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The dictionary defines Miracle - a divinely natural phenomenon experienced humanly as the fulfillment of spiritual law. We see miracles all around us as we speak of divine intervention in our lives. Miracles have always been part of the human experience - allowing us to believe in a god greater than us who will return one day. Miracles are generally unexplained phenomenon. Miracles can be experienced by one person or can be a collective experience / hallucination.

The Skeptics Dictionary states: "A miracle is "a transgression of a law of nature by a particular volition of the Deity, or by the interposition of some invisible agent". Theologians of the Old & New Testament religions consider only God-willed contravention of the laws of nature to be true miracles. However, they admit others can do and have done things which contravene the laws of nature; such acts are attributed to diabolical powers and are called "false miracles." Many outside of the Biblical based religions believe in the ability to transgress laws of nature through acts of will in consort with paranormal or occult powers. They generally refer to these transgressions not as miracles, but as magick." ;- miracle
A miracle is "a transgression of a law of nature by a particular volition of the Deity, or by the interposition of some invisible agent" (Hume, 123n). Theologians of the Old & New Testament religions consider only God-willed contravention of the laws of nature to be true miracles. However, they admit others can do and have done things which contravene the laws of nature; such acts are attributed to diabolical powers and are called "false miracles." Many outside of the Biblical based religions believe in the ability to transgress laws of nature through acts of will in consort with paranormal or occult powers. They generally refer to these transgressions not as miracles, but as magick.

All religions report numerous and equally credible miracles. Hume compares deciding amongst religions on the basis of their miracles to the task of a judge who must evaluate contradictory, but equally reliable, testimonies. Each religion establishes itself as solidly as the next, thereby overthrowing and destroying its rivals. Furthermore, the more ancient and barbarous a people is, the greater the tendency for miracles and prodigies of all kinds to flourish.

...it forms a strong presumption against all supernatural and miraculous relations that they are observed chiefly to abound among ignorant and barbarous nations; or if a civilized people has ever given admission to any of them, that people will be found to have received them from ignorant and barbarous ancestors, who transmitted them with that inviolable sanction and authority which always attend received opinions (Hume, 126).

While there are still many people today who believe in miracles, no modern historian fills his or her books with accounts of miraculous events. It is improbable that the report of even a single miracle would find its way into such texts today. Indeed, only those who cater to the superstitious and credulous, such as the National Enquirer and a good portion of the rest of the mass media, would even think of reporting an alleged miracle without taking a very skeptical attitude towards it. No scholarly journal today would consider an author rational if he or she were to sprinkle reports of miracles throughout a treatise. The modern scholar dismisses all such reports as either lies or cases of collective hallucination.

Hume was aware that no matter how scientific or rational a civilization became, belief in miracles would never be eradicated. Human nature is such that we love the marvelous and the wondrous. Human nature is also such that we love even more to be the bearer of a story of the marvelous and the wondrous. The more wondrous our story, the more merit both we and it attain. Vanity, delusion and zealotry have led to more than one pious fraud supporting a holy and meritorious cause with gross embellishments and outright lies about witnessing miraculous events (Hume, 136).

Hume's greatest argument against belief in miracles, however, was modeled after an argument made by John Tillotson, Archbishop of Canterbury. Tillotson and others, such as William Chillingworth before him and his contemporary Bishop Edward Stillingfleet, had argued for what they called a "commonsense" defense of Christianity, i.e., Anglicanism. Tillotson's argument against the Catholic doctrine of transubstantiation or "the real presence" was simple and direct. The idea contradicts common sense, he said. The doctrine claims that the bread and wine used in the communion ceremony is changed in substance so that what is bread and wine to all the senses is in fact the body and blood of Christ. If it looks like bread, smells like bread, tastes like bread, then it is bread. To believe otherwise is to give up the basis for all knowledge based on sense experience. Anything could be other than it appears to the senses. This argument has nothing to do with the skeptical argument about the uncertainty of sense knowledge. This is an argument not about certainty but about reasonable belief. If the Catholics are right about transubstantiation, then a book might really be a bishop, for example, or a pear might actually be Westminster Cathedral. The accidents of a thing would be no clue as to its substance. Everything we perceive could be completely unrelated to what it appears to be. Such a world would be unreasonable and unworthy of God. If the senses can't be trusted in this one case, they can't be trusted in any. To believe in transubstantiation is to abandon the basis of all knowledge: sense experience.

Hume begins his essay on miracles by praising Tillotson's argument as being "as concise and elegant and strong as any argument can possibly be supposed against a doctrine so little worthy of a serious refutation." He then goes on to say that he fancies that he has (118)

discovered an argument of a like nature 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 history, sacred and profane.

His argument is a paradigm of simplicity and elegance (122):

A miracle is a violation of the laws of nature; and as a firm and unalterable experience has established these laws, the proof against a miracle, from the very nature of the fact, is as entire as any argument from experience can possibly be imagined.

Or put even more succinctly (122):

There must...be a uniform experience against every miraculous event, otherwise the event would not merit that appellation.

The logical implication of this argument is that (123)

no testimony is sufficient to establish a miracle unless the testimony be of such a kind that its falsehood would be more miraculous than the fact which it endeavors to establish.

What Hume has done is to take the commonsense Anglican argument against the Catholic doctrine of transubstantiation and applied it to miracles, the basis of all religious sects. The laws of nature have not been established by occasional or frequent experiences of a similar kind, but of uniform experience. It is "more than probable," says Hume, that all men must die, that lead can't remain suspended in air by itself and that fire consumes wood and is extinguished by water. If someone were to report to Hume that a man could suspend lead in the air by an act of will, Hume would ask himself if "the falsehood of his testimony would be more miraculous than the event which he relates." If so, then he would believe the testimony. However, he does not believe there ever was a miraculous event established "on so full an evidence."

Consider the fact that the uniformity of experience of people around the world has been that once a human limb has been amputated, it does not grow back. What would you think if a friend of yours, a scientist of the highest integrity with a Ph.D. in physics from Harvard, were to tell you that she was off in Spain last summer and met a man who used to have no legs but now walks on two fine, healthy limbs. She tells you that a holy man rubbed oil on his stumps and his legs grew back. He lives in a small village and all the villagers attest to this "miracle." Your friend is convinced a miracle occurred. What would you believe? To believe in this miracle would be to reject the principle of the uniformity of experience, upon which laws of nature are based. It would be to reject a fundamental assumption of all science, that the laws of nature are inviolate. The miracle cannot be believed without abandoning a basic principle of empirical knowledge: that like things under like circumstances produce like results.

Of course there is another constant, another product of uniform experience which should not be forgotten: the tendency of people at all times in all ages to desire wondrous events, to be deluded about them, to fabricate them, create them, embellish them, enhance them, and come to believe in the absolute truth of the creations of their own passions and heated imaginations. Does this mean that miracles cannot occur? Of course not. It means, however, that when a miracle is reported the probability will always be greater that the person doing the reporting is mistaken, deluded or a fraud than that the miracle really occurred. To believe in a miracle, as Hume said, is not an act of reason but of faith.
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The Catholic Encyclopedia states: "A miracle is said to be above nature when the effect produced is above the native powers and forces in creatures of which the known laws of nature are the expression."

Miracle
(Latin miraculum, from mirari, "to wonder").

In general, a wonderful thing, the word being so used in classical Latin; in a specific sense, the Latin Vulgate designates by miracula wonders of a peculiar kind, expressed more clearly in the Greek text by the terms terata, dynameis, semeia, i.e., wonders performed by supernatural power as signs of some special mission or gift and explicitly ascribed to God.

These terms are used habitually in the New Testament and express the meaning of miraculum of the Vulgate. Thus St. Peter in his first sermon speaks of Christ as approved of God, dynamesin, kai terasin kai semeiois (Acts 2:22) and St. Paul says that the signs of his Apostleship were wrought, semeiois te kai terasin kai dynamesin (2 Corinthians 12:12). Their united meaning is found in the term erga i.e., works, the word constantly employed in the Gospels to designate the miracles of Christ. The analysis of these terms therefore gives the nature and scope of the miracle.

I. NATURE
(1) The word terata literally means "wonders", in reference to feelings of amazement excited by their occurrence, hence effects produced in the material creation appealing to, and grasped by, the senses, usually by the sense of sight, at times by hearing, e.g., the baptism of Jesus, the conversion of St. Paul. Thus, though the works of Divine grace, such as the Sacramental Presence, are above the power of nature, and due to God alone, they may be called miraculous only in the wide meaning of the term, i.e., as supernatural effects, but they are not miracles in the sense here understood, for miracles in the strict sense are apparent. The miracle falls under the grasp of the senses, either in the work itself (e.g. raising the dead to life) or in its effects (e.g., the gifts of infused knowledge with the Apostles). In like manner the justification of a soul in itself is miraculous, but is not a miracle properly so called, unless it takes place in a sensible manner, as, e.g., in the case of St. Paul.

The wonder of the miracle is due to the fact that its cause is hidden, and an effect is expected other than what actually takes place. Hence, by comparison with the ordinary course of things, the miracle is called extraordinary. In analyzing the difference between the extraordinary character of the miracle and the ordinary course of nature, the Fathers of the Church and theologians employ the terms above, contrary to, and outside nature. These terms express the manner in which the miracle is extraordinary.

A miracle is said to be above nature when the effect produced is above the native powers and forces in creatures of which the known laws of nature are the expression, as raising a dead man to life, e.g., Lazarus (John 11), the widow's son (1 Kings 17). A miracle is said to be outside, or beside, nature when natural forces may have the power to produce the effect, at least in part, but could not of themselves alone have produced it in the way it was actually brought about. Thus the effect in abundance far exceeds the power of natural forces, or it takes place instantaneously without the means or processes which nature employs. In illustration we have the multiplication of loaves by Jesus (John 6), the changing of water into wine at Cana (John 2) -- for the moisture of the air by natural and artificial processes is changed into wine -- or the sudden healing of a large extent of diseased tissue by a draught of water. A miracle is said to be contrary to nature when the effect produced is contrary to the natural course of things.

