enemies. All
the powers of the earth rise up against it. Dioclesian, the mighty
master of the world, makes a politic point of reducing it to nothing.
But in spite of his efforts, and the violence of so many other per-
secutors of the Christian name, the faith is established, unshaken
and immoveable, on a solid basis. Thousands of martyrs stand
forth, and defend it by the effusion of their blood. People of all
ranks value themselves on becoming victims to it, and on immo-
lating themselves for it. Innumerable virgins bear to it the same
testimony, and suffer in their tender and delicate bodies, with joy,
the most cruel and excruciating torments. It spreads, it multiplies
not only in Judea, where it took its rise, but to the extremity of
the earth, where, in the days of St. Jerom, (it is he who remarks
142 ON THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION.
it as a kind of prodigy,) the name of Jesus Christ was revered and
adored, not only among barbarians, but civilized nations ; at Rome,
where the religion of a crucified God, in a short time, is the esta-
blished religion ; in the palaces of emperors, where God, with a
view to settle his church, raises fervent Christians in the midst of
iniquity ; in short, (and take special notice of this,) in the most
enlightened of all ages, in the age of Augustus, which the Lord
made choice of to display the more conspicuously the character of
his law, a law, 'which was destined to overthrow, alone, all the
wisdom of man, and all the pride of reason.
Let us own, (with St. Chrysostom,) beloved hearers, that though
the Christian religion had met with, in the world, all the necessary
favour and support from its infancy ; though it had commenced
without storm, persecution, or distress ; yet a thousand other indi-
cations and circumstances evidently demonstrate it to be the work
of God. But that it should be established in persecutions, or
rather by persecutions; that it should never have been more
flourishing, than when most violently attacked ; that the blood of
its propagators (as one of the fathers of the church expresses it)
should be the source of fruitfulness ; that the greater its losses were
by fire and faggot, the greater should be its acquisitions by the
gospel ministry ; that the cruelty exercised against some proselytes,
shoidd be a powerful attraction in the call of others ; that by the
sufferings, death, and resignation of its members, tliis body of
Christians should have so great, so speedy, so marvellous an increase,
is one of those prodigies, beloved brethren, at which human wisdom
must acknowledge the narrowness of its own limits, and pay lowly
homage to the power of the Deity. This is a wonderful, a sub-
sisting fact, a fact that displays itself before our eyes, and to which
we bear witness. For, in spite of hell, we see the world become
Christian, and submitted to the worship of the God-man, at whom
the Jews are scandalized, and the Gentiles scoff : " This is the
Lord's doing, and it is wonderful in our eyes." Ps. cxvii.
And to the intent that we may be impressed with a stronger
idea of this wonder, the same heavenly Lord hath renewed it in
these latter ages of the church. You know that full well. Francis
Xavier, alone, and unattended by ought but the word, and the
doctrine he preached, converted in the east an entire new world.
They were pagans and idolaters, and he formed them to the same
holiness of life and manners, inspired them with the same ardour
ON THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 143
for martyrdom, and made appear in them whatever appealed the
most heroical and most striking in ancient Christianism, so perfect
and so venerable. And how did he compass it ? By the same
means, (notwithstanding the same obstacles,) with the same success.
As if God had taken pleasure in exhibiting, once more, in this
renowned successor of the apostles, what his omnipotent hand had
operated by the ministry of the apostles themselves ; and had been
willing to give us, by these examples, fresh credentials for all that
we have heard of past ages.
Now, I hold, beloved hearers, that after this, we have no right
to ask miracles of God ; and that we outgo, in incredulity, the
Pharisees themselves, if we have, like them, the presumption to
say, " We would see a sign." The reason is, that the conversion
of the world, such as I have described it, however imperfectly, is,
beyond all doubt, a perpetual miracle. Whereupon there are
three reflections to be made, or three circumstances to be remarked.
A miracle, which surpasses all other miracles ; a miracle, which
presupposes all other miracles ; a miracle, which verifies, in the
order of Providence, all other miracles. And by a melancholy,
but yet inevitable consequence, a miracle, which, if it becomes not
a means of our instruction and conversion, must make us deserving
of God's chastisements. My God ! that I am not endowed with
one of those tongues of fire, which descended from heaven on the
twelve deputed to propagate your word, and that my breast is not
filled with the same spirit that actuated theirs, in order to impress
so sublime a truth on the hearts of all !
