Appendix A 12 min read

Lambertini, Book IV Part I: Chapter-by-Chapter Guide

From the minimally refined research manuscript

The following guide preserves the complete chapter map from the research handbook. It is retained as specialist apparatus rather than interrupting the main argument.

Lambertini chapter guide
Chapter	Working English title	Function in Lambertini’s inquiry
I	On Miracles and the Degrees of Miracles	Lambertini establishes the ontology. He begins with the distinction between the natural order and the supernatural order of grace and glory. He then adopts the Thomistic conception of miracle as something occurring beyond the ordinary order of the appropriate created causes. Importantly, he distinguishes miracles exceeding all created nature from extraordinary effects exceeding only visible/corporeal powers. That gives him room for a distinction roughly corresponding to strict miracle versus miracle “with respect to us.” He also brackets mysteries such as the Incarnation as belonging to a still higher supernatural order rather than to the class of miracles being investigated in canonization.
II	On the Efficient Cause of Miracles	The question becomes: Who actually causes a miracle? Lambertini's governing answer is that “God alone is the principal efficient cause of miracles.” Saints, angels, and human agents can be instruments, but never independent possessors of divine miraculous power. He considers competing scholastic accounts of whether saintly causality is physical/instrumental or moral/intercessory, while preserving the central point: God remains the true efficient cause. This is fundamental to a Catholic doctrine of intercession.
III	On Evil Angels, Infidels, Heretics, Antichrist, and Finally Sinners with Respect to the Working of Miracles	This is astonishingly relevant to religious pluralism. Lambertini asks whether demons, non-Christians, heretics, schismatics, sinners, etc. can be associated with miracles. Demons can produce extraordinary effects through superior created powers, but not a strict miracle by their own nature. More remarkably, Lambertini records and accepts the possibility that God may use a pagan, heretic, or schismatic instrumentally in producing a miracle in order to confirm some truth of faith or morals. He explicitly uses Mark 9, the outsider casting out demons in Christ's name. So a miracle occurring “through” someone does not automatically certify that person's complete religious system.
IV	On the End of Miracles and the Differences Between True and False Miracles	This is probably the single most important chapter for this study. Lambertini says the primary end of miracles is God's glory; subordinate ends include manifesting the truth of doctrine concerning faith and morals and attesting genuine holiness. He then confronts whether God could work a miracle to confirm falsehood and answers, under the present providential order, no. God is truthful and cannot become a witness to falsehood. Most importantly, Lambertini reproduces Martín del Río's distinction between two arguments: “He worked a miracle, therefore his faith is true” can be false; “He worked a true miracle in confirmation of the faith he professed, therefore that faith is true” is valid. That is essentially our distinction between miraculous occurrence and semantic scope of vindication.
V	On the Necessity of Miracles in Causes of Beatification and Canonization	Lambertini now applies the theory ecclesially. He rejects both extremes: holiness cannot simply be replaced by spectacular signs, but miracles are not dispensable either in the normal canonization process. Heroic virtue or martyrdom establishes the human side of the cause; posthumous miracles can serve as a form of divine confirmation of the person's sanctity and intercessory status. Thus ecclesial judgment and divine attestation have different but complementary roles.
VI	On the Number and Quality of Miracles Required in Causes of Beatification and Canonization	Here he moves from necessity to evidential sufficiency. Not every extraordinary story qualifies. Number, quality, quality of witnesses, circumstances, and relation to the candidate matter. Especially interesting for our theory: Lambertini allows that explicit invocation of the saint need not always occur if the surrounding circumstances make it sufficiently evident that the event occurred for the manifestation of that person's sanctity. In other words, attribution is contextual and inferential, not magical.
VII	In Which the Matters Stated in the Previous Chapters Are Confirmed by Writings of Learned Men Sent to Us from France	Lambertini places his account into dialogue with contemporary intellectual controversy. The chapter revisits the definition of miracle, natural laws, divine immutability, continued miracles after the apostolic period, and evidential discernment. The larger methodological point is revealing: Catholic miracle theory is expected to withstand philosophical and scientific objections rather than retreat into “mystery” whenever a difficulty arises.
VIII	On Divine and Wonderful Healing from Diseases and Infirmities	This is the foundational medical chapter. Lambertini gives his famous general criteria before proceeding disease by disease. The illness should be grave and naturally incurable or very difficult to cure; not already at a stage where natural improvement is expected; treatment must either be absent or demonstrably inadequate; recovery should be sudden; complete; not produced through an ordinary crisis or evacuation; and lasting without relapse. These became enormously influential in Catholic miracle investigation.
IX	On the Giving of Sight to the Blind by Miracle	He begins applying those principles to particular pathologies. The central problem is that “blindness” is not a single condition. One must establish the organic cause, severity, duration, natural possibility of recovery, and precise character of restored sight. He explicitly says that after considering miraculous cures generally, the proper procedure is now to examine them individually.