The term miracle here implies the direct opposition of the effect actually produced to the natural causes at work, and its imperfect understanding has given rise to much confusion in modern thought. Thus Spinoza calls a miracle a violation of the order of nature (proeverti, "Tract. Theol. Polit.", vi). Hume says it is a "violation" or an "infraction", and many writers -- e.g., Martensen, Hodge, Baden-Powell, Theodore Parker -- use the term for miracles as a whole. But every miracle is not of necessity contrary to nature, for there are miracles above or outside nature.

Again, the term contrary to nature does not mean "unnatural" in the sense of producing discord and confusion. The forces of nature differ in power and are in constant interaction. This produces interferences and counteractions of forces. This is true of mechanical, chemical, and biological forces. So, also, at every moment of the day I interfere with and counteract natural forces about me. I study the properties of natural forces with a view to obtain conscious control by intelligent counteractions of one force against another. Intelligent counteraction marks progress in chemistry, in physics -- e.g., steam locomotion, aviation -- and in the prescriptions of the physician. Man controls nature, nay, can live only by the counteraction of natural forces. Though all this goes on around us, we never speak of natural forces violated. These forces are still working after their kind, and no force is destroyed, nor is any law broken, nor does confusion result. The introduction of human will may bring about a displacement of the physical forces, but no infraction of physical processes.

Now in a miracle God's action relative to its bearing on natural forces is analogous to the action of human personality. Thus, e.g., it is against the nature of iron to float, but the action of Eliseus in raising the axe-head to the surface of the water (2 Kings 6) is no more a violation, or a transgression, or an infraction of natural laws than if he raised it with his hand. Again, it is of the nature of fire to burn, but when, e.g., the Three Children were preserved untouched in the fiery furnace (Daniel 3) there was nothing unnatural in the act, as these writers use the word, any more than there would be in erecting a dwelling absolutely fireproof. In the one case, as in the other, there was no paralysis of natural forces and no consequent disorder.

The extraordinary element in the miracle -- i.e. an event apart from the ordinary course of things; enables us to understand the teaching of theologians that events which ordinarily take place in the natural or supernatural course of Divine Providence are not miracles, although they are beyond the efficiency of natural forces. Thus, e.g., the creation of the soul is not a miracle, for it takes place in the ordinary course of nature. Again, the justification of the sinner, the Eucharistic Presence, the sacramental effects, are not miracles for two reasons: they are beyond the grasp of the senses and they have place in the ordinary course of God's supernatural Providence.

(2) The word dynamis, "power" is used in the New Testament to signify:

the power of working miracles, (en dymamei semeion -- Romans 15:19);
mighty works as the effects of this power, i.e., miracles themselves (al pleistai dynameis autou -- Matthew 11:20) and expresses the efficient cause of the miracle, i.e., Divine power.
Hence the miracle is called supernatural, because the effect is beyond the productive power of nature and implies supernatural agency. Thus St. Thomas teaches: "Those effects are rightly to be termed miracles which are wrought by Divine power apart from the order usually observed in nature" (Contra Gent., III, cii), and they are apart from the natural order because they are "beyond the order or laws of the whole created nature" (ST I:102:4). Hence dynamis adds to the meaning of terata by pointing out the efficient cause. For this reason miracles in Scripture are called "the finger of God" (Exodus 8:19, Luke 11:20), "the hand of the Lord" (1 Samuel 5:6), "the hand of our God" (Ezra 8:31). In referring the miracle to God as its efficient cause the answer is given to the objection that the miracle is unnatural, i.e., an uncaused event without meaning or place in nature. With God as the cause, the miracle has a place in the designs of God's Providence (Contra Gent. III, xcviii). In this sense -- i.e., relatively to God -- St. Augustine speaks of the miracle as natural (De Civit. Dei, XXI, viii, n. 2).
An event is above the course of nature and beyond its productive powers:

with regard to its substantial nature, i.e., when the effect is of such a kind that no natural power could bring it to pass in any manner or form whatsoever, as e.g., the raising to life of the widow's son (Luke 7), or the cure of the man born blind (John 9). These miracles are called miracles as to substance (quoad substantiam).
With regard to the manner in which the effect is produced i.e., where there may be forces in nature fitted and capable of producing the effect considered in itself, yet the effect is produced in a manner wholly different from the manner in which it should naturally be performed, i.e., instantaneously, by a word, e.g., the cure of the leper (Luke 5). These are called miracles as to the manner of their production (quoad modum).
God's power is shown in the miracle:

directly through His own immediate action or
mediately through creatures as means or instruments.
In the latter case the effects must be ascribed to God, for He works in and through the instruments; "Ipso Deo in illis operante" (Augustine, "De Civit. Dei", X, xii). Hence God works miracles through the instrumentality

of angels, e.g., the Three Children in the fiery furnace (Daniel 3), the deliverance of St. Peter from prison (Acts 12);
of men, e.g., Moses and Aaron (Exodus 7), Elias (1 Kings 17), Eliseus (2 Kings 5), the Apostles (Acts 2:43), St. Peter (Acts 3:9), St. Paul (Acts 19), the early Christians (Galatians 3:5).
In the Bible also, as in church history, we learn that animate things are instruments of Divine power, not because they have any excellence in themselves, but through a special relation to God. Thus we distinguish holy relics, e.g., the mantle of Elias (2 Kings 2), the body of Eliseus (2 Kings 13), the hem of Christ's garment (Matthew 9), the handkerchiefs of St. Paul (Acts 19:12); holy images, e.g., the brazen serpent (Numbers 21) holy things, e.g., the Ark of the Covenant, the sacred vessels of the Temple (Daniel 5); holy places, e.g., the Temple of Jerusalem (2 Chronicles 6:7), the waters of the Jordan (2 Kings 5), the Pool of Bethsaida (John 5).
Hence the contention of some modern writers, that a miracle requires an immediate action of Divine power, is not true. It is sufficient that the miracle be due to the intervention of God, and its nature is revealed by the utter lack of proportion between the effect and what are called means or instruments.

The word semeion means "sign", an appeal to intelligence, and expresses the purpose or final cause of the miracle. A miracle is a factor in the Providence of God over men. Hence the glory of God and the good of men are the primary or supreme ends of every miracle. This is clearly expressed by Christ in the raising of Lazarus (John 11), and the Evangelist says that Jesus, in working His first miracle at Cana, "manifested his glory" (John 2:11). Therefore the miracle must be worthy the holiness, goodness, and justice of God, and conducive to the true good of men. Hence they are not performed by God to repair physical defects in His creation, nor are they intended to produce, nor do they produce, disorder or discord; do they contain any element which is wicked, ridiculous, useless, or unmeaning. Hence they are not on the same plane with mere wonders, tricks works of ingenuity, or magic. The efficacy, usefulness, purpose of the work and the manner of performing it clearly show that it must be ascribed to Divine power. This high standing and dignity of the miracle is shown, e.g., in the miracles of Moses (Exodus 7-10), of Elias (1 Kings 18:21-3

, of Eliseus (2 Kings 5). The multitudes glorified God at the cure of the paralytic (Matthew 9:

, of the blind man (Luke 18:43), at the miracles of Christ in general (Matthew 15:31, Luke 19:37), as at the cure of the lame man by St. Peter (Acts 4:21). Hence miracles are signs of the supernatural world and our connection with it.

In miracles we can always distinguish secondary ends, subordinate, however, to the primary ends. Thus

they are evidences attesting and confirming the truth of a Divine mission, or of a doctrine of faith or morals, e.g., Moses (Exodus 4), Elias (1 Kings 17:24). For this reason the Jews see in Christ "the prophet" (John 6:14), in whom "God hath visited his people" (Luke 7:16). Hence the disciples believed in Him (John 2:11) and Nicodemus (John 3:2) and the man born blind (John 9:3

, and the many who had seen the raising of Lazarus (John 11:45). Jesus constantly appealed to His "works" to prove that He was sent by God and that He is the Son of God, e.g., to the Disciples of John (Matthew 11:4), to the Jews (John 10:37). He claims that His miracles are a greater testimony than the testimony of John (John 5:36), condemns those who will not believe (John 15:24), as He praises those who do (John 17:

, and exhibits miracles as the signs of the True Faith (Mark 16:17). The Apostles appeal to miracles as the confirmation of Christ's Divinity and mission (John 20:31; Acts 10:3

