the
dogmatist. It is we Christians who accept all actual evidence--it is you
rationalists who refuse actual evidence, being constrained to do so by
your creed. But I am not constrained by any creed in the matter, and
looking impartially into certain miracles of mediaeval and modern times,
I have come to the conclusion that they occurred. All argument against
these plain facts is always argument in a circle. If I say, "Mediaeval
documents attest certain miracles as much as they attest certain
battles," they answer, "But mediaevals were superstitious"; if I want to
know in what they were superstitious, the only ultimate answer is that
they believed in the miracles. If I say "a peasant saw a ghost," I am
told, "But peasants are so credulous." If I ask, "Why credulous?" the
only answer is--that they see ghosts. Iceland is impossible because only
stupid sailors have seen it; and the sailors are only stupid because
they say they have seen Iceland. It is only fair to add that there is
another argument that the unbeliever may rationally use against
miracles, though he himself generally forgets to use it.

He may say that there has been in many miraculous stories a notion of
spiritual preparation and acceptance: in short, that the miracle could
only come to him who believed in it. It may be so, and if it is so how
are we to test it? If we are inquiring whether certain results follow
faith, it is useless to repeat wearily that (if they happen) they do
follow faith. If faith is one of the conditions, those without faith
have a most healthy right to laugh. But they have no right to judge.
Being a believer may be, if you like, as bad as being drunk; still if we
were extracting psychological facts from drunkards, it would be absurd
to be always taunting them with having been drunk. Suppose we were
investigating whether angry men really saw a red mist before their eyes.
Suppose sixty excellent householders swore that when angry they had seen
this crimson cloud: surely it would be absurd to answer "Oh, but you
admit you were angry at the time." They might reasonably rejoin (in a
stentorian chorus), "How the blazes could we discover, without being
angry, whether angry people see red?" So the saints and ascetics might
rationally reply, "Suppose that the question is whether believers can
see visions--even then, if you are interested in visions it is no point
to object to believers." You are still arguing in a circle--in that old
mad circl