criterion. Do you not perceive that, if our experience and that of
the immense majority, or of all about us, be not a sufficient
criterion of the laws of nature, our argument falls to the ground?
'Your principle,' our adversaries will say, 'is a fallacious one;
Nature has her laws, no doubt, which apply to miracles as to every
other phenomenon; but in assuming your experience to be a sufficient
criterion of these laws, you have been, not interpreting her laws,
but imposing upon her your own.' If unknown powers of nature may
thus reverse our experience and the experience of all those whose
experience, under the given conditions, we have opportunities of
testing, we ought to abstain from saying that some unknown powers may
not also have wrought miracles. Let us then affirm consistently the
sufficiency of our criterion; and the prince aforesaid must do the
same; and it warranted him, I say, in believing that there neither
was nor could be such a thing as ice."
"But this seems ridiculous," said Fellowes; "for according to this,
different and opposite experiences may, in different places give
different or opposite measures of the laws of nature; which
nevertheless are supposed to be invariably the same, or invariably
the limits certified by that experience."
"I cannot help it; upon that same experience we must believe it true
that there are no miracles, and our unbelieving prince, that there
could be no such thing as ice; for to him it was a miracle. If we do
not reason thus, may we not be compelled to admit that our uniform
experience, with its limited variations, is no rule at all, and that
there are cases for which it makes no provision? and may not the
advocate for miracles say that miracles are amongst them? No, let us
adhere to our principle, and adhering to it, I wish to know whether
the prince in question was not quite right in saying that there
neither was nor could be such a thing as ice; for the assertion that
there was, was contrary to all his experience and to that of every soul
about him."
"I must say, that, if we look only to the principle of this uniform
experience, he was right."
"But he rejected the truth."
"He certainly did."
"And he was right in rejecting the truth?"
"Certainly, upon your principle."
"Upon my principle! Do not say upon my principle, unless you mean to
deny that you too embrace it; if you give up that principle, you lay
yourself open at once to the retort that your position is insecure;
that you have taken your experience as a sufficient criterion of the
possibilities of events, when it is in fact merely a measure of such
as have fallen under your own observation."
"Perhaps," said Fellowes, "I should say that the prince in question
was justified at first in rejecting the fact, but that when he found
other men, whose veracity he could not suspect, coming from the same
regions of the world, and affirming the same phenomenon, it was his
business to correct his experience, and to admit that the fact
was so."
"I am surprised to hear you say so; you are again ruining our principle.
Do you admit that the assertion that there was a place on earth at
which water in large quantities became solid, was apparently as great
a violation of all the experience of this man, as what is ordinarily
called a miracle is of ours?"
"I cannot deny that it was so."
"But yet you think, that, though justified in disbelieving it at first,
he would not be so when others, whose veracity and motives he had no
reason to suspect, told him the same tale?"
"Yes."
"Why, then, is not this plainly to make a belief of such events depend
upon testimony, and do we not give up altogether our sufficient
principle of rejection of all such testimony? You are yielding,
without doubt, the principle of our opponents, who affirm that there
is no event so improbable that a certain combination of testimony
would not be sufficient to warrant your reception of it; because, as
they say, that testimony might be given under such circumstances,--so
variously certified, and so above suspicion,--that it would be more
improbable that the statement to which it applied (however strange)
should be false, than that the testimony should not be true; in other
words, that the falsehood of the testimony would be the greater miracle
of the two. And they say this, because (as they assert) the uniform
experience on which we found our objection to any miraculous narrative
is no less applicable to the world of mind than to the world of matter;
that there is not indeed an absolute uniformity of experience in the
former, as neither is there in the latter; but neither in one nor in
the other is there any absolute bouleversement of the principles and
constitution of nature; which, they say, would be implied, if under
all conceivable circumstances testimony might prove false. And yet
now you seem to admit the very thing for which they contend; and in
contending for it, you give up your case. Doing so, you certainly get
rid of the paradoxical conclusions which my wretched scepticism
sometimes suggests to me, as throwing a doubt on the integrity of our
principle. I say your admission gets rid of it; but then it is with
the ruin of the principle itself."
"What was that paradox?"
"It is this; that, if we adhere to our principle, we must deny that any
amount of testimony is sufficient to warrant the belief of a miracle."
"That is what we do maintain."
"I thought so; but you seem to me to have hastily given it up. Let us
then again maintain that our prince, in denying what was a miracle
to him, was not only consistent in saying that it could not be, when
first asserted to him, but also when last asserted; and died an orthodox
infidel in the possibility of ice, or an orthodox believer in the
eternal fluidity of water, whichever you prefer to consider it."