, and St. Paul counts them as the signs of his Apostleship (2 Corinthians 12:12).
Miracles are wrought to attest true sanctity. Thus, e.g., God defends Moses (Numbers 12), Elias (2 Kings 1), Eliseus (2 Kings 13). Hence the testimony of the man born blind (John 9:30 sqq.) and the official processes in the canonization of saints.
As benefits either spiritual or temporal. The temporal favours are always subordinate to spiritual ends, for they are a reward or a pledge of virtue, e.g. the widow of Sarephta (1 Kings 17), the Three Children in the fiery furnace (Daniel 3), the preservation of Daniel (Daniel 5), the deliverance of St. Peter from prison (Acts 12), of St. Paul from shipwreck (Acts 27). Thus semeion, i.e., "sign", completes the meaning of dynamis, i.e., "[Divine] power". It reveals the miracle as an act of God's supernatural Providence over men. It gives a positive content to teras, i.e., "wonder", for, whereas the wonder shows the miracle as a deviation from the ordinary course of nature, the sign gives the purpose of the deviation.
This analysis shows that

the miracle is essentially an appeal to knowledge. Therefore miracles can be distinguished from purely natural occurrences. A miracle is a fact in material creation, and falls under the observation of the senses or comes to us through testimony, like any natural fact. Its miraculous character is known:
from positive knowledge of natural forces, e.g., the law of gravity, the law that fire burns. To say that we do not know all the laws of nature, and therefore cannot know a miracle (Rousseau, "Lett. de la Mont.", let. iii), is beside the question, for it would make the miracle an appeal to ignorance. I may not know all the laws of the penal code, but I can know with certainty that in a particular instance a person violates one definite law.
From our positive knowledge of the limits of natural forces. Thus, e.g., we may not know the strength of a man, but we do know that he cannot by himself move a mountain. In enlarging our knowledge of natural forces, the progress of science has curtailed their sphere and defined their limits, as in the law of abiogenesis. Hence, as soon as we have reason to suspect that any event, however uncommon or rare it appear, may arise from natural causes or be conformable to the usual course of nature, we immediately lose the conviction of its being a miracle. A miracle is a manifestation of God's power; so long as this is not clear, we hould reject it as such.
Miracles are signs of God's Providence over men, hence they are of high moral character, simple and obvious in the forces at work, in the circumstances of their working, and in their aim and purpose. Now philosophy indicates the possibility, and Revelation teaches the fact, that spiritual beings, both good and bad, exist, and possess greater power than man possesses. Apart from the speculative question as to the native power of these beings, we are certain
that God alone can perform those effects which are called substantial miracles, e.g., raising the dead to life,
that miracles performed by the angels, as recorded in the Bible, are always ascribed to God, and Holy Scripture gives Divine authority to no miracles less than Divine;
that Holy Scripture shows the power of evil spirits as strictly conditioned, e.g., testimony of the Egyptian magicians (Exodus 8:19), the story of Job, evil spirits acknowledging the power of Christ (Matthew 8:31), the express testimony of Christ himself (Matthew 24:24) and of the Apocalypse (Revelation 9:14). Granting that these spirits may perform prodigies -- i.e., works of skill and ingenuity which, relatively to our powers, may seem to be miraculous -- yet these works lack the meaning and purpose which would stamp them as the language of God to men.
II. ERRORS
Deists reject miracles, for they deny the Providence of God. Agnostics also, and Positivists reject them: Comte regarded miracles as the fruit of the theological imagination. Modern Pantheism has no place for miracles. Thus Spinoza held creation to be the aspect of the one substance, i.e., God, and, as he taught that miracles were a violation of nature, they would therefore be a violation of God. The answer is, first that Spinoza's conception of God and nature is false and, secondly, that in fact miracles are not a violation of nature. To Hegel creation is the evolutive manifestation of the one Absolute Idea, i.e., God, and to the neo-Hegelians (e.g., Thos. Green) consciousness is identified with God; therefore to both a miracle has no meaning.

Erroneous definitions of the supernatural lead to erroneous definitions of the miracle. Thus

Bushnell defines the natural to be what is necessary, the supernatural to be what is free; therefore the material world is what we call nature, the world of man's life is supernatural. So also Dr. Strong ("Baptist Rev.", vol. I, 1879), Rev. C.A. Row ("Supernat. in the New Test.", London, 1875). In this sense every free volition of man is a supernatural act and a miracle.
The natural supernaturalism proposed by Carlyle, Theodore Parker, Prof. Pfleiderer, and, more recently, Prof. Everett ("The Psychologic Elem. of Relig. Faith", London and New York, 1902), Prof. Bowne ("Immanence of God", Boston and New York, 1905), Hastings ("Diction. of Christ and the Gospels", s.v. "Miracles"). Thus the natural and the supernatural are in reality one: the natural is its aspect to man, the supernatural is its aspect to God.
The "Immediate theory", that God acts immediately without second causes, or that second causes, or laws of nature, must be defined as the regular methods of God's acting. This teaching is combined with the doctrine of evolution.
The "relative" theory of miracles is by far the most popular with non-Catholic writers. This view was originally proposed to hold Christian miracles and at the same time hold belief in the uniformity of nature. Its main forms are three.
(1) The mechanical view of Babbage (Bridgewater Treatises)
In Babbage's view, which was later advanced by the Duke of Argyll (Reign of Law), nature is presented as a vast mechanism wound up in the beginning and containing in itself the capacity to deviate at stated times from its ordinary course. The theory is ingenious, but it makes the miracle a natural event. It admits the assumption of opponents of miracles, viz., that physical effects must have physical causes, but this assumption is contradicted by common facts of experience, e.g., will acts on matter.

(2) The "unknown" law of Spinoza
Spinoza taught that the term miracle should be understood with reference to the opinions of men, and that it means simply an event which we are unable to explain by other events familiar to our experience. Locke, Kant, Eichhorn, Paulus Renan hold the same view. Thus Prof. Cooper writes "The miracle of one age becomes the ordinary working of nature in the next" ("Ref. Ch. R.", July, 1900). Hence a miracle never happened in fact, and is only a name to cover our ignorance. Thus Matthew Arnold could claim that all Biblical miracles will disappear with the progress of science (Lit. and Bible) and M. Muller that "the miraculous is reduced to mere seeming" (in Rel., pref., p. 10). The advocates of this theory assume that miracles are an appeal to ignorance.

(3) The "higher law" theory of Argyll of "Unseen Universe"
Trench, Lange (on Matt., p. 153), Gore (Bampton Lect, p. 36) proposed to refute Spinoza's claim that miracles are unnatural and productive of disorder. Thus with them the miracle is quite natural because it takes place in accordance with laws of a higher nature. Others -- e.g., Schleiermacher and Ritschl -- mean by higher law, subjective religious feeling. Thus, to them a miracle is not different from any other natural event; it becomes a miracle by relation to the religious feeling. A writer in "The Biblical World" (Oct., 1908) holds that the miracle consists in the religious significance of the natural event in its relation to the religious appreciation as a sign of Divine favour. Others explain higher law as a moral law, or law of the spirit. Thus the miracles of Christ are understood as illustrations of a higher, grander, more comprehensive law than men had yet known, the incoming of a new life, of higher forces acting according to higher laws as manifestations of the spirit in the higher stages of its development. The criticism of this theory is that miracles would cease to be miracles: they would not be extraordinary, for they would take place under the same conditions. To bring miracles under a law not yet understood is to deny their existence. Thus, when Trench defines a miracle as "an extraordinary event which beholders can reduce to no law with which they are acquainted", the definition includes hypnotism and clairvoyance. If by higher law we mean the high law of God's holiness, then a miracle can be referred to this law, but the higher law in this case is God Himself and the use of the term is apt to create confusion.

III. ANTECEDENT IMPROBABILITY
The great problem of modern theology is the place and value of miracles. In the opinion of certain writers, their antecedent improbability, based on the universal reign of law is so great that they are not worthy of serious consideration. Thus his conviction of the uniformity of nature led Hume to deny testimony for miracles in general, as it led Baur, Strauss, and Renan to explain the miracles of Christ on natural grounds. The fundamental principle is that whatever happens is natural, and what is not natural does not happen. On belief in the uniformity of nature is based the profound conviction of the organic unity of the universe, a characteristic trait of nineteenth-century thought. It has dominated a certain school of literature, and, with George Eliot, Hall Came, and Thomas Hardy, the natural agencies of heredity, environment, and necessary law rule the world of human life. It is the basic principle in modern treatises on sociology.

Its chief exponent is science philosophy, a continuation of the Deism of the eighteenth century without the idea of God, and the view herein presented, of an evolving universe working out its own destiny under the rigid sway of inherent natural laws, finds but a thin disguise in the Pantheistic conception, so prevalent among non-Catholic theologians, of an immanent God, who is the active ground of the world-development according to natural law -- i.e., Monism of mind or will. This belief is the gulf between the old and the modern school of theology. Max Muller finds the kernel of the modern conception of the world in the idea that "there is a law and order in everything, and that an unbroken chain of causes and effects holds the whole universe together" ("Anthrop. Relig.", pref., p. 10). Throughout the universe there is a mechanism of nature and of human life, presenting a necessary chain, or sequence, of cause and effect, which is not, and cannot be, broken by an interference from without, as is assumed in the case of a miracle. This view is the ground of modern objections to Christianity, the source of modern scepticism, and the reason for a prevailing disposition among Christian thinkers to deny miracles a place in Christian evidences and to base the proof for Christianity on internal evidences alone.

Criticism
(1) This view ultimately rests upon the assumption that the material universe alone exists. It is refuted:

by proving that in man there is a spiritual soul totally distinct from organic and inorganic existence, and that this soul reveals an intellectual and moral order totally distinct from the physical order;
by inferring the existence of God from the phenomena of the intellectual, the moral, and the physical order.
(2) This view is also based on an erroneous meaning of the term nature. Kant made a distinction between the noumenon and the phenomenon of a thing, he denied that we can know the noumenon, i.e., the thing in itself; all we know is the phenomenon, i.e., the appearance of the thing. This distinction has profoundly influenced modern thought. As a Transcendental Idealist, Kant denied that we know the real phenomenon; to him only the ideal appearance is the object of the mind. Thus knowledge is a succession of ideal appearances, and a miracle would be an interruption of that succession. Others, i.e., the Sense-School (Hume, Mill, Bain, Spencer, and others), teach that, while we cannot know the substance or essences of things, we can and do grasp the real phenomena. To them the world is a phenomenal world and is a pure coexistence and succession of phenomena, the antecedent determines the consequent. In this view a miracle would be an unexplained break in the (so-called) invariable law of sequence, on which law Mill based his Logic. Now we reply that the real meaning of the word nature includes both the phenomenon and the noumenon. We have the idea of substance with an objective content. In reality the progress of science consists in the observation of, and experimentation upon, things with a view to find out their properties or potencies, which in turn enable us to know the physical essences of the various substances.

(3) Through the erroneous conception of nature, the principle of causality is confounded with the law of the uniformity of nature. But they are absolutely different things. The former is a primary conviction which has its source in our inner consciousness. The latter is an induction based upon a long and careful observation of facts: it is not a self-evident truth, nor is it a universal and necessary principle, as Mill himself has shown (Logic, IV, xxi). In fact uniformity of nature is the result of the principle of causation.

