" But, as a matter of fact, no testimony exists of which the
falsehood would be a prodigy. We cannot find in history any miracle
attested by a sufficient number of men of such unquestionable good
[161] sense, education, and learning, as to secure us against all
delusion in themselves; of such undoubted integrity as to place them
beyond all suspicion of any design to deceive others; of such credit in
the eyes of mankind as to have a great deal to lose in case of their
being detected in any falsehood, and at the same time attesting facts
performed in such a public manner as to render detection unavoidable
--all which circumstances are requisite to give us a full assurance in
the testimony of men.
In the Dialogues on Natural Religion which were not published till after
his death (1776), Hume made an attack on the "argument from design," on
which deists and Christians alike relied to prove the existence of a
Deity. The argument is that the world presents clear marks of design,
endless adaptation of means to ends, which can only be explained as due
to the deliberate plan of a powerful intelligence. Hume disputes the
inference on the ground that a mere intelligent being is not a
sufficient cause to explain the effect. For the argument must be that
the system of the material world demands as a cause a corresponding
system of interconnected ideas; but such a mental system would demand an
explanation of its existence just as much as the material world; and
thus we find ourselves
[162] committed to an endless series of causes.
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