Martyn's First tract refers chiefly to this subject of miracles. He asserts that
to be conclusive, a miracle must exceed universal experience; that the testimony
and opinion of the Arabs is therefore insufficient, besides being that of a
party concerned; that, were the Coran even allowed to be inimitable, that would
not prove it a miracle; and its being an intellectual prodigy is not a virtue,
but rather, by making it inappreciable by the vast body of mankind, a defect. He
concludes by denying Mohammed's other miracles, in the proof of which two
requisites are wanting, viz., their being recorded at or near the time of their
occurrence, and the narrators being under no constraint. The Second tract
directly attacks Mohammed's mission ; alleges the debasing nature of some of the
precepts and contents of the Coran; and holds good works and repentance alone to
be insufficient for salvation. He then turns to the atonement, which prefigured
in types, was fulfilled in Christ, and made public by the marvellous spread of
Christianity. The Third tract commences with an attack upon the strange
doctrines of Sufiism, and shows that love and union with the Deity cannot be
obtained by contemplation, but only through the manifestation of His goodness
towards us, accompanied by an assurance of our safety; and that this is
fulfilled in Christianity, not by the amalgamation of the soul with God, but by
the pouring out of His Spirit upon us, and by the obedience and atonement of
Christ. Vicarious suffering is then defended by analogy, the truth of the Mosaic
and Christian miracles upheld, and the argument closes with an appeal to the
authenticity of the Christian annals as wholly coincident with profane history.