(4) The main contention, that the uniformity of nature rules miracles out of consideration, because they would imply a break in the uniformity and a violation of natural law, is not true. The laws of nature are the observed modes or processes in which natural forces act. These forces are the properties or potencies of the essences of natural things. Our experience of causation is not the experience of a mere sequence but of a sequence due to the necessary operation of essences viewed as principles or sources of action.

Now essences are necessarily what they are and unchangeable, therefore their properties, or potencies, or forces, under given circumstances, act in the same way. On this, Scholastic philosophy bases the truth that nature is uniform in its action, yet holds that constancy of succession is not an absolute law for the succession is only constant so long as the noumenal relations remain the same. Thus Scholastic philosophy, in defending miracles, accepts the universal reign of law in this sense, and its teaching is in absolute accord with the methods actually pursued by modern science in scientific investigations. Hence it teaches the order of nature and the reign of law, and openly declares that, if there were no order, there would be no miracle.

It is significant that the Bible appeals constantly to the reign of law in nature, while it attests the actual occurrence of miracles. Now human will, in acting on material forces, interferes with the regular sequences, but does not paralyze the natural forces or destroy their innate tendency to act in a uniform manner. Thus a boy, by throwing a stone into the air, does not disarrange the order of nature or do away with the law of gravity. A new force only is brought in and counteracts the tendencies of the natural forces, just as the natural forces interact and counteract among themselves, as is shown in the well-known truths of the parallelogram of forces and the distinction between kinetic and potential energy. The analogy from man's act to God's act is complete as far as concerns a break in the uniformity of nature or a violation of its laws. The extent of the power exerted does not affect the point at issue. Hence physical nature is presented as a system of physical causes producing uniform results, and yet permits the interposition of personal agency without affecting its stability.

(5) The truth of this position is so manifest that Mill admits Hume's argument against miracles to be valid only on the supposition that God does not exist for, he says, "a miracle is a new effect supposed to be produced by the introduction of a new cause . . . of the adequacy of that cause, if present, there can be no doubt" (Logic, III, xxv). Hence, admitting the existence of God, Hume's "uniform sequence" does not hold as an objection to miracles. Huxley also denies that physicists withhold belief in miracles because miracles are in violation of natural laws and he rejects the whole of this line of argument ("Some Controverted questions", 209; "Life of Hume", 132), and holds that a miracle is a question of evidence pure and simple. Hence the objection to miracles on the ground of their antecedent improbability has been abandoned. "The Biblical World" (Oct., 1908) says "The old rigid system of 'Laws of Nature' is being broken up by modern science. There are many events which scientists recognize to be inexplicable by any known law. But this inability to furnish a scientific explanation is no reason for denying the existence of any event, if it is adequately attested. Thus the old a priori argument against miracles is gone." Thus in modern thought the question of the miracle is simply a question of fact.

IV. PLACE AND VALUE OF MIRACLES IN THE CHRISTIAN VIEW OF THE WORLD
As the great objection to miracles really rests on narrow and false philosophical views of the universe, so the true world-view is necessary to grasp their place and value.

Christianity teaches that God created and governs the world. This government is His xxyyyk.htm">Providence. It is shown in the delicate adjustment and subordination of the tendencies proper to material things, resulting in the marvellous stability and harmony which prevail throughout the physical creation, and in the moral order, which through conscience, is to guide and control the tendencies of man's nature to a complete harmony in human life. Man is a personal being, with intelligence and free-will, capable of knowing and serving God, and created for that purpose. To him nature is the book of God's work revealing the Creator through the design visible in the material order and through conscience, the voice of the moral order based in the very constitution of his own being. Hence the relation of man to God is a personal one. God's Providence is not confined to the revelation of Himself through His works. He has manifested Himself in a supernatural manner throwing a flood of light on the relations which should exist between man and Himself. The Bible contains this revelation, and is called the Book of God's Word. It gives the record of God's supernatural Providence leading up to the Redemption and the founding of the Christian Church. Here we are told that beyond the sphere of nature there is another realm of existence -- the supernatural, peopled by spiritual beings and departed souls. Both spheres, the natural and the supernatural, are under the overruling Providence of God. Thus God and man are two great facts. The relation of the soul to its Maker is religion.

Religion is the knowledge, love, and service of God; its expression is called worship, and the essence of worship is prayer. Thus between man and God there is constant intercourse, and in God's Providence the appointed means of this intercourse is prayer. By prayer man speaks to God in acts of faith, hope, love, and contrition and implores His aid. In answer to prayer God acts on the soul by His grace and, in special circumstances, by working miracles. Hence the great fact of prayer, as the connecting link of man to God, implies a constant interference of God in the life of man. Therefore in the Christian view of the world, miracles have a place and a meaning. They arise out of the personal relation between God and man. The conviction that the pure of heart are pleasing to God, in some mysterious way, is worldwide; even among the heathens pure offerings only are prepared for the sacrifice.

This intimate sense of God's presence may account for the universal tendency to refer all striking phenomena to supernatural causes. Error and exaggeration do not change the nature of the belief founded in the abiding conviction of the Providence of God. To this belief St. Paul appealed in his discourse to the Athenians (Acts 17). In the miracle, therefore, God subordinates physical nature to a higher purpose, and this higher purpose is identical with the highest moral aims of existence. The mechanical view of the world is in harmony with the teleological, and when purpose exists, no event is isolated or unmeaning. Man is created for God, and a miracle is the proof and pledge of His supernatural xxyyyk.htm">Providence. Hence we can understand how, in devout minds, there is even a presumption for and an expectation of miracles. They show the subordination of the lower world to the higher, they are the breaking in of the higher world on the lower ("C. Gent.", III, xcviii, xcix; Benedict XIV, 1,c,1,IV,p. l.c.I).

Some writers -- e.g., Paley, Mansel, Mozley, Dr. George Fisher -- push the Christian view to the extreme, and say that miracles are necessary to attest revelation. Catholic theologians, however, take a broader view. They hold

that the great primary ends of miracles are the manifestation of God's glory and the good of men; that the particular or secondary ends, subordinate to the former, are to confirm the truth of a mission or a doctrine of faith or morals, to attest the sanctity of God's servants, to confer benefits and vindicate Divine justice.
Hence they teach that the attestation of Revelation is not the primary end of the miracle, but its main secondary end, though not the only one.
They say that the miracles of Christ were not necessary but "most fitting and altogether in accord with His mission" (decentissimum et maximopere conveniens) -- Benedict XIV, IV, p. 1, c. 2, n. 3; ST III:43) as a means to attest its truth. At the same time they place miracles among the strongest and most certain evidences of Divine revelation.
Yet they teach that, as evidences, miracles have not a physical force, i.e., absolutely compelling assent, but only a moral force, i.e. they do no violence to free will, though their appeal to the assent is of the strongest kind.
That, as evidences, they are not wrought to show the internal truth of the doctrines, but only to give manifest reasons why we should accept the doctrines. Hence the distinction: not evidenter vera, but evidenter credibilia. For the Revelation, which miracles attest, contains supernatural doctrines above the comprehension of the mind and positive institutions in God's supernatural Providence over men. Thus the opinion of Locke, Trench, Mill, Mozley, and Cox, that the doctrine proves the miracle not the miracle the doctrine, is not true.
Finally, they maintain that the miracles of Scripture and the power in the Church of working miracles are of Divine faith, not, however the miracles of church history themselves. Hence they teach that the former are both evidences of faith and objects of faith, that the latter are evidences of the purpose for which they are wrought, not, however, objects of Divine faith. Hence this teaching guards against the other exaggerated view recently proposed by non-Catholic writers, who hold that miracles are now considered not as evidences but as objects of faith.
V. TESTIMONY
A miracle, like any natural event, is known either from personal observation or from the testimony of others. In the miracle we have the fact itself as an external occurrence and its miraculous character. The miraculous character of the fact consists in this: that its nature and the surrounding circumstances are of such a kind that we are forced to admit natural forces alone could not have produced it, and the only rational explanation is to be had in the interference of Divine agency. The perception of its miraculous character is a rational act of the mind, and is simply the application of the principle of causality with the methods of induction. The general rules governing the acceptance of testimony apply to miracles as to other facts of history. If we have certain evidence for the fact, we are bound to accept it. The evidence for miracles, as for historical facts in general, depends on the knowledge and veracity of the narrators, i.e., they who testify to the occurrence of the events must know what they tell and tell the truth. The extraordinary nature of the miracle requires more complete and accurate investigation. Such testimony we are not free to reject; otherwise we must deny all history whatsoever. We have no more rational warrant for rejecting miracles than for rejecting accounts of stellar eclipses. Hence, they who deny miracles have concentrated their efforts with the purpose of destroying the historical evidence for all miracles whatsoever and especially the evidence for the miracles of the Gospel.

