We can assert that the general character of Nature is uniformity, but we cannot go beyond this. Every separate law of nature is established by induction from the facts, and so too is the general uniformity. Every separate law of Nature is a working hypothesis. So too is the uniformity of Nature a working hypothesis, and it never can be more. It is true that there is far more evidence for the uniformity of Nature as a whole than for any one law of Nature; because a law of Nature is established by the uniformity of sequences in those phenomena to which it applies; whereas every uniformity of sequence, of whatever kind, is an evidence of the general uniformity. The evidence for the uniformity of nature is the accumulated evidence for all the separate uniformities. But, however much greater the quantity of evidence, the kind ever remains the same. There is no means by which we can demonstrate this uniformity. We can only make it probable. We can say that in almost every case all the evidence is one way; but whenever there is evidence to the contrary we cannot refuse to examine it. If a miracle were worked science could not prove that it was a miracle, nor of course prove that it was not a miracle. To prove it to be a miracle would require not a vast range of knowledge, but absolutely universal knowledge, which it is entirely beyond our faculties to attain. To say that any event was a miracle would be to say that we knew that there was no higher law that could explain it, and this we could not say unless we knew all laws: to say that it was not a miracle would be _ex hypothesi_ to assert what was false. In fact, to assert the occurrence of a miracle is simply to go back to the beginning of science, and to say: Here is an event which we cannot assign to that derivative action to which we have been led to assign the great body of events; we cannot explain it except by referring it to direct and spontaneous action, to a will like our own will. Science has shown that the vast majority of events are due to derivative action regulated by laws. Here is an event which cannot be so explained, any more than the action of our own free will can be so explained. Science may fairly claim to have shown that miracles, if they happen at all, are exceedingly rare. To demonstrate that they never happen at all is impossible, from the very nature of the evidence on which Science rests. But for the same reason Science can never in its character of Science admit that a miracle has happened. Science can only admit that, so far as the evidence goes, an event has happened which lies outside its province.