Yes, Christians, the conversion of the world is a perpetual
miracle, which infidelity will never be able to destroy. In this
light it was always considered by all the fathers of the church,
particularly St. Augustin, whose judgment, in this place, we may
make, without danger, the rule of our own. For that great man
shut the mouths of the pagans by this way of reasoning : " Since
you are so opinionated as to refuse credit upon any authority to
the other miracles, which for us are incontestable proofs of our
faith, grant at least, therefore, that in your own system, there is
one which you must admit, and that miracle is, the conversion of
the world to the religion of Jesus without any miracle. For,
things which are not, and which could never be, would be the
miracle of miracles. And to what, therefore, (continues St.
Augustin,) shall we attribute this work, the sanctification of the
144 ON THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION.
world, if we have not recourse to the infinite virtue and power of
God ? The honour of it cannot be justly ascribed either to the
strength and refinements of the human understanding, or to the
bland insinuations and charms of eloquence. For although the
apostles had been as renowned for eloquence and learning, as they
really were otherwise, it is well known what human eloquence and
learning are capable of; or, rather, it is but too well known how
ineffectual both the one and the other are, when reformation of
manners is the point in question. The example of Plato, who
with all the credit and esteem which his philosophy had procure
him in the world, could not prevail upon one town or village
live after his maxims, and be governed by his laws, demonstrativ
shows, that St. Peter proceeded upon principles infinitely more
exalted, when he brought kingdoms and provinces under the obe-
dience of the gospel.
The faith was not planted by force or violence ; for, the first
admonition which the disciples received from their Master, was,
that " he sent them forth as lambs among wolves ;" (Luke xix. ;)
and so well they understood it, that, without resistance, they let
themselves be slaughtered like innocent victims. Mahoinetanism
was established by conquests and arms; heresy, by rebellion
against lawful power ; the law alone of Jesus by patience and
humility. It was neither the mildness of this law, nor the relaxa-
tion of morals, that occasioned its progress; for in this law, how
reasonable soever, there is nothing but what is humiliating for the
mind, and mortifying for the body. It is easy to conceive how
paganism should spread in the wc rid without miracles, as it coun-
tenanced the indulgence of all the passions, and authorised vices
of every kind, and as nothing is more natural to the human heart
than to close with these ways. But how is it conceivable, that
a law winch commands us to love our enemies, and to hate our-
selves, should meet with so many, and such strenuous abettors ?
Caprice, in this, can have no share ; for caprice, how blind soever
it be, could never induce the heart of man to forego revenge, to
renounce pleasures, and to crucify the flesh. The conclusion is
evident : that a God only as powerful as ours, could so happily
conduct, and crown with success, so great an undertaking ; and
that, therefore, Christ Jesus, the oracle of truth, had reason to
infer, though he spake in its favour, that " it was the Lord's doing,
and was wonderful in our eyes."
ON THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 145
1st. I said that this miracle greatly surpassed all other miracles.
And can it be called in question ? If (according to the opinion
of St. Gregory pope,) the particular conversion of an inveterate
sinner is of greater estimation in the presence of God, and, in that
sense, is more miraculous than the resurrection of the dead, how
shall we estimate the conversion of so many avIio were educated,
and, as it were, engrafted in idolatry ? But to make this compa-
rison still more intelligible : there are in the world, nay, in the
Christian world, men, at this day, devoid of religion. You know
it well ; atheists in belief, and in manners too ; so confirmed in
perversity, that all the miracles which have ever been wrought,
would scarcely reclaim them. Perhaps your intercourse and con-
nexions with them are but too frequent. How great an effect,
therefore, of the Almighty's arm, and what a miracle was requisite
to gain over to Christ, a number almost infinite, I do not say of
such libertines, but of libertines more obstinate in a high degree,
and more determined to impugn the grounds of conversion, whose
change, nevertheless, hath been the glory and honour of the Chris-
tian religion ! What would you say — (this will put my meaning
in a clearer light, and will convince you of what I call a miracle
that exceeds the very notion of a miracle) — what would you say,
if, by virtue of the sacred word which I am preaching, some incre-
dulous person, of whose return to God you despair for evermore,
were converted in your presence ; so that, renouncing his liber-
tinism, he should declare himself openly, and all at once, and should
actually begin to live like a Christian ? What would you say, if,
constantly inflexible for many years together, he withdrew from
this audience, deeply penetrated with a holy compunction, and
resolved to repair, by a holy repentance, the scandal of his deism ?