Hume held that no testimony could prove miracles, for it is more probable that the testimony is false than that the miracles are true. But

his contention that "a uniform experience", which is "a direct and full proof", is against miracles, is denied by Mill, provided an adequate cause -- i.e., God -- exists.
Hume's "experience" may mean: (a) the experience of the individual, and his argument is made absurd (e.g., historic doubts about Napoleon) or (b) the experience of the race, which has become common property and the type of what may be expected. Now in fact we get this by testimony; many supernatural facts are part of this race experience; this supernatural part Hume prejudges, arbitrarily declares it untrue, which is the point to be proved and assumes that miraculous is synonymous with absurd. The past, so expurgated, is made the test of the future, and should prevent the consistent advocates of Hume from accepting the discoveries of science.
Hard-pressed, Hume is forced to make the distinction between testimony contrary to experience and testimony not conformable to experience, and holds that the latter may be accepted -- e.g., testimony of ice to the Indian prince. But this admission is fatal to his position.
Hume proceeds on the supposition that, for practical purposes, all the laws of nature are known, yet experience shows that this is not true.
His whole argument rests upon the rejected philosophical principle that external experience is the sole source of knowledge, rests upon the discredited basis that miracles are opposed to the uniformity of nature as violations of natural laws and was advanced through prejudice against Christianity. Hence later sceptics have receded from Hume's extreme position and teach, not that miracles cannot be proved, but that as a matter of fact they are not proved.
The attack by Hume on miracles in general has been applied to the miracles of the Bible, and has received added weight from the denial of Divine inspiration. Varying in form, its basic principle is the same, viz., the humanism of the Renaissance applied to theology. Thus we have:

(1) The interpretation theory
The old rationalism of Semler Eichhorn, de Wette, and Paulus, who held the credibility of the Bible records, but contended that they were a collection of writings composed by natural intelligence alone, and to be treated on the same plane with other natural productions of the human mind. They got rid of the supernatural by a bold interpretation of miracles as purely natural facts. This is called the "interpretation" theory, and appears today under two forms:

Modified rationalism, which teaches that we are warranted in accepting a very considerable portion of the Gospel narratives as substantially historical, without being compelled to believe in any miracles. Hence they give credence to the accounts of the demoniacs and healings, but allege that these wonders were wrought by, or in accordance with, natural law. Thus we have the electric theory of M. Corelli, the appeal to "moral therapeutics" by Matthew Arnold, and the psychological theory advanced by Prof. Bousset of Gottingen, in which he claims that Christ performed miracles by natural mental powers of a superior kind (cf. "N. World", March 1896). But the attempt to explain the miracles of the Gospel either by the natural powers of Christ, i.e., mental or moral superiority, or by peculiar states of the recipient, faith cure, and allied psychic phenomena, is arbitrary and not true to facts. In many of the miracles faith is not required, and is in fact absent this is shown, in the miracles of power, by the expressed fear of the Apostles, e.g., at Christ stilling the tempest (Mark 4:40), at Christ on the waters (Mark 6:51), at the draught of fishes (Luke 5:

, and in the miracles of expelling demons. In some miracles Christ requires faith, but the faith is not the cause of the miracle, only the condition of His exercising the power.

Others, like Holstein, Renan, and Huxley, follow de Wette, who explains the miracles as the emotional interpretation of commonplace events. They claim that the facts which occurred were substantially historical, but in the narrating were covered over with the interpretations of the writers. Hence, they say that, in studying the Gospels, we must distinguish between the facts as they actually took place and the subjective emotions of those who witnessed them, their strong excitement, tendency to exaggeration, and vivid imagination. Thus they appeal not to the "fallacies of testimony" so much as to the "fallacies of the senses". But this attempt to transform the Apostles into nervous visionaries cannot be held by an unbiased mind. St. Peter clearly distinguished between a vision (Acts 10:17) and a reality (Acts 12), and St. Paul mentions two cases of visions (Acts 22:17; 2 Corinthians 12), the latter by way of contrast with his ordinary missionary life of labours and sufferings (2 Corinthians 11). Renan even goes so far as to present the glaring inconsistency of a Christ remarkable, as he says, for moral beauty of life and doctrine, who nevertheless is guilty of conscious deception, as, e.g., in the make-believe raising of Lazarus. This teaching is in reality a denial of testimony. The miracles of Christ must be taken as a whole; and in the Gospel setting where they are presented as a part of his teaching and his life. On the ground of evidence there is no reason to make a distinction among them or to interpret them so that they become other than they are. The real reason is prejudgment on false philosophical grounds with a view to get rid of the supernatural element. In fact the conjectures and hypotheses proposed are far more improbable than the miracles themselves. Again, how thus explain the great miracle that the hero of a baseless legend, the impotent and deceitful Christ, could be come the founder of the Christian Church and of Christian civilization? Finally, this method violates the first principles of interpretation; for the New Testament writers are not allowed to speak their own language.

(2) The theory of Biblical Humanism
The fundamental idea of Hegel's metaphysic (viz., that existing things are the progressive manifestation of the idea, i.e., the absolute) gave a philosophical basis for the organic conception of the universe, i.e., the Divine as organic to the human. Thus revelation is presented as a human process, and history -- e.g., the Bible -- is a record of human experience, the product of a human life. This philosophy of history was applied to explain the miraculous in the Gospels and appears under two forms: the Tübingen School and the "Mystical" School.

(a) the Tübingen School

Baur regards the Hegelian process in its objective aspect, i.e., the facts as things. He held the books of the New Testament to be states through which the human life and thought of early Christianity had passed. He attempted to do with reference to the origin what Gibbon tried with reference to the spread of Christianity -- i.e., get rid of the supernatural by the tacit assumption that there were no miracles and by the enumeration of natural causes, chief of which was the Messianic idea to which Jesus accommodated Himself. The evolution element in Baur's Humanism, however, constrained him to deny that we possess contemporaneous documents of our Lord's life, to hold that the New Testament literature was the result of warring factions among the early Christians, and therefore of a much later date than tradition ascribes to it, and that Christ was only the occasional cause of Christianity. He accepted as genuine only the Epistles to the Galatians, Romans, 1 and 2 Corinthians, and the Apocalypse. But the Epistles admitted by Baur show that St. Paul believed in miracles and asserted the actual occurrence of them as well-known facts both in regard to Christ and in regard to himself and the other Apostles (e.g., Romans 15:18; 1 Corinthians 1:22; 12:10, 2 Corinthians 12:12, Galatians 3:5, especially his repeated references to the Resurrection of Christ, 1 Corinthians 15). The basis on which the Tübingen School rests, viz., that we possess no contemporaneous records of Christ's life, and that the New Testament writings belong to the second century, has been proved to be false by the higher criticisms. Hence Huxley admits that this position is no longer tenable (The Nineteenth Century, Feb., 1889), and in fact there is no longer a Tübingen School at Tübingen. Harnack says: "As regards the criticisms of the sources of Christianity, we stand unquestionably in a movement of return to tradition. The chronological framework in which tradition set the earliest documents is to be henceforth accepted in its main outlines" (The Nineteenth Cent., Oct., 1899). Hence Romanes said that the outcome of the battle on the Bible documents is a signal victory for Christianity (Thoughts on Religion, p. 165). Dr. Emil Reich speaks of the bankruptcy of the higher criticism ("Contemp. Rev.", April, 1905).

(b) The "Mythical" School

Strauss regarded the Hegelian process in its subjective aspect. The facts as matters of consciousness with the early Christians concerned him exclusively. Hence he regarded Christ within the Christian consciousness of the time, and held that Christ of the New Testament was the outcome of this consciousness. He did not deny a relatively small nucleus of historical reality, but contended that the Gospels, as we possess them, are mythical inventions or fabulous and fanciful embellishments and are to be regarded only as symbols for spiritual ideas, e.g., the Messianic idea. Strauss thus attempted to remove the miraculous -- or what he considered the unhistorical matter -- from the text. But this view was too fanciful long to hold currency after a careful study of the truthful, matter-of-fact character of the New Testament writings, and a comparison of them with the Apocrypha. Hence it has been rejected, and Strauss himself confessed to disappointment at the result of his labours (The Old and New Faith).

(3) The Critical Agnostic School
Its basis is the organic idea of the universe, but it views the world process apart from God, because reason cannot prove the existence of God, and therefore, to the Agnostic, He does not exist (e.g., Huxley); or to the Christian Agnostic, His existence is accepted on Faith (s.g., Baden-Powell). To both there is no miracle, for we have no way of knowing it. Thus Huxley admits the facts of miracles in the New Testament, but says that the testimony as to their miraculous character may be worthless, and strives to explain it by the subjective mental conditions of the writers ("The Nineteenth Cent.", Mar., 1889). Baden-Powell (in "Essays and Reviews"), Holtzmann (Die synoptischen Evangelien), and Harnack (The Essence of Christianity) admit the miracles as recorded in the Gospels, but hold that their miraculous character is beyond the scope of historical proof, and depends on the mental assumptions of the readers.

Criticism

The real problem of the historian is to state well-authenticated facts and give an explanation of the testimony. He should show how such events must have taken place and how such a theory only can explain them. He takes cognizance of all that is said about these events by competent witnesses, and from their testimony he draws the conclusion. To admit the facts and to deny an explanation is to furnish very great evidence for their historical truth, and to show qualities not consistent with the scientific historian.

(4) The theory of liberal Protestantism
(a) Older form

In its older form, this was advocated by Carlyle (Froude's "Life of Carlyle"), Martineau (Seal of Authority in Religion), Rathbone Greg (Creed of Christendom), Prof. Wm. H. Green (Works, III pp. 230, 253), proposed as a religious creed under the title of the "new Reformation" ("The Nineteenth Cent.", Mar., 1889) and popularized by Mrs. Humphry Ward in "Robert Elsmere." As the old Reformation was a movement to destroy the Divine authority of the Church by exalting the supernatural character of the Bible, so the new Reformation aimed at removing the supernatural element from the Bible and resting faith in Christianity on the high moral character of Jesus and the excellence of His moral teaching. It is in close sympathy with some writers on the science of religion who see in Christianity a natural religion, though superior to other forms. In describing their position as "a revolt against miraculous belief", its adherents yet profess great reverence for Jesus as "that friend of God and Man, in whom, through all human frailty and necessary imperfection, they see the natural head of their inmost life, the symbol of those religious forces in man which are primitive, essential and universal" ("The Nineteenth Cent.", Mar., 1889). By way of criticism it may be said that this school has its source in the philosophical assumption that the uniformity of nature has made the miracle unthinkable -- an assumption now discarded. Again, it has its basis in the Tübingen School which has been proved false, and it requires a mutilation of the Gospels so radical and wholesale that nearly every sentence has to be excised or rewritten. The miracles of Jesus are too essential a part of His life and teaching to be thus removed. We might as well expurgate the records of military achievements from the lives of Alexander or of Caesar. Strauss exposed the inconsistencies of this position, which he once held (Old Faith and the New), and von Hartmann considered the Liberal theologians as causing the disintegration of Christianity ("Selbstersetzung des Christ", 1888).

