wonderful, and as much out of the common course of things, as the
other. Perhaps it is so; and what then? Surely the Gentleman does not
expect, that, in order to prove the reality of the greatest miracle
that ever was, I should shew that there was nothing miraculous in it,
but that everything happened according to the ordinary course of
things. My only concern is, to shew, that these passages do not infer,
that the body of Christ after the resurrection was no real body. I
wonder the Gentleman did not carry his argument a little further, and
prove, that Christ, before his death, had no real body; for we read,
that when the multitude would have thrown him down a precipice, he
went through the midst of them unseen. Now, nothing happened after his
resurrection more unaccountable than this that happened before it; and
if the argument be good at all, it will be good to prove, that there
never was such a man as Jesus in the world. Perhaps the gentleman may
think that this is a little too much to prove: and if he does, I hope
he will quit the argument in one case as well as in the other; for
difference there is none.

Hitherto we have been called upon to prove the reality of
Christ's body, and that it was the same after the resurrection that was
before: but the next objection complains, that the body was too much
the same with that which was buried; for the Gentleman thinks that it
had the same mortal wounds open and uncured of which he died. His
observation is grounded upon the words which Christ uses to Thomas:
[John 20:27] Reach hither thy finger, and behold my hands; and reach
hither thy hand and thrust it into my side. Is it here affirmed that
Thomas did actually put his hand into his side, or so much as see his
wounds fresh and bleeding? Nothing like it: but it is supposed from
the words of Christ; for if he had no wounds, he would not have invited
Thomas to probe them. Now, the meaning of Christ will best appear by