Could any miracle affect you more ? Now I say that this miracle,
which, perhaps, might affect you, but would certainly surprise you,
is precisely that which hath a thousand and a thousand times been
seen in the Christian world ; and that one of the most ordinary
triumphs of our religion hath been to subdue these haughty, obdu-
rate, refractory spirits ; to compel them to return into the way of
the Lord, and to make them tractable, pliant, and submissive as
tender babes ; that it began by these means, and that, notwith-
standing the united powers of darkness, even in these our days, it
gives us illustrious examples, when it pleases the Lord, whose arm
is not shortened, to lay open the treasures of his holy grace, and
146 ON THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION.
therewith to replenish these vessels of mercy, whom he hath pre-
destinated to enjoy his glory. Recent examples there are of this
kind, which we have seen and admired. And oy this alone, do I
not adduce a more cogent argument, than if I had entered into a
long detail of so many miracles, which take up so much of our
sacred histories, and we find are authorized by constant tradition ?
2ndly. I added (and this appears still more convictive) that this
miracle necessarily presupposes all other miracles. For, in short,
(says St. Chrysostom, and after him St. Thomas, in his summa
against the Gentiles, what could have induced the primitive Chris-
tians to embrace a law, odious, according to all worldly maxims,
and repugnant to the dictates of flesh and blood ? The apostate
Julian reproached the apostles with levity and credulity, pretend-
ing that their attachment to the Son of God was not found in
reason. But to judge in that manner (replies St. Chrysostom)
must not one be equal in wickedness to Julian ? For was it levity
to follow, and adhere to a man, who, as a pledge of his promise,
gave sight before their eyes, to " the blind from their birth," and
restored to life " the dead of four days ?" Being so mistrustful
and selfish as they were, and as the gospel informs us, would they
have quitted all to follow Christ, if they could in the least have
supposed or suspected that his miracles were fictitious ? How
could they behold them, and not believe in him ? After so shame-
fully abandoning him in his passion, after being scandalized in him
so as to renounce him, would they have returned to the charge,
and declared in his favour more openly than ever, if the miracle of
his resurrection, so authentic and undeniable (as St. Jerom speaks,)
had not now revived their fallen faith ? Would they have gone
with pleasure to dungeons and torments ; have cheerfully under-
gone crucifixions and the lashes of scorpion whips, have been the
confessors and martyrs of this glorious resurrection, if the strongest
evidence of such a miracle had not dissipated all their doubts ?
How was St. Paul transformed, in a moment, from a persecutor
of the church to a preacher of the gospel ? Could this miracle
have been wrought without another ? Would this man, so zealous
a defender of the Jewish law, so passionately fond of the traditions
of his fathers, ever have deserted them, to be the disciple of a
sect, whose downfall and ruin he had undertaken, if God on a
sudden had not thrown him on the ground, in his way to Damas-
cus, filled him with dismay, and inspired his heart with new
ON THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 147
sentiments ? Did lie not acknowledge, himself, in the synagogue,
that he owed his conversion to the fear he was in of being rebel-
lions to the light which surrounded him on all sides, and to the
terrifying voice with which he was thunderstruck ? " Saul, Said,
why persecutest thou me ?" And did he not conceive from that
very moment, an ardent desire of laying down his life, and of
undergoing hardships of every kind for the glory of that Jesus
whose enemy he had been ? Was it simplicity ? Was it preju-
dice ? Was it worldly interest ? But is it not certain, that St.
Paul's disposition was entirely otherwise, and that breathing,
nothing at that very time but blood and carnage, he could not be
withdrawn from the ancient law, of which he was one of the prin-
cipal pillars, nor brought over to the new, winch he meant to
destroy, by any other means, than the miraculous impulse, and
divine effort, which struck him to the ground, and bore him away ?
We read of St. Peter, not without astonishment, that the very
first time he preached to the Jews, he converted to the faith, three
thousand men. But what should surprise us ? cries St. Augustin.
