distinction between a wonder and a miracle: "to say that all recorded
wonders are false, from those recorded by Herodotus to the latest
reports of animal magnetism, would be a boldness of assertion wholly
unjustifiable." At the same time he thinks the character of Bede, added
to the religious difficulty, may incline us to limit miracles to the
earliest times of Christianity, and refuse our belief to all which are
reported by the historians of subsequent centuries. He then proceeds to
consider the questions which suggest themselves when we read Matthew
Paris, or still more, any of the French, German, or Italian historians
of the same period:--

"The thirteenth century contains in it, at its beginning, the
most splendid period of the Papacy, the time of Innocent the
Third; its end coincides with that great struggle between
Boniface the Eighth and Philip the Fair, which marks the first
stage of its decline. It contains the reign of Frederick the
Second, and his long contest with the popes in Italy; the
foundation of the orders of friars, Dominican and Franciscan;
the last period of the crusades, and the age of the greatest
glory of the schoolmen. Thus, full of matters of interest as it
is, it will yet be found that all its interest is more or less
connected with two great questions concerning the church;
namely, the power of the priesthood in matters of government
and in matters of faith; the merits of the contest between the
Papacy and the kings of Europe; the nature and character of
that influence over men's minds which affected the whole
philosophy of the period, the whole intellectual condition of
the Christian world."--P. 138.

The pretensions and corruptions of the Church are undoubtedly the chief