"Well, and what then?"
"Why, then, let us act upon our principle with equal consistency in
other cases; for you say that there is no amount or complexity of
evidence which would induce you to believe in a miracle."
"I do."
"Let us suppose it was asserted that a man known to have been dead
and buried had risen again, and, after having been seen by many, had
at last, in presence of a multitude, on a clear day, ascended to
heaven through the calm sky, without artificial wings or balloon, or
any such thing; that he was seen to pass out of sight of the gazing
crowd, who watched and watched in vain for his return; and that he had
never more been seen. Let us suppose that the witnesses who saw this
constantly affirmed it; that amongst them were many known to you,
whose veracity you had no reason to suspect, and who had no imaginable
motive to deceive you; let us suppose further, that they persisted in
affirming this, in spite of all contumely and contempt, insult and
wrong, amidst threats of persecution, and persecution itself; lastly,
let there be amongst them many, who before this event had been as
strenuous assertors of the impossibility of a miracle as yourself.
I want to know whether you would believe this story, thus authenticated,
or not?"
"But it is, I think, unfair to put any such case; for there never was
such an event so authenticated."
"It is quite sufficient to test our principle, that you can imagine
such testimony. If that principle is sound, it is plain that it will
apply to all imaginable degrees of testimony, as well as to all actual.
No testimony, you say, can establish a miracle. This is true or not.
If you admit that there are any degrees in this matter, you come at
last to the old argument, which you abjure; namely, that whether a
miraculous event has taken place or not depends on the degree of
evidence with which it is substantiated, and that must be the result
of a certain investigation of it in the particular alleged case.
You remember the story of the ring of Gyges, which made the wearer
invisible. Plato tells us how a man ought to act, and how a good man
would act, if he had such a ring. Cicero tells us how absurd it would
be to reply to his reasoning (as one did), by saying that there never
was such a ring. It was not necessary to the force of the illustration
that there should be such a ring. So neither is it necessary to my
argument there should be such testimony as I have supposed, to enable
us to see whether we are prepared to admit the truth of your principle
that no evidence can establish a miracle. Once more, then, I ask you
whether, on supposition of such testimony, you would reject the
supposed fact or not?"
"Well, then, I should say, that, since no testimony can establish a
miracle, I should reject it."
"Bravo, Fellowes! I do of all things like to see an unflinching
regard to a principle, when once laid down."
"But would not you also reject it, upon the same principle?"
"Of course I should, if the principle be true; but ah! my friend,
pardon me for acknowledging my infirmities; my miserable scepticism
tosses me to and fro. I have not your strength of will; and I fear
that the rejection in such a case would cost me many qualms and
doubts. Such is the infirmity of our nature, and so much may be
said on all sides! And I fear that I should be more likely to have
these uneasy thoughts, inasmuch as I fancy I see a difficult
dilemma (I but now referred to it), which would be proposed to us by
some keen-sighted opponent,--I say not with justice,--who would
endeavor to show that we had abandoned our principle in the very
attempt to maintain it; that the bow from which we were about to
launch so fatal an arrow at the enemy had broken in our hands, and
left us defenceless."
"What dilemma do you refer to?" said Fellowes.
"I think such an adversary might perhaps say: 'That same uniform
experience on which you justify the rejection of all miracles,--does
it extend only to one part of nature, to the physical and material
only, or to the mental and spiritual also?' In other words, if there
were such things as miracles at all, might there be miracles in
connection with mind as well as in connection with matter? What would
you say?"
"What can I say, but what Hume himself says, so truly and so
beautifully, in his essay on 'Necessary Connection,' and 'On Liberty
and Necessity'; namely, that there is a uniformity in both the moral
and physical world, and that nature does not transgress certain
limits in either the one or the other'? You must remember that he
says so?"
"I do," said Harrington. "Now, I am afraid our astute adversary would
say that such a complication of false testimony as we have supposed
would itself be a flagrant violation of the established series of
sequences, on which, as applied to the physical world, we justify
the rejection of all miracles; that we have got rid of a miracle by
admitting a miracle; and that our uniform experience has broken down
with us."
"But again I say, there never was such a case of testimony,"
urged Fellowes.
"I wish this could help us; but it plainly will not; because we have
concluded that, if there were such testimony, we must believe it false,
and therefore should admit that the miracle of its falsehood was, in
that case, necessary to be believed; not to say that there has been,
in the opinion of millions, testimony often given to miracles, which,
if false, does imply that the laws of human nature must have been
turned topsy-turvy,--and I, for my part, know not how to disprove it.