They saw a poor fisherman, void till that time of every kind of
knowledge, save that of liis business, in a masterly manner explain
the most sublime and abstruse mysteries of the kingdom of God,
speak all sorts of languages, and make himself understood, at the
same instant, to as many nations as a great ceremony had assembled
from every corner of the world. This great miracle St. Luke
hath related, and at a time, too, when he could not have had the
effrontery to publish it, if it had not been true beyond all dispute,
as he would have had against him, not one or two witnesses, but
the whole earth ; for, such an imposture w^ould have lost him all
credit, and would only have served to put down the religion of
which he thereby designed to make known the excellence and
holiness. Admitting, I say, the authenticity of this miracle, is it
strange that so many Jews were converted ? And it is not more
surprising, that any there should be among them so blind, so per-
verse and headstrong, as to remain hardened in their incredulity ?
It is with some difficulty we comprehend the extraordinary and
almost innumerable miracles which St. Paid wrought among the
Gentiles ; but in preaching to the Gentiles, did he not, as the
mark and seal of Iris apostleship, add illustrious miracles ? Was
not tins the testimony he bore to them, himself, writing to the
Corinthians, and beseeching them to call to mind the wonderful
148 ON THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION.
works he had performed among them ? If all these had been
counterfeit miracles, would he have had the assurance to speak in
this strain ? Would he have appealed to themselves, and have
called them to witness ? Would he not have exposed, by such
manifest forgery, his ministry to discredit, and have frustrated the
plan which he meant to pursue ?
What induced St. Augustin to adhere so closely to the Catholic
church ? Did he not confess that it was, in great part, the power
of miracles ? What needed he more than those which he had
seen with his own eyes ? Than the famous miracle which was
wrought at Carthage in his own time, in the person of a Christian,
suddenly and supernaturally restored to health, by the intercession
of St. Stephen, at which this great saint protests he was present,
and of which he hath left us, in his excellent book of the " City of
God," an account ? What though his faith had till then been
wavering, would not this alone have been sufficient to corroborate
and settle it for ever ? Shall we say that St. Augustin was a
weak man, and that he fancied he saw what he did not see ? Shall
Ave call him a cheat, who imposed upon the world b}^ a fabulous
narrative ? But as neither supposition can be reasonably adopted,
must we not conclude with Vicentius Liriensis, that as the mira-
cle oi our religion helped to convert the world, so the conversion
. cue world is one of the most infallible and strongest proofs of
the miracles of our religion.
ordly. And here, Christians, we cannot too much admire the
wisdom of the great Creator, who doth not oblige us to believe in
miracles which are above reason. For, in our regard, the conver-
sion of the world, founded in so many other miracles, is an eternal
miracle, a miracle which justifies all other miracles, of which it is
only the consequence and effect. And for this reason, we may say
to the Almighty, with Richard of St. Victor, "Lord, if Ave
believe erroneously, we are deceived by you." Yes, my God, if
we were in error, we should have a right to impute it to you ;
and howeA^er you be God, Ave might make you responsible for all
our aberrations, because religion is raised on a foundation that
could only have been laid by you ; because this religion in Avhich
Ave liA T e, to say nothing of its holiness and irreprehensible purity,
is confirmed by miracle:, Avhich can be attributed to you, and to
no other cause.
True, my brethren : but likeAvise these miracles will put us to
ON THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION 149
confusion at the judgment of God ; and in a particular manner the
mighty miracle of the conversion of the world to the faith of Christ
Jesus. These pagans, these idolaters, enrolled among the faithful,
will rise up against us, and will become our accusers : " The men
of Nineve shall rise up in judgment." And what will they allege
to our condemnation ? Ah ! Christians, what will they not allege ?
And what ought we not ourselves to allege against ourselves ?
Indeed, if we bring ourselves, in any degree, to a reasonable
account, it must needs be, I do not say shameful, but terrible for
us, in the presence of God, that this faith should have given rise,
throughout the world, to such admirable virt 1 ie 3 and should now
be among us so feeble and drowsy ; that it should have produced,
in corrupt paganism, so much godliness, and perhaps have as yet
caused in us no change, no return to God, no renunciation of sinful
practices. If our minds be illumined with the least ray of light,
ought we not to tremble, to shudder at the thought, that this same
faith hath been settled so successfully all over the earth, and is not
as yet thoroughly settled in our hearts ? We profess it in words,
we give outward signs of it, we are Christians in all that concerns
ceremony and external worship, but are we so in heart ? And yet
it is particularly in the heart that faith must fix her abode, in order