If we proceed to examine Paley's "simple case" a little more closely, however, we find that not only is it utterly inadmissible as a hypothesis, but that as an illustration of the case of Gospel miracles it is completely devoid of relevancy and argumentative force. The only point which gives a momentary value to the supposed instance is the condition attached to the account of the miracle related by the twelve men, that not only was it wrought before their eyes, but that it was one "in which it was impossible that they should be deceived." Now {91} this qualification of infallibility on the part of the twelve witnesses is as incredible as the miracle which they are supposed to attest. The existence of twelve men incapable of error or mistake is as opposed to experience as the hypothesis of a miracle in which it is impossible for the twelve men to be deceived is contradictory to reason. The exclusion of all error in the observation of the actual occurrence and its antecedents and consequences, whose united sum constitutes the miracle, is an assumption which deprives the argument of all potency. It cannot be entertained. On the other hand, the moment the possibility of error is admitted, the reasoning breaks down, for the probability of error on the part of the observers, either as regards the external phenomena, or the inferences drawn from them, being so infinitely greater than the probability of mistake in the complete induction, we must unquestionably hold by the law and reject the testimony of the twelve men. It need scarcely be said that the assertion of liability to error on the part of the observers by no means involves any insinuation of wilful "falsehood or imposture in the case." It is quite intelligible that twelve men might witness an occurrence which might seem to them and others miraculous,--but which was susceptible of a perfectly natural explanation,--and truthfully relate what they believed to have seen, and that they might, therefore, refuse "with one voice to acknowledge that there existed any falsehood or imposture in the case," even although the alternative might be death on a gibbet. This, however, would in no way affect the character of the actual occurrence. It would not convert a natural, though by them inexplicable, phenomenon into a miracle. Their constancy in adhering to the account they had {92} given would merely bear upon the truth of their own statements, and the fact of seeing them "one after another consenting to be racked, burned, or strangled, rather than give up the truth of their account," would not in the least justify our believing in a miracle. Even martyrdom cannot transform imaginations into facts. The truth of a narrative is no guarantee for the correctness of an inference. It seems almost incredible that arguments like these should for so many years have been tolerated in the text-book of a University.