If, in such cases, the testimony, the falsity of which would be a
miracle, is not to be rejected, then we must admit that the miracle
which it supports is true. I must leave it there." said Harrington,
with an air of comic resignation; "I cannot answer for any thing
except that you may reject both miracles alternatively, if that
will be any comfort to you, without being able to disbelieve
simultaneously. If you believe the testimony false, you must believe
the alleged miracle false; but you will have then the moral miracle
to believe. If you believe the testimony true, you will then believe
the physical miracle true. Perhaps the best way will be to believe both
alternately in rapid succession; and you will then hardly perceive the
difficulty at all!"
There was here a brief pause. Harrington suddenly resumed. "These
are very perplexing considerations. One thing, I confess, has often
puzzled me much; and that is,--what should we do, in what state of
mind should we be, if we did see a miracle?"
"Of what use is the discussion of such a particular case, when you know
it is impossible that we should ever see it realized?" replied Fellowes.
"Of course it is; just as it is impossible that we should ever see
levers perfectly inflexible, or cords perfectly flexible. Nevertheless,
it is perfectly possible to entertain such a hypothetical case, and
to reason with great conclusiveness on the consequences of such a
supposition; and in the same way we can imagine that we have seen a
miracle; and what then?"
"Why, if we were to see one, of course seeing is believing. We must
give up our principle," said Fellowes, laughing.
"Do you think so? I think we should be very foolish then. How can we
be sure that we have seen it? Can it appeal to any thing stronger
than senses, and have not our senses often beguiled us?" Must we not
rather abide by that general induction from the evidence to which our
ordinary experience points us? In other words, ought we not to adhere
to the great principle we have already laid down, that a miracle
is impossible?"
"But, according to this, if we err in that principle, and God were to
work a miracle for the very purpose of convincing us, it would be
impossible for him to attain his purpose."
"I think it would, my friend, I confess; just for the reason that,
since we believe a miracle to be impossible, we must believe it
impossible for even God to work one; and therefore, if we are
mistaken, and it is possible for him to work one, it is still
impossible that he should convince us of it."
"I really know not how to go that length."
"Why not? You acknowledge that your senses have deceived you; you know
that they have deceived others; and it is on that very ground that
you dispose of very many cases of supposed miracles which you are
not willing, or are not able, to resolve otherwise. If I believe, then,
that a miracle is impossible, I must admit that, if I err in that, it
is still impossible for God himself to convince me of it."
Fellowes looked grave, but said nothing.
"And do you know," said Harrington, "I have sometimes thought that
Hume, so far from representing his argument from 'Transubstantiation'
fairly, (there is an obvious fallacy on the very face of it, to which
I do not now allude,) is himself precisely in the condition in
which he represents the believer in miracles?"
Fellowes smiled incredulously. "First, however," said he, "what
is the more notorious fallacy to which you allude?"
"It is so barefaced an assumption, that I am surprised that his acuteness
did not see it; or that, if he saw it, he could have descended to make
a point by appearing not to see it. It has been often pointed out,
and you will recollect it the moment I name it. You know he commences
with the well-known argument of Tillotson against Transubstantiation
and flatters himself that he sees a similar argument in relation to
miracles. Now it certainly requires but a moderate degree of sagacity
to see that the very point in which Tillotson's argument tells, is
that very one in which Hume's is totally unlike it. Tillotson says,
that when it is pretended that the bread and wine which are submitted
to his own senses have been 'transubstantiated into flesh and blood,'
the alleged phenomena contradict his senses; and that as the information
of his senses as much comes from God as the doctrines of Scripture
(and even the miracles of Scripture appeal to nothing stronger), he must
believe his senses in this case in preference to the assertions of the
priest. Hume then goes on quietly to take it for granted that the
miracles to which consent is asked in like manner contradict the
testimony of the senses of him to whom they appeal is made; whereas,
in fact, the assertor of the miracles does not pretend that he who
denies them has ever seen them, or had the opportunity of seeing them.
To make the argument analogous, it ought to be shown that the objector,
having been a spectator of the pretended miracles, when and where they
were affirmed to have been wrought, had then and there the testimony
of his senses that no such events had taken place. It is mere juggling
with words to say that never to have seen a like event is the same
argument of an event's never having occurred, as never to have seen
that event when it was alleged to have taken place under our very
eyes!"