(b) Newer form

In its recent form, it has been advocated by the exponents of the psychological theory. Hence, where the old school followed an objective, this pursues a subjective method. This theory combines the basic teaching of Hegel, Schleiermacher, and Ritschl. Hegel taught that religious truths are the figurative representation of rational ideas; Schleiermacher taught that propositions of faith are the pious states of the heart expressed in language; Ritschl, that the evidence of Christian doctrine is in the "value judgment", i.e., the religious effect on the mind; on this basis Prof. Gardner ("A Historical View of the New Test.", London, 1904) holds that no reasonable man would profess to disprove the Christian miracles historically; that in historical studies we must accept the principle of continuity as set forth by evolution, that the statements of the New Testament are based mainly on Christian experience, in which there is always an element of false theory; that we must distinguish between the true underlying fact and its defective outward expression; that this expression is conditioned by the intellectual atmosphere of the time, and passes away to give place to a higher and better expression. Hence the outward expression of Christianity should be different now from what it was in other days. Hence, while miracles may have had their value for the early Christians, they have no value for us, for our experience is different from theirs. Thus M. Réville ("Liberal Christianity", London, 1903) says: "The faith of a liberal Protestant does not depend upon the solution of a problem of historical criticism. It is founded upon his own experience of the value and power of the Gospel of Christ", and "The Gospel of Jesus is independent of its local and temporary forms" (pp. 54, 5

. All this, however, is philosophy, not history, it is not Christianity, but Rationalism. So it inverts the true standard of historical criticism -- viz., we should study past events in the light of their own surroundings, and not from the subjective feeling on the part of the historian of what might, could, or would have occurred. There is no reason to restrict these principles to questions of religious history; and if extended to embrace the whole of past history, they would lead to absolute scepticism.

VI. THE FACT
The Bible shows that at all times God has wrought miracles to attest the Revelation of His will.

(1) The mirac

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Miracles and Modern Scientific Thought
by a Professor Norman Geisler
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Since the "Enlightenment" it is widely accepted that the belief in miracles and a commitment to modern scientific methodology are incompatible. This study will examine the arguments of important anti-supernatural thinkers from Spinoza to the present with a view to finding any common threads. Next, we will analyze the nature of miracles in the light of scientific methodology to see if they are irresolvably incompatible. Finally, we will see if a way can be found to retain the integrity of science without denying the credibility of the supernatural.

I. The Arguments Against Miracles.
A. Benedict Spinoza (1632-1677).
We will begin our study with the Jewish philosopher, Benedict Spinoza. Arguing from a Newtonian concept of nature, Spinoza insisted that "nothing then, comes to pass in nature in contravention to her universal laws, nay, nothing does not agree with them and follow from them, for . . . she keeps a fixed and immutable order." In fact "a miracle, whether in contravention to, or beyond, nature, is a mere absurdity." Spinoza was dogmatic about the impossibility of miracles when he proclaimed, "We may, then, be absolutely certain that every event which is truly described in Scripture necessarily happened, like everything else, according to natural laws."[1]
In support of his crucial premise Spinoza insisted that Nature "keeps a fixed and immutable Order." That is to say, everything "necessarily happened . . . according to natural laws." And "nothing comes to pass in nature in contravention to her universal laws . . . "[2]

Spinoza's argument can be summarized as follows:

Miracles are violations of natural laws.
Natural laws are immutable.
It is impossible for immutable laws to be violated.
Therefore, miracles are impossible.
Put in this form it is clear that the second premise is crucial: natural laws are universal or immutable. Just how does one know this? Laying aside for the moment Spinoza's deductive rationalism, from a strictly empirical point of view Spinoza's answer is: we know this by universal observation. That is, we always observe physical objects fall in accordance with Newton's law of gravitation. There are no known exceptions. But a miracle would be an exception. Hence, miracles are contrary to universal scientific observation.

B. David Hume (1711-1776).
Next, let us consider briefly Hume's argument against miracles. David Hume said of his argument: "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."[3]
Just what is this "final" argument against the miraculous? In Hume's own words:

"A miracle is a violation of the laws of nature."
"Firm and unalterable experience has established these laws."
"A wise man proportions his belief to the evidence."
Therefore, "the proof against miracles . . . is as entire as any argument from experience can possibly be imagined."[4]
In this form the crucial premise is the second one which Hume explains as follows: "There must, therefore, be a uniform experience against every miraculous event. Otherwise the event would not merit that appellation." So "nothing is esteemed a miracle if it ever happened in the common course of nature."[5]
Here again the essence of the argument depends on man's repeated observation. For the common course of nature provides us with uniform experience of natural regularities. However, there is a difference between Hume and Spinoza. For Spinoza a scientific law was universal and immutable; hence, miracles were absolutely impossible. For Hume human experience is uniform and, thus, miracles may be possible but they are incredible. So between Spinoza and Hume there was a softening of the basis for naturalism which corresponds to the later softening of the understanding of a scientific law. A scientific law is not necessarily universal (with no possible exception); it is simply uniform (with no credible exception). But even in this weaker form, Hume's argument rests upon the regularity of nature as opposed to the claim for highly irregular events (such as miracles).

C. Immanuel Kant (1724-1804).
There is a widely neglected argument against miracles tucked away in Kant's famous book, Religion Within the Limits of Reason Alone. In his own words, Kant reasons this way:

Those whose judgment in these matters is so inclined that they suppose themselves to be helpless without miracles, believe that they soften the blow which reason suffers from them by holding that they happen but seldom. [but we can ask] How seldom? Once in a hundred years? . . . Here we can determine nothing on the basis of knowledge of the object . . . but only on the basis of the maxims which are necessary to the use of our reason. Thus, miracles must be admitted as [occurring] daily (though indeed hidden under the guise of natural events) or else never . . . Since the former alternative [that they occur daily] is not at all compatible with reason, nothing remains but to adopt the later maxim-for this principle remains ever a mere maxim for making judgments, not a theoretical assertion. [For example, with regard to the] admirable conservation of the species in the plant and animal kingdoms, . . . no one, indeed, can claim to comprehend whether or not the direct influence of the Creator is required on each occasion. [Kant insists] they are for us, . . . nothing but natural effects and ought never to be adjudged otherwise . . . To venture beyond these limits is rashness and immodesty . . . .[6]
The heart of Kant's argument can be summarized as follows:
Everything in our experience (the world to us) is determined by practical reason.
Practical reason operates according to universal laws.
Miracles occur either (1) daily, (2) seldom, or (3) never.
But what occurs daily is not a miracle since it occurs regularly according to natural laws.
And what occurs seldom is not determined by any law.
But all scientific knowledge must be determined by practical reason which operates on universal laws.
Therefore, it is rationally necessary for us to conclude that miracles never occur.
Stated this way the critical premise is the second one which claims that practical reason operates according to universal laws. In support of this premise Kant wrote, "In the affairs of life, therefore, it is impossible for us to count on miracles or to take them into consideration at all in our use of reason (and reason must be used in every incident of life)."[7]
In brief, miracles are theoretically possible but they are practically impossible. We must live as if they never occur. If we lived any other way it would overthrow the dictates of practical reason and erode the basis for both science and morality. For both science and morality are based on universal principles. Once more we can see that the key element in the anti-supernatural argument is the regularity of the operational laws of the universe. Kant believed these regular events to be universal. To deny them by admitting miracles, Kant thought, would be to deny the very basis of a rational and moral life.

D. Antony Flew (1923- ).
In his article on "Miracles" in The Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Flew notes that "Hume was primarily concerned, not with the question of fact, but with that of evidence. The problem was how the occurrence of a miracle could be proved, rather than whether any such events had ever occurred." However, adds Flew, "our sole ground for characterizing the reported occurrence as miraculous is at the same time a sufficient reason for calling it physically impossible." Why is this so? Because "the critical historian, confronted with some story of a miracle, will usually dismiss it out of hand . . . ." On what grounds? Flew answers, "To justify his procedure he will have to appeal to precisely the principle which Hume advanced: the 'absolute impossibility or miraculous nature' of the events attested must, 'in the eyes of all reasonable people . . . alone be regarded as a sufficient refutation.'" In short, even though miracles are not logically impossible, they are scientifically impossible. "For it is only and precisely by presuming that the laws that hold today held in the past . . . that we can rationally interpret the detritus [fragments] of the past as evidence and from it construct our account of what actually happened."[8]
Flew's argument against miracles can be summarized this way:

Miracles are by nature particular and unrepeatable.
Natural events are by nature general and repeatable.
Now, in practice, the evidence for the general and repeatable is always greater than that for the particular and unrepeatable.
Therefore, in practice, the evidence will always be greater against miracles than for them.
Like the arguments of Spinoza, Hume, and Kant, the key to Flew's argument is premise number 3 which counts as greater evidence events which are regular or repeatable. For science by its very nature is not based on the exceptional or the odd but on the normal and the usual.

E. Alastair McKinnon.
Other contemporary philosophers have offered arguments with similar premises against supernatural acts. Alastair McKinnon's argument is an example. It can be summarized as follows:[9]

A scientific law is a generalization based on observation.
Any exception to a scientific law invalidates that law as such and calls for a revision of it.
A miracle is an exception to a scientific law.
Therefore, a "miracle" would call for a revision of a law and the recognition of a broader law (which thereby explains the "miracle" as a natural event).
Here the critical premise is the second one. It is admitted by all that a scientific law is a generalization based on observation. But not all would insist that a single exception would invalidate a law. Even some anti-supernaturalists admit that "This a priori argument can be refuted by noting that a supernaturally caused exception to a scientific law would not invalidate it, because scientific laws are designed to express natural regularities."[10] But in the case of a miracle we have "a special and non-repeatable" exception.
From a strictly scientific perspective a non-repeatable exception is an anomaly. And scientists do not overthrow established laws on the basis of singular, unrepeated anomalies. In fact, they are more likely to attribute the anomaly to faulty observation. At any rate, scientists do not revise laws based on unrepeated exceptions, since scientifically the irregular never outweighs the regular.