X	On Speech Granted or Restored to the Mute and Hearing Restored to the Deaf by Miracle	The same differential method is applied to deafness and mutism. The investigator must distinguish different underlying causes and natural prospects for recovery rather than treating the phenomenological label “couldn't speak” or “couldn't hear” as a sufficient medical diagnosis.
XI	On the Divine and Wonderful Healing of the Lame, Those Unable to Walk, and the Hunchbacked	Mobility impairments are examined according to underlying structure and cause. The important principle is that the visible inability to walk does not itself tell us whether the impairment was neurologic, musculoskeletal, functional, temporary, or naturally reversible. A miraculous judgment requires demonstrating that ordinary causal explanations do not adequately account for the restoration.
XII	On the Healing of Paralytics by Miracle	Paralysis gets separate treatment because rapid return of movement can have very different significance depending on what produced the paralysis. Lambertini's concern is again diagnostic precision, natural prognosis, completeness, suddenness, and durability.
XIII	On the Wonderful Divine Healing of Epileptics and Those Suffering from Hysterical Affliction	This chapter is particularly interesting historically because it forces Lambertini to distinguish medical disorders, psychological/psychophysiological phenomena, and alleged demonic effects. His medicine is obviously eighteenth century, but the methodological instinct remains valuable: do not collapse neurological, psychological, preternatural, and miraculous explanations into one category merely because an event appears dramatic.
XIV	On the Wonderful Divine Healing of Mania and Hydrophobia [Rabies]	Here he considers mental disturbance and rabies. He is remarkably concerned with false appearances of recovery and especially recurrence: apparent lucid periods need not constitute permanent cure. The broader criterion is longitudinal: one cannot judge a recurring disorder miraculous simply from a short period of improvement.
XV	On the Divine and Wonderful Healing of Dropsy, Empyema, and Hernia	Lambertini turns to bodily disorders with more readily physical/anatomical manifestations. The evidential problem becomes whether the pathological condition itself objectively disappeared and whether known mechanisms or treatment could explain that disappearance.
XVI	On Deliverance from a Flow of Blood and Hemorrhages Generally, and on the Miraculous Healing of Wounds	Beginning from biblical examples such as the woman with the hemorrhage, Lambertini evaluates cessation of bleeding and wound healing against ordinary mechanisms. A sudden stop is not enough if ordinary coagulation or healing can adequately explain the result.
XVII	On the Wonderful Divine Healing of Leprosy, Cancer, Gangrene, and Certain Other Diseases	Severe destructive illnesses provide potentially stronger cases, but diagnosis becomes correspondingly important. Lambertini asks whether the disease really was what witnesses say it was and whether the natural history allowed the outcome. This anticipates the modern insistence that a miraculous cure requires a secure prior diagnosis, not merely an old testimonial description.
XVIII	When Healing from Fever Is to Be Attributed to Miracle	Fever illustrates the opposite problem: common diseases frequently resolve naturally. Lambertini is correspondingly cautious. A rapid cure after invocation is not automatically miraculous because the natural course can itself include sudden improvement. This is a good example of his rejection of post hoc = miracle reasoning.
XIX	On Healings from Various Infirmities Which Occur Miraculously	This functions partly as a residual/application chapter, bringing miscellaneous illnesses under the criteria already developed rather than pretending every medical condition requires an entirely new theology. The governing question remains: what precisely was wrong, what could nature do, what happened, and under what circumstances?
XX	On Childbirth Occurring Miraculously	Lambertini applies medical criteria to extraordinary deliveries. Difficult, prolonged, premature, or dangerous delivery does not by itself constitute miracle. He repeatedly asks what obstetrics regards as naturally possible and whether the supposedly impossible outcome was actually beyond ordinary possibility. His skepticism is sometimes striking: even a successful delivery following invocation can fail to qualify if the underlying situation was naturally survivable.
XXI	On the Calling of the Dead Back to Life, or Resuscitation	Here the first problem is not “Can God raise the dead?” but Was the person actually dead? Lambertini brings contemporary anatomy and physiology into the inquiry and distinguishes genuine death from apparent death, suspended signs, drowning, and uncertain diagnoses. In one discussion, he reports the refusal to recognize supposed resuscitations of drowned children because the evidence for actual death was inadequate. This is a beautiful example of theological confidence paired with empirical caution.
XXII	On Negative Miracles	A “negative” miracle is one in which a naturally expected effect fails to occur: preservation rather than production. Examples include fire failing to burn, protection from destruction, or a plague suddenly ceasing. Lambertini insists that there must actually be a well-founded expectation of the natural effect; otherwise mere survival or non-occurrence proves little. Circumstances and timing are decisive.
