The stories told about Jesus in the synoptic gospels can be paralleled
in the literature of the time throughout the Roman world. The use of
spittle as a sovereign remedy was universal. In his essay upon
miracles, Hume called attention to the story told about the Emperor
Vespasian by Tacitus. Vespasian was a little more careful than Jesus,
for he had physicians examine the eyes of the blind suppliant before he
exerted his touch and spittle as healing agents. But, then, Jesus
could not be so careful about such things as an emperor.

When we once clearly realize the emotional atmosphere of the times and
the complete lack of the sort of intellectual background we possess, we
are not surprised either at the recorded acts of Jesus or at the myths
which grew up around his figure. The absence of miracles from the New
Testament would be far more surprising than is their presence.

The miracles attributed to Jesus are of two main kinds, the expulsion
of demons as a means of curing ills and allegorical fulfillments of
supposed Old Testament prophecies. The first kind has been
sufficiently examined. The second can be touched upon only briefly.
It has been one of the main contributions of the higher criticism to
point out how much of the life of Jesus is built up around passages in
the Septuagint or Greek version of the Old Testament.

I do not think that I am going too far when I assert that the presence
of these tales in the sacred literature of Christianity has done an
incalculable amount of {129} harm. They have given a sanction to all
sorts of superstitious beliefs and have helped to carry over into our
day an outlook which would otherwise have been more quickly cast off.
Had it not been for the miracles related in the gospels, there would
have been no problem of miracles to discuss. The idea, itself, would
have been outgrown and have died a natural death. And, in the long
run, that is what must take place. As a saner view of Jesus is taken
and a better knowledge of the outlook of the time in which he lived is
gained, the recorded miracles will be explained, not as actual events,
but as actual beliefs.

Another period deserves study in this connection. When one examines
the literature of the Middle Ages, one gains the conviction that
miracles formed the staple emotional diet of the people. They played
the part that novels and detective stories do now. Man is naturally
dramatic in his interpretation of life, an