reply that
we ascribe no such effects to such causes. We perceive no virtue or
energy in these things more than in other things of the same kind. They
are merely signs to connect the miracle with its end. The effect we
ascribe simply to the volition of Deity; of whose existence and power,
not to say of whose Presence and agency, we have previous and
independent proof. We have, therefore, all we seek for in the works of
rational agents--a sufficient power and an adequate motive. In a word,
once believe that there is a God, and miracles are not incredible.

Mr. Hume states the ease of miracles to be a contest of opposite
improbabilities, that is to say, a question whether it be more
improbable that the miracle should be true, or the testimony false: and
this I think a fair account of the controversy. But herein I remark a
want of argumentative justice, that, in describing the improbability of
miracles, he suppresses all those circumstances of extenuation, which
result from our knowledge of the existence, power, and disposition of
the Deity; his concern in the creation, the end answered by the miracle,
the importance of that end, and its subserviency to the plan pursued in
the work of nature. As Mr. Hume has represented the question, miracles
are alike incredible to him who is previously assured of the constant
agency of a Divine Being, and to him who believes that no such Being
exists in the universe. They are equally incredible, whether related to
have been wrought upon occasion the most deserving, and for purposes the
most beneficial, or for no assignable end whatever, or for an end
confessedly trifling or pernicious. This surely cannot be a correct
statement. In adjusting also the other side of the balance, the strength
and weight of testimony, this author has provided an answer to every
possible accumulation of historical proof by telling us that we are not
obliged to explain how the story of the evidence arose. Now I think that
we are obliged; not, perhaps, to show by positive accounts how it did,
but by a probable hypothesis how it might so happen. The existence of
the testimony is a phenomenon; the truth of the fact solves the
phenomenon. If we reject this solution, we ought to have some other to
rest in; and none, even by our adversaries, can be admired, which is not
inconsistent with the principles that regulate human affairs and human
conduct at present, or which makes men then to have been a different
kind of