F. The Common Thread.
Even in this admittedly unsuccessful anti-supernatural argument is hidden the premise of an apparently successful one, namely the evidence for the regular and repeatable is always greater than that for the irregular and singular. Science is based on uniform experience, not anomalies. Regularity is the basis of a scientific understanding. Therefore, science as such can never accept the miraculous. Thus the principle of regularity seems to be the common thread of the anti- supernatural arguments.

II. The Nature of Science
A. Two Fundamental Principles of Science.
It seems beyond question that science involves at least two things: observation and repetition. No scientific law emerges unless there has been some observation of natural phenomena. This observation need not be strictly empirical. Microscopes and telescopes are legitimate extensions of man's empirical senses. Nor need one observe the actual event directly, as long as there are observed phenomena associated with the event. But there must be observation of some recurring pattern or else there is no scientific basis for drawing conclusions.
The events of the past, such as are indicated by the rock and fossil record, are not an exception to the need for observation. There were no human scientific observers of the origin of the universe or the origin of living things. However, our scientific understanding of these events is dependent, nonetheless, on observations. It is not dependent on past observation of these events but on present observation of similar events. That is, all understanding of the past is based on the principle of uniformity, to wit, "the present is the key to the past."[11] This principle of uniformity means that processes observed in the present are the basis for a scientific approach to unobserved processes in the past. So even in the case of unavailable past events science is based on observation of similar events which repeatedly happen in the present.

B. Repetition and the Odd.
Science is so firmly based in regular repeatable events in the present that even when an odd event occurs scientists do not consider it part of a scientific explanation. Thus experiments that cannot be repeated are given little or no validity. At least unrepeatable events are never made the basis for an operational law of science.
In a thought provoking article on miracles one contemporary philosopher argued that:[12]

No event can be attributed to a rational agent unless its occurrence is regular and repeatable.
Miracles are by nature not regular or repeatable.
Therefore, no miracle can be attributed to any rational agent (e.g., to God).
The crux of the argument is what he called the "repeatability requirement."[13] Unless an event can be repeated over and over again we have no right to claim we know who (or what) caused it. For example, one should not make a causal connection between the golfer's type of swing and a once-in-a-life-time-hole-in-one he shot. Rather than drawing a direct causal connection between them, we would consider it a lucky shot. And scientific analysis is not based on fluke relations but on repeated relations. This is why scientists use the principle of concomitant variation. For unless there is a direct correlation between the presence and absence of the cause and the presence and absence of the effect, then there is here no scientific basis for believing it is the cause.
This same point applies whether the cause is a natural force or an intelligent being. With regard to an intelligent cause, certainly no one would believe that there is a scientifically established causal connection between one's intellectual ability to pick a winning horse and a one-time win at the racetrack. For unless the intelligent being can do it over and over we would believe the result was a matter of luck, not a matter of scientific intelligence. Likewise, with regard to non-intelligent causes, there is no scientific basis for belief in a causal connection between spilt letters of alphabet cereal and a fan which blew them into the word "careful." Unless the fan does this repeatedly with randomly dropped letters we would consider this one-time event an anomaly. In such a case no scientific causal connection will be drawn between the apparent message and the fan.

So whether we are dealing with non-intelligent or intelligent causes, there must be a relationship repeatedly observed before one can consider the connection scientifically based. But this repeated relation is precisely what we do not-indeed, cannot-have with miracles because they are one-time events. Hence, by nature, singularities such as miracles would seem to be ruled out of the realm of science.

III. Science and the Supernatural.
If all scientific understanding of the universe is based on observed repetitions and if miracles are by nature singularities, then are not miracles automatically ruled out on scientific grounds? For miracles are by nature singular (unusual) events which are caused by an intelligent being (namely, God) beyond the realm of natural law.

A. Are Miracles a Matter of Faith?
For the supernaturalist there seem to be two basic avenues of escape from this argument. First, he could simply admit there is no scientific basis for belief in miracles. Simply because miracles are not subject to repetition does not mean they do not occur. After all, a hole-in-one has happened; desperation shots have gone through the hoop, and some have won at the lottery on the first ticket. So all the theist needs to admit is that singular events (such as miracles) are not subject to scientific analysis. That is, there may be no way to have a scientific understanding of them; they might be understood only by "faith." In this sense, what the non-supernaturalist would call a "fluke" the supernaturalist may choose (by faith) to see as the "hand of God." Thus the theist could admit that there is no scientific way to differentiate between a natural statistical improbability and a miracle. Both would have the same empirical data associated with them and neither would be based in the scientific principle of repeatability.
Of course, if the theist admits this then the naturalist has won a major victory. For the theist has admitted that there is no scientific basis for a belief in either the creation of the universe or of life, to say nothing of the resurrection of Christ. Further, the anti-supernaturalist could press his argument that there is no rational or evidential grounds for belief in miracles either. For all rational connections seem to be based on previously observed causal connections. And all empirical evidence is likewise dependent on empirical observations of regular events. In brief, if the supernaturalist admits there is no regularly observed phenomena as a basis for miracles, then he has given up any basis for knowing they have happened. It has become simply a matter of unjustifiable faith in believing they have happened. If this is so then his faith is empirically unfalsifiable. This would not differ in principle from someone who claims his watch works because a little invisible green gremlin changes the time each second.

B. A Scientific Basis for the Miraculous.
However, before all is given up to fideism let us suggest another possibility which offers a scientific basis for belief in miracles. This approach is grounded on the most fundamental principle of science-the very principle of regularity used to argue against miracles. In order to understand this approach let us first try to pinpoint the basic problem in the arguments against miracles. The essence of the argument goes like this:

Only what is observed to occur over and over again can be the basis for a scientific understanding of what caused the event.[14]
Singular events like miracles are not repeated over and over again.
Therefore, there is no scientific basis for an understanding of what caused a singularity such as a miracle.
1. Antisupernaturalism Proves too Much.
The first and most obvious problem with this argument is that it seems to prove too much. For if the argument is valid, then it would prove that there is no scientific basis for some events considered to be scientific by non-supernaturalistic scientists. For example, the Big Bang theory is considered by most astronomers to be a viable scientific explanation of the origin of the universe,[15] but so far as the scientific evidence goes the Big Bang occurred only once. It has not been repeated. It is a singularity. Hence, if the repeatability requirement is pressed it would eliminate one of the most widely held scientific views on the origin of the universe.

Further, most non-supernaturalist scientists believe in the spontaneous generation of first life on earth.[16] And even naturalists who believe life began in outer space, must acknowledge that it began by spontaneous generation somewhere out there. But to bring the problem back down to earth, most scientists believe that life began here only once. At the very least the spontaneous generation of life has not happened over and over again. What is more, we do not observe it happening spontaneously over and over again in the present. But if repeatability in the present is essential to a scientific understanding of an event, then the belief in spontaneous generation is not scientific either.[17]

The same logic applies to the naturalistic theory of macro-evolution. According to this belief, the evolutionary development of life occurred only once. Each new forward development occurred only once. For example fish evolved into reptiles only once, and reptiles evolved into birds only once. and so on. These events have never happened again. Yet naturalistic scientists believe it is scientific to speak of macro-evolution. Some even call evolution a "fact," not merely a theory.[18] But if it is unscientific to believe in singularities, then it would also be unscientific to believe in macro-evolution. In short, the naturalist's argument against singularities proves too much; it proves that even some of his naturalistic explanations are not science either.

2. Naturalism Neglects Uniformity.

In one of the strangest ironies in the history of thought, naturalism has destroyed its own argument by its own basic premise. For we have seen that from Spinoza to the present the repeatability or regularity requirement has been part of the anti-supernaturalists' argument against miracles. Scientific laws are based on repetition of events. Miracles are not repeated over and over. Therefore, miracles are not scientific.

Not only do naturalists hold to the need for regularities but they also believe there are scientific explanations for singular events (such as the origin of life). But how do they know this? The answer seems to be the principle of uniformity. That is, they insist that we can understand past singularities in terms of present regularities. For we observe over and over in the present that when certain chemicals (gases) are put together under certain circumstances that amino acids, which are the basic elements of life, are the result. Hence, we can assume that the same thing would occur under similar circumstances in the past.

The same is true of macro-evolution. Scientists have observed over and over in the present that small changes occur in animals. Hence, they assume that given long periods of time in the past these small changes could add up to the large changes needed to explain a common ancestry of all life. So here too the principle of uniformity is the key. That is, even though the past event is a singularity which the naturalist did not observe, nevertheless, there are present regularities (which are observed to occur over and over again) which are used as the scientific basis for understanding these past singularities. In this way what is repeated in the present is the key to understanding what happened only once in the past. Thus, the naturalist can avoid the charge that his view about past singularities is unscientific. It is scientific, they can insist, because their understanding of a singular event is based on similar regular events which happen all the time.

What is true of past singularities is also true of present ones. For example, one need only see one Mount Rushmore to know that some intelligence carved these faces on the mountain. For repeated experiences of similar situations are a sufficient basis for knowing that what caused this singular event must have been intelligent. There is an analogous situation here to the astronomical search for extra-terrestrial intelligence. Carl Sagan believes that even a single message from outer space would prove the existence of highly intelligent beings there.[19] How does he know this? Because he has repeated experiences of similar messages caused by intelligent beings. So the general principle can be stated as follows: all singularities must be understood in terms of similar regularities.

This being the case, the objection of the supernaturalist about their belief in singularities without a scientific basis in repetition seems to have collapsed. For if one can know there is an intelligent cause of a single message (or event), based on repeated experience of similar situations, then why cannot one know there was an intelligent cause for the origin of life? In short, the answer of the naturalist opens the door wide for a scientific explanation for a supernatural origin of life. For if repetition is the key to understanding singularities, then a supernaturalist can argue that there was a supernatural cause for the origin of first life. For this reasoning is also based on repeated observation. The argument has two sides, both of which are based in repeated observation.