"I give up the reasoning on this point," said Fellowes, "but how,
I should like to know, do you retort the argument upon him?"
"Thus; you see that we maintain that a miracle is incredible per se,
because impossible; not to be believed, therefore, on any evidence."
"Certainly."
"If, then, we saw what seemed a miracle, we should distrust our senses;
we should say that it was most likely that they deceived us. Hear what
Voltaire says in one of his letters to D'Alembert: 'Je persiste a
penser que cent mille hommes qui ont vu ressusciter un mort, pourraient
bien etre cent mille hommes qui auraient la berlue.' And what he says
of their bad eyes, there is no doubt he would say of his own, if he had
been one of the hundred thousand."
"I think so, certainly."
"And Strauss, and Hume, and Voltaire, and you and I, and all who hold
a miracle impossible, would distrust our senses, and fall back upon
that testimony from the general experience of others, which alone could
correct our own halting and ambiguous experience."
"Certainly."
"It appears, then, my good fellow, that the position of those who
deny and those who assert miracles is exactly the reverse of Hume's
statement. The man who believes 'Transubstantiation' distrusts his
senses, and rather believes testimony: and even so would he who has
fully made up his mind, on our sublime principle as to the
impossibility of miracles, when any thing which has that appearance
crosses his path; he is prepared to deny his senses and to trust
to testimony,--to that general experience of others which comes to
him, and can come to him, only in that shape. It is we, therefore,
and not our adversaries, who are liable to be reached by this
unlucky illustration."
Fellowes himself seemed much amused by finding the tables thus
turned. For my part, I had difficulty in repressing a chuckle over
this display of sceptical candor and subtilty.
"There is perhaps another paradox which may be as well mentioned,"
resumed Harrington. "It is a little trying to my scepticism, but
perhaps will not be to your faith. I mean this. We are constrained
to believe from our 'uniform-experience' criterion that no miracle
has ever occurred, or ever will; in short, it is, as we say,
impossible. Now the principle which undoubtedly leads us to the
conclusion we may regard as a principle of our nature, if ever there
was one; that is, we are so constituted as to infer the perpetual
uniformity of certain sequences of phenomena from our observation
of that uniformity."
"Assuredly."
"And as all mankind obviously act upon that same principle in most
cases, and we believe that it is part of the very uniformity in
question that human nature is radically the same in all ages and in
all countries, I think we ought to conclude that it is not you and
I only, but at all events the vast majority of mankind, who have
maintained the impossibility of miracles."
"We ought to be able to conclude so," said Fellowes, "but it is very
far from being the case. So far from it, that nothing can be plainer
than that miraculous legends have been most greedily taken up by the
vast majority of mankind, and have made a very common part of almost
every form of religion."
"Men do not then, it appears, in this instance, at all regard the
uniform tenor of their experience; so that it is a part of our uniform
experience, that mankind disregard and disbelieve the lessons of their
uniform experience. This is almost a miracle of itself; at all events,
a curious paradox; but one which we must not stay to examine: though
I confess it leads to one other humiliating conclusion,--a little
corollary, which I think it is not unimportant to mark; and that is,
that we can never expect these enlightened views of ours to spread
amongst the mass of mankind."
"Nay, I cannot agree with you. I hope far other wise, and far better
for the human race."
"But will the result not contradict your uniform experience, if your
hopes be realized? Is not your experience sufficiently long and
sufficiently varied to show that the belief of miracles and all sorts
of prodigies is the normal condition of mankind, and that it is only
a comparatively few who can discern that uniform experience justifies
man in believing that no miracle is possible? While it teaches us that
a miracle is impossible does it not also teach us that, though none
is possible, it is nevertheless impossible that they should not
be generally believed? Is not this taught us as plainly by our
uniform experience as any thing else? See how fairly Hume admits this
at the commencement of his Essay on Miracles. He says, 'I flatter
myself that I have discovered an argument which, if just, will, with
the wise and learned, be an everlasting check to all kinds of
superstitious delusion, and consequently will be useful as long as the
world endures. For so long, I presume, will the accounts of miracles
and prodigies be found in all histories, sacred and profane.' Thus
are we led to the conclusion, that, though miracles never can be real,
they will nevertheless be always believed; and that, though the truth
is with us, it never can be established in the minds of men in general.
And, my dear friend, let us be thankful that it never can; for if it
could, that fact would have proved the possibility of miracles by
contradicting one of those very deductions from uniform experience on
the validity of which their impossibility is demonstrated.