The proof of miracles is then, as I said, a matter of evidence. When
Hume asserts that "a miracle is a violation of the laws of nature," we
meet him with the counter-assertion that it is rather the new
manifestation in this order of things of the oldest of powers, that
which originally introduced life into a lifeless world.
When he says that "a firm and unalterable experience has established
these laws," we say that science teaches us that there must have been
epochs in the history of the world when new forces made their appearance
on the scene, for it teaches us that the world was once incandescent,
and so incapable of supporting any conceivable form of animal life, but
that at a certain geological period life made its appearance.
Now, we believe that it is just as wonderful, and contrary to the
experience of a lifeless world, that life should appear on that world,
as that it is contrary to the experience of the present state of things,
that a dead body should be raised.
When he asserts that a miraculous event is contrary to uniform
experience, we can only reply that it is not contrary to the experience
of the Evangelists, of St.
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