An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding by David Hume (a book to read .txt) 📕

judgement, which they can employ, find themselves often at a loss to

distinguish between truth and falsehood in the most recent actions. But

the matter never comes to any issue, if trusted to the common method of

altercations and debate and flying rumours; especially when men’s

passions have taken part on either side.

In the infancy of new religions, the wise and learned commonly esteem

the matter too inconsiderable to deserve their attention or regard. And

when afterwards they would willingly detect the cheat, in order to

undeceive the deluded multitude, the season is now past, and the records

and witnesses, which might clear up the matter, have perished

beyond recovery.

No means of detection remain, but those which must be drawn from the

very testimony itself of the reporters: and these, though always

sufficient with the judicious and knowing, are commonly too fine to fall

under the comprehension of the vulgar.

98. Upon the whole, then, it appears, that no testimony for any kind of

miracle has ever amounted to a probability, much less to a proof; and

that, even supposing it amounted to a proof, it would be opposed by

another proof; derived from the very nature of the fact, which it would

endeavour to establish. It is experience only, which gives authority to

human testimony; and it is the same experience, which assures us of the

laws of nature. When, therefore, these two kinds of experience are

contrary, we have nothing to do but substract the one from the other,

and embrace an opinion, either on one side or the other, with that

assurance which arises from the remainder. But according to the

principle here explained, this substraction, with regard to all popular

religions, amounts to an entire annihilation; and therefore we may

establish it as a maxim, that no human testimony can have such force as

to prove a miracle, and make it a just foundation for any such system

of religion.

99. I beg the limitations here made may be remarked, when I say, that a

miracle can never be proved, so as to be the foundation of a system of

religion. For I own, that otherwise, there may possibly be miracles, or

violations of the usual course of nature, of such a kind as to admit of

proof from human testimony; though, perhaps, it will be impossible to

find any such in all the records of history. Thus, suppose, all authors,

in all languages, agree, that, from the first of January 1600, there was

a total darkness over the whole earth for eight days: suppose that the

tradition of this extraordinary event is still strong and lively among

the people: that all travellers, who return from foreign countries,

bring us accounts of the same tradition, without the least variation or

contradiction: it is evident, that our present philosophers, instead of

doubting the fact, ought to receive it as certain, and ought to search

for the causes whence it might be derived. The decay, corruption, and

dissolution of nature, is an event rendered probable by so many

analogies, that any phenomenon, which seems to have a tendency towards

that catastrophe, comes within the reach of human testimony, if that

testimony be very extensive and uniform.

But suppose, that all the historians who treat of England, should agree,

that, on the first of January 1600, Queen Elizabeth died; that both

before and after her death she was seen by her physicians and the whole

court, as is usual with persons of her rank; that her successor was

acknowledged and proclaimed by the parliament; and that, after being

interred a month, she again appeared, resumed the throne, and governed

England for three years: I must confess that I should be surprised at

the concurrence of so many odd circumstances, but should not have the

least inclination to believe so miraculous an event. I should not doubt

of her pretended death, and of those other public circumstances that

followed it: I should only assert it to have been pretended, and that it

neither was, nor possibly could be real. You would in vain object to me

the difficulty, and almost impossibility of deceiving the world in an

affair of such consequence; the wisdom and solid judgement of that

renowned queen; with the little or no advantage which she could reap

from so poor an artifice: All this might astonish me; but I would still

reply, that the knavery and folly of men are such common phenomena, that

I should rather believe the most extraordinary events to arise from

their concurrence, than admit of so signal a violation of the laws

of nature.

But should this miracle be ascribed to any new system of religion; men,

in all ages, have been so much imposed on by ridiculous stories of that

kind, that this very circumstance would be a full proof of a cheat, and

sufficient, with all men of sense, not only to make them reject the

fact, but even reject it without farther examination. Though the Being

to whom the miracle is ascribed, be, in this case, Almighty, it does

not, upon that account, become a whit more probable; since it is

impossible for us to know the attributes or actions of such a Being,

otherwise than from the experience which we have of his productions, in

the usual course of nature. This still reduces us to past observation,

and obliges us to compare the instances of the violation of truth in the

testimony of men, with those of the violation of the laws of nature by

miracles, in order to judge which of them is most likely and probable.

As the violations of truth are more common in the testimony concerning

religious miracles, than in that concerning any other matter of fact;

this must diminish very much the authority of the former testimony, and

make us form a general resolution, never to lend any attention to it,

with whatever specious pretence it may be covered.