First, all observational evidence indicates that the non-living never produces the living. Pasteur's experiments disproved spontaneous generation long ago.[20] There is a uniform and universally available experience as a basis for this conclusion, and there are no verified exceptions. Hence, the argument against spontaneous generation is as firmly scientific as any such argument can be.

There appears to be one exception to this principle that life only produces life. Are not scientists able to produce life? That is, cannot life be created by intelligent beings? In response to this two things should be noted. First of all, scientists have not yet created life from non-living chemicals. They have only succeeded in producing some biologically interesting chemicals, such as amino acids. Furthermore, even in these experiments the role of the experimenters plays a crucial role in the success of the experiment.[21] Thus intelligent intervention is necessary in the production of these results. Hence, even if scientists could produce life, it would show that it took an intelligent form of life to produce a less than intelligent form of life. And the production of an intelligent robot would also show that only intelligence produces intelligence. So in any event, the creation of life (whether non-intelligent or intelligent life) always takes an intelligent source of life to accomplish it. But if this is so, then here again scientific observation would lead us to believe that the first living thing must have had an intelligent cause.

Second, this leads us to the other side to this scientific argument for an intelligent origin of life.

The only cause repeatedly observed to be adequate to produce information is intelligence.
Now the information in the first single cell which emerged on earth would fill a whole volume of an encyclopedia.[22]
But observation of regularities are the scientific basis for understanding singularities.
Hence, there is a scientific basis (in repeated observation) for believing that first life was caused by some intelligence beyond the natural world.
But since this kind of singularity produced by a supernatural intelligent being would be a miracle by definition, then we have a firm scientific basis for believing in miracles.
In short, repetition in the present does give us a firm scientific basis for believing in an intelligent intervention into the natural world. To borrow Hume's term, we have "uniform experience" on which to base our belief in the miraculous origin of life. For we never observe an encyclopedia resulting from an explosion in a printing shop. We never observe a fan blowing on alphabet cereal produce a scientific research paper. No one would conclude Mount Rushmore resulted from wind or rain erosion. Why? Our uniform experience teaches us that the kind of information conveyed on Mount Rushmore never results from natural laws but only from intelligent intervention.

Summary and Conclusion
Since the rise of modern science anti-supernatural arguments have stressed the principle of uniformity. They have argued that:

Scientific understanding is always based on constant repetition of events.
Miracles are not constantly repeated.
Therefore, there is no scientific way to understand miracles.
Two things should be noted about this argument. First, this form of the argument does not deny that unusual events like miracles may occur, any more than it denies a hole-in-one may occur. It simply says that scientific law is based on regularities. And until one can establish a constant conjunction between antecedent and consequent factors there is no scientific basis for assuming a causal connection between them.
Second, neither does this argument deny that there is any scientific way to analyze singularities, such as the origin of the universe, or the origin of life, or receiving one message from outer space. It simply says that observed regularities must be the basis for analyzing singularities. For example, if we observe over and over again that a certain kind of effect regularly results from a certain kind of cause then when we discover even a singular case of this kind of effect (whether from the past or present), we have a scientific basis for assuming it had the same kind of cause too. This same assumption is behind the naturalists' search for a chemical basis for the origins of life and an evolutionary basis for the origin of species. In both cases repeatable observations in the present are used as a basis for understanding the singularity of origin in the past. Without this principle of uniformity there would be no way of getting at singularities in either the past or the present.

Certainly we must grant that this is a legitimate procedure to base all scientific understanding in the principle of regularity. However, the question is this: Does such a procedure eliminate a scientific understanding of miracles? In order to better understand our answer to this question let us reformulate the naturalist argument in the light of the two qualifications noted above.

1) Scientific understanding is always based on constant repetition of events.

la) This repetition need not be a repetition of the event we are analyzing but only of other similar events.

2) Miracles are not constantly repeated events.

3b) Therefore, miracles need not be eliminated from the realm of scientific understanding.

Once the argument is put in this form we can see that all one needs to do to establish a basis for singularities such as miracles is to find some constantly repeated process as a basis for understanding them. This we believe can be done by adding these premises:

4) Constant repetition informs us that wherever complex information is conveyed there was an intelligent cause.

5) There are some scientific singularities (such as the origin of first life) where complex information is conveyed.

6) Therefore, there is a scientific basis for positing an intelligent non-natural cause for the origin of first life.

Certainly no one can reasonably deny the information comes from an informer. This is a uniform experience. The only apparent exceptions are flukes which cannot be repeated constantly. So firmly established is our uniform experience that only intelligence causes information that we would consider it highly unscientific for a geology teacher to insist that his students continue to study the faces on Mount Rushmore until they can find some natural law of erosion which can explain them. Furthermore, one does not have to see more than one Mount Rushmore to know that it was formed by intelligence, not by natural processes of erosion. For uniform experience of similar situations indicates that these kinds of forms on rocks always result from intelligent intervention. Likewise, if a single sentence or paragraph is repeatedly observed to result from intelligence, then the encyclopedia full of information contained in the first simple form of life surely must have had an intelligent cause too.

Should someone protest that there is still a chance-remote as it may be- that life arose naturally, we need only remind them that science is not based on flukes or anomalies. It is based on regularities and repetition. And we have no observed regularly repeated conjunctions that would provide a scientific basis for us to believe in such an unrepeated singularity. In brief, the principle of repeatability which naturalists use to attack miracles actually boomerangs to support the miraculous. Naturalism is defeated at its own game of science on its own principles.

NOTES
Benedict De Spinoza, Tractatus Theologica-Pliticus, in The Chief Works of Benedict de Spinoza, trans. R. H. M. Elwes (London: George Bell and Sons, 1883), 1:83, 87, 92.
Ibid., p. 83.
David Hume, An Inquiry Concerning Human Understanding, ed. C. W. Hendel (New York: Bobbs-Merrill, 1955), 10.1.118.
Ibid., pp. 118-123.
Ibid., pp. 10.1.122-123.
Immanuel Kant, Religion Within the Limits of Reason Alone, 2nd ed., trans. T. M. Green and H. H. Hudon (New York: Harper Torchbook, 1960), pp. 83-84.
Ibid., p. 82.
Anthony Flew, "Miracles" in The Encyclopedia of Philosophy, ed. Paul Edwards (New York: The Macmillan Company and The Free Press, 1967), 5.346-353.
Alastair McKinnon, "Miracle' and 'Paradox'" in American Philosophical Quarterly 4 (Oct. 1967): 308-14.
Malcolm L. Diamond, "Miracles," Religious Studies 9 (Sept., 1973), 316-317.
Charles Lyell (1797-1876), the father of modern uniformitarianism, wrote: It may be necessary in the present state of science to supply some part of the assumed course of nature hypothetically; but if so, this must be done without any violation of probability, and always consistently with the analogy of what is known both of the past and present economy of our system." See his Principles of Geology (New York: D. Appleton and Company, 1887), p. 229.
George D. Chryssides, "Miracles and Agents," Religious Studies 11 (Sept., 1975), 319-27.
Ibid., p. 322.
This point was made by Paley in his famous watchmaker argument, but it seems to have been largely lost in the subsequent arguments against God. For example, Paley used phrases like "we observe," "our observer," "each observation," "Our observation" over and over again. He even used the phrase "uniform experience" as the basis for his belief in an intelligent Designer of nature. (See William Paley, A View of the Evidences of Christianity (Cambridge: J. Hall & Sons, 1875), 6th ed., pp. 10, 11, 20, 29 and especially 37-38.
See Robert Jastrow, God and the Astronomers (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, Inc., 1978), especially pp. 14, 111, 116 and 120f.
George Wald wrote, "We tell this story [about Pasteur's experiments] to beginning students of biology as though it represents a triumph of reason over mysticism. In fact it is very nearly the opposite. The reasonable view was to believe in spontaneous generation; the only alternative, to believe in a single, primary act of supernatural creation. There is no third position." See "The Origin of Life" in Scientific American (Aug., 1954), p. 48; reprinted in Life: Origin and Evolution, ed. C. E. Folsome (San Francisco: W. H. Freeman and Company, 1979).
Many scientists recognize this point. J. W. N. Sullivan wrote: "So far as actual evidence goes, this is still the only possible conclusion. But since it is a conclusion that seems to lead back to some supernatural creative act, it is a conclusion that scientific men find very difficult of acceptance" (The Limitations of Science, New York: Mentor Book, 1963, p . 94). Speaking of spontaneous generation, Robert Jastrow said, the "theory is also an act of faith. The act of faith consists in assuming that the scientific view of the origin of life is correct, without having concrete evidence to support that belief" (Until the Sun Dies, New York: W. W. Norton and Company, 1977, p. 63).
Isaac Asimov said, "Scientists who deal with evolution as their field of specialization may argue over the mechanism behind evolutionary development, but none questions the fact of evolution itself" (Science Digest, October, 1981, p. 86).
Sagan wrote: "There are others who believe that our problems are soluble, that humanity is still in its childhood, that one day soon we will grow up. The receipt of a single message from space would show that it is possible to live through such technological adolescence: the transmitting civilization, after all, has survived. Such knowledge, it seems to me, might be worth a great price" (Broca's Brain, New York: Random House, 1979, p. 275, emphasis added).
See Note 17 above.
See the excellent new book by some creative scientists on this point: Charles Thaxton, Walter Bradley, and Roger Olsen, The Mystery of Life's Origin: Reassessing Current Theories (New York: Philosophical Library, 1984).
The information in a complex form of life is much greater. Carl Sagan pointed out that "If written out in English, say, that information [in the human brain] would fill some twenty million volumes, as many as in the world's largest libraries" (Cosmos, New York: Random House, 1980, p. 278).