rked, neither by
the Deity, nor by any invisible agent; but by Beelzebub and his
compeers, or by very visible men.

Moreover, not to repeat what has been said respecting the absurdity of
supposing that something which occurs is a transgression of laws, our
only knowledge of which is derived from the observation of that which
occurs; upon what sort of evidence can we be justified in concluding
that a given event is the effect of a particular volition of the Deity,
or of the interposition of some invisible (that is unperceivable) agent?
It may be so, but how is the assertion, that it is so, to be tested? If
it be said that the event exceeds the power of natural causes, what can
justify such a saying? The day-fly has better grounds for calling a
thunderstorm supernatural, than has man, with his experience of an
infinitesimal fraction of duration, to say that the most astonishing
event that can be imagined is beyond the scope of natural causes.

"Whatever is intelligible and can be distinctly conceived, implies
no contradiction, and can never be proved false by any
demonstration, argument, or abstract reasoning _a priori_."--(IV.
p. 44.)

So wrote Hume, with perfect justice, in his _Sceptical Doubts_. But a
miracle, in the sense of a sudden and complete change in the customary
order of nature, is intelligible, can be distinctly conceived, implies
no contradiction; and, therefore, according to Hume's own showing,
cannot be proved false by any demonstrative argument.

Nevertheless, in diametrical contradiction to his own principles, Hume
says elsewhere:--

"It is a miracle that a dead man should come to life: because that
has never been observed in any age or country."--(IV. p. 134.)

That is to say, there is an uniform experience against such an event,
and therefore, if it occurs, it is a violation of the laws of nature.
Or, to put the argument in its naked absurdity, that which never has
happened never can happen, without a violation of the laws of nature. In
truth, if a dead man did come to life, the fact would be evidence, not
that any law of nature had been violated, but that those laws, even when
they express the results of a very long and uniform experience, are
necessarily based on incomplete knowledge, and are to be held only as
grounds of more or less justifiable expectation.

To sum up, the definition of a miracle as a suspension or a
contravention of the order of Nature is sel