Lord Bacon seems to have embraced the same principles of reasoning. ‘We

ought,’ says he, ‘to make a collection or particular history of all

monsters and prodigious births or productions, and in a word of every

thing new, rare, and extraordinary in nature. But this must be done with

the most severe scrutiny, lest we depart from truth. Above all, every

relation must be considered as suspicious, which depends in any degree

upon religion, as the prodigies of Livy: And no less so, every thing

that is to be found in the writers of natural magic or alchimy, or such

authors, who seem, all of them, to have an unconquerable appetite for

falsehood and fable[26].’

[26] Nov. Org. lib. ii. aph. 29.

100. I am the better pleased with the method of reasoning here

delivered, as I think it may serve to confound those dangerous friends

or disguised enemies to the Christian Religion, who have undertaken to

defend it by the principles of human reason. Our most holy religion is

founded on Faith, not on reason; and it is a sure method of exposing

it to put it to such a trial as it is, by no means, fitted to endure. To

make this more evident, let us examine those miracles, related in

scripture; and not to lose ourselves in too wide a field, let us confine

ourselves to such as we find in the Pentateuch, which we shall

examine, according to the principles of these pretended Christians, not

as the word or testimony of God himself, but as the production of a mere

human writer and historian. Here then we are first to consider a book,

presented to us by a barbarous and ignorant people, written in an age

when they were still more barbarous, and in all probability long after

the facts which it relates, corroborated by no concurring testimony, and

resembling those fabulous accounts, which every nation gives of its

origin. Upon reading this book, we find it full of prodigies and

miracles. It gives an account of a state of the world and of human

nature entirely different from the present: Of our fall from that state:

Of the age of man, extended to near a thousand years: Of the destruction

of the world by a deluge: Of the arbitrary choice of one people, as the

favourites of heaven; and that people the countrymen of the author: Of

their deliverance from bondage by prodigies the most astonishing

imaginable: I desire any one to lay his hand upon his heart, and after a

serious consideration declare, whether he thinks that the falsehood of

such a book, supported by such a testimony, would be more extraordinary

and miraculous than all the miracles it relates; which is, however,

necessary to make it be received, according to the measures of

probability above established.

101. What we have said of miracles may be applied, without any

variation, to prophecies; and indeed, all prophecies are real miracles,

and as such only, can be admitted as proofs of any revelation. If it did

not exceed the capacity of human nature to foretell future events, it

would be absurd to employ any prophecy as an argument for a divine

mission or authority from heaven. So that, upon the whole, we may

conclude, that the Christian Religion not only was at first attended

with miracles, but even at this day cannot be believed by any reasonable

person without one. Mere reason is insufficient to convince us of its

veracity: And whoever is moved by Faith to assent to it, is conscious

of a continued miracle in his own person, which subverts all the

principles of his understanding, and gives him a determination to

believe what is most contrary to custom and experience.

SECTION XI.

OF A PARTICULAR PROVIDENCE AND OF A FUTURE STATE.

102. I was lately engaged in conversation with a friend who loves

sceptical paradoxes; where, though he advanced many principles, of which

I can by no means approve, yet as they seem to be curious, and to bear

some relation to the chain of reasoning carried on throughout this

enquiry, I shall here copy them from my memory as accurately as I can,

in order to submit them to the judgement of the reader.

Our conversation began with my admiring the singular good fortune of

philosophy, which, as it requires entire liberty above all other

privileges, and chiefly flourishes from the free opposition of

sentiments and argumentation, received its first birth in an age and

country of freedom and toleration, and was never cramped, even in its

most extravagant principles, by any creeds, concessions, or penal

statutes. For, except the banishment of Protagoras, and the death of

Socrates, which last event proceeded partly from other motives, there

are scarcely any instances to be met with, in ancient history, of this

bigotted jealousy, with which the present age is so much infested.

Epicurus lived at Athens to an advanced age, in peace and tranquillity:

Epicureans[27] were even admitted to receive the sacerdotal character,

and to officiate at the altar, in the most sacred rites of the

established religion: And the public encouragement[28] of pensions and

salaries was afforded equally, by the wisest of all the Roman

emperors[29], to the professors of every sect of philosophy. How

requisite such kind of treatment was to philosophy, in her early youth,

will easily be conceived, if we reflect, that, even at present, when she

may be supposed more hardy and robust, she bears with much difficulty

the inclemency of the seasons, and those harsh winds of calumny and

persecution, which blow upon her.

[27] Luciani [Greek: symp. ae Lapithai].

[28] Luciani [Greek: eunouchos].

[29] Luciani and Dio.

You admire, says my friend, as the singular good fortune of philosophy,

what seems to result from the