XXIII	On the Multiplication of Things and the Conversion of Things into Other Things	Here belong multiplication phenomena and transformations such as biblical multiplication of food and water into wine. Lambertini distinguishes accidental changes from genuinely substantial transformations and asks whether hidden transport, substitution, ordinary generation, or created agency could explain what occurred. The more radical the ontological transformation, the stronger the claim that created power is exceeded.
XXIV	On Miracles Concerning Dominion over the Elements and Irrational Creatures	This encompasses extraordinary relations to fire, water, weather, animals, and vegetation. Lambertini is already thinking experimentally: for walking on water, for example, one should ask whether witnesses saw clearly, whether it was day or night, whether the body was actually unsupported, etc. For fire, one asks about wind, duration, arrangement of fuel, clothing, and evidence of injury. Circumstantial controls matter.
XXV	On Certain Miracles Occurring in the Heavens and on the Earth	Astronomical, meteorological, and terrestrial marvels are subjected to the same discipline. An unusual celestial or atmospheric event is not miraculous simply because it is rare. Lambertini explicitly gives natural alternatives for phenomena such as “rains of stones” and says the miraculous attribution must come from the circumstances showing divine ordering rather than from strangeness alone.
XXVI	On Bloody Sweat and Bloody Tears Flowing from the Bodies and Eyes of Servants of God, and on the Light and Splendor by Which Their Faces Sometimes Shine	This chapter is especially instructive for sensational modern miracle claims. Lambertini recognizes that bloody sweat can have physiological causes and therefore explicitly says such phenomena may have to be excluded from the class of miracles. He then separately examines luminosity and transfiguration-like phenomena. Extraordinary appearance is never sufficient by itself.
XXVII	On Long Abstinence from Food and Drink, Whether and How It Is to Be Attributed to Miracle	Claims that saints survived without food receive naturalistic scrutiny: physiology, duration, possible hidden nourishment, liquids, individual constitution, and testimony. Lambertini even consults contemporary learned scientific bodies regarding disputed fasting cases. The lesson is again methodological: extreme asceticism does not become miraculous simply because it accompanies holiness.
XXVIII	On Certain Spiritual Miracles	This is fascinating. Lambertini expands “miracle” beyond immediately bodily phenomena. He discusses extraordinary deliverance from severe spiritual affliction and, crucially, the extraordinary conversion or justification of a sinner. Drawing on Aquinas, he allows that a conversion occurring outside the accustomed order, with extraordinary immediacy and perfection, can be described as miraculous. Miracle therefore need not always mean altered matter; there can be extraordinary divine action upon the human person as spiritual subject.
XXIX	On the Expulsion of Demons from Possessed Bodies	Lambertini separates demonology from ordinary medicine as carefully as his period permits. He asks what possession means, what powers demons possess, whether physical substances can directly act on incorporeal spirits, how liberation is established, and how long freedom must persist before a cure can be judged stable. This chapter prevents “exorcistic effect” from functioning as an evidential shortcut.
XXX	On the Incorruption of Corpses	Incorruption is emphatically not automatically miraculous. Lambertini examines environmental preservation, dryness, bodily constitution, disease, embalming, and other natural/artificial causes. He distinguishes genuine absence of corruption from desiccation or mummification, noting that drying is itself a kind of bodily corruption rather than miraculous preservation. This is one of his clearest examples of aggressively seeking natural alternatives first.
XXXI	On Certain Qualities of Corpses, and Whether Blood, Other Liquids, and Odor Flowing from Corpses Are to Be Attributed to Miracle	Here he examines bodies said to remain flexible, stand, kneel, exude blood or liquid, or emit unusual fragrance. Again he considers decomposition, location, groundwater, preservation conditions, and other ordinary causes. Even blood flowing from a corpse is not automatically miraculous; duration and physical circumstances matter.
XXXII	On Apparitions of the Blessed and Saints, and Whether They Can Be Counted Among Miracles	Lambertini asks whether saintly apparitions themselves constitute miracles. He considers apparitions of the dead, appearances associated with assistance or benefits, and even appearances of living persons at a distance. The key criterion is strong evidence plus exclusion of ordinary explanations; under such conditions, an apparition can enter a canonization cause because it depends upon special divine providence. Importantly, apparition and holiness are not simply identical propositions: the event still needs interpretation and authentication.
Final	On Imagination and Its Powers	The treatise ends in exactly the right place epistemologically: How much might the mind itself explain? Lambertini asks what imagination is, how it relates to the brain and body, whether it can cause illness, whether it can cure disease rapidly, whether it can affect another body, and what role it plays in supposed miraculous cures. In modern terminology, he is investigating psychosomatic and psychophysiological alternatives. The point is methodological: if an adequate created causal explanation remains viable, the Church has not yet established a miracle.