ic
Covenant--whether such reasoners are not siding with the sceptic,

and

whether it is not a happy inconsistency by which they continue to
believe the Scriptures while they reject the Church[62] (p. liii).

Again, I invite Anglican orthodoxy to consider this passage:--

the narrative of the combats of St. Antony with evil spirits, is a
development rather than a contradiction of revelation, viz. of such
texts as speak of Satan being cast out by prayer and fasting. To be
shocked, then, at the miracles of Ecclesiastical history, or to
ridicule them for their strangeness, is no part of a scriptural
philosophy (pp. liii-liv).

Further on, Dr. Newman declares that it has been admitted

that a distinct line can lie drawn in point of character and
circumstance between the miracles of Scripture and of Church
history; but this is by no means the case (p. lv) ... specimens are
not wanting in the history of the Church, of miracles as awful in
their character and as momentous in their effects as those which
are recorded in Scripture. The fire interrupting the rebuilding of
the Jewish Temple, and the death of Arius, are instances, in
Ecclesiastical history, of such solemn events. On the other hand,
difficult instances in the Scripture history are such as these: the
serpent in Eden, the Ark, Jacob's vision for the multiplication of
his cattle, the speaking of Balaam's ass, the axe swimming at
Elisha's word, the miracle on the swine, and various instances of
prayers or prophecies, in which, as in that of Noah's blessing and
curse, words which seem the result of private feeling are expressly
or virtually ascribed to a Divine suggestion (p. lvi).

Who is to gainsay our ecclesiastical authority here? "Infidel authors"
might be accused of a wish to ridicule the Scripture miracles by putting
them on a level with the remarkable story about the fire which stopped
the rebuilding of the Temple, or that about the death of Arius--but Dr.
Newman is above suspicion. The pity is that his list of what he
delicately terms "difficult" instances is so short. Why omit the
manufacture of Eve out of Adam's rib, on the strict historical accuracy
of which the chief argument of the defenders of an iniquitous portion of
our present marriage law depends? Why leave out the account of the "Bene
Elohim" and their gallantries, on which a