Mill a little more
closely, he would not have committed the serious error of arguing:
"Obviously, if the author has established his conclusions in the first
part, the second and third are altogether superfluous. It is somewhat
strange, therefore, that more than three-fourths of the whole work
should be devoted to this needless task." [37:1] Now my argument in the
first part is not that miracles are impossible--a thesis which it is
quite unnecessary to maintain--but the much more simple one that
miracles are _antecedently_ incredible. Having shown that they are so,
and appreciated the true nature of the allegation of miracles, and the
amount of evidence requisite to establish it, I proceed to examine the
evidence which is actually produced in support of the assertion that,
although miracles are antecedently incredible, they nevertheless took
place. Mr. Mill clearly supports me in this course. He states the main
principle of my argument thus: "A revelation, therefore, cannot be
proved divine unless by external evidence; that is, by the exhibition of
supernatural facts. And we have to consider, whether it is possible to
prove supernatural facts, and if it is, what evidence is required to
prove them." [37:2] Mr. Mill decides that it is possible to prove the
occurrence of a supernatural fact, if it actually occurred, and after
showing the great preponderance of evidence against miracles, he says:
"Against this weight of negative evidence we have to set such positive
evidence as is produced in attestation of exceptions; in other words,
the positive evidences of miracles. And I have already admitted that
this evidence might conceivably have been such as to make the exception
equally certain with the rule." [38:1] Mr. Mill's opinion of the
evidence actually produced is not flattering, and may be compared with
my results:

"But the evidence of miracles, at least to Protestant Christians, is
not, in our day, of this cogent description. It is not the evidence
of our senses, but of witnesses, and even this not at first hand,
but resting on the attestation of books and traditions. And even in
the case of the original eye-witnesses, the supernatural facts
asserted on their alleged testimony are not of the transcendent
character supposed in our example, about the nature of which, or the
impossibility of their having had a natural origin, there could be
little room for doubt. On the contrary, the re