go after other gods . . . thou shalt not hearken unto the voice of that
prophet; for the Lord your God proveth you, and that prophet shall be put to
death." (48) From this it clearly follows that miracles could be wrought
even by false prophets; and that, unless men are honestly endowed with the
true knowledge and love of God, they may be as easily led by miracles to
follow false gods as to follow the true God; for these words are added: "For
the Lord your God tempts you, that He may know whether you love Him with all
your heart and with all your mind."

(49) Further, the Israelites, from all their miracles, were unable to form a
sound conception of God, as their experience testified: for when they had
persuaded themselves that Moses had departed from among them, they
petitioned Aaron to give them visible gods; and the idea of God they had
formed as the result of all their miracles was - a calf!

(50) Asaph, though he had heard of so many miracles, yet doubted of the
providence of God, and would have turned himself from the true way, if he
had not at last come to understand true blessedness. (See Ps. lxxxiii.) (51)
Solomon, too, at a time when the Jewish nation was at the height of its
prosperity, suspects that all things happen by chance. (See Eccles. iii:19,
20, 21; and chap. ix:2, 3, &c.)

(52) Lastly, nearly all the prophets found it very hard to reconcile the
order of nature and human affairs with the conception they had formed of
God's providence, whereas philosophers who endeavour to understand things by
clear conceptions of them, rather than by miracles, have always found the
task extremely easy - at least, such of them as place true happiness solely
in virtue and peace of mind, and who aim at obeying nature, rather than
being obeyed by her. (53) Such persons rest assured that God directs nature
according to the requirements of universal laws, not according to the