Hobbes - Leviathan.pdf

A man that hath practised to speak by drawing in of his breath
(which kind of men in ancient time were called ventriloqui) and so
make the weakness of his voice seem to proceed, not from the weak
impulsion of the organs of speech, but from distance of place, is able
to make very many men believe it is a voice from heaven, whatsoever he
please to tell them. And for a crafty man that hath enquired into
the secrets and familiar confessions that one man ordinarily maketh to
another of his actions and adventures past, to tell them him again
is no hard matter; and yet there be many that by such means as that
obtain the reputation of being conjurers. But it is too long a
business to reckon up the several sorts of those men which the
Greeks called thaumaturgi, that is to say, workers of things
wonderful; and yet these do all they do by their own single dexterity.
But if we look upon the impostures wrought by confederacy, there is
nothing how impossible soever to be done that is impossible to be
believed. For two men conspiring, one to seem lame, the other to
cure him with a charm, will deceive many: but many conspiring, one
to seem lame, another so to cure him, and all the rest to bear
witness, will deceive many more.
In this aptitude of mankind to give too hasty belief to pretended
miracles, there can there can be no better nor I think any other
caution than that which God hath prescribed, first by Moses (as I have
said before in the precedent chapter), in the beginning of the
thirteenth and end of the eighteenth of Deuteronomy; that we take
not any for prophets that teach any other religion than that which
God's lieutenant, which at that time was Moses, hath established;
nor any, though he teach the same religion, whose prediction we do not
see come to pass. Moses therefore in his time, and Aaron and his
successors in their times, and the sovereign governor of God's
people next under God Himself, that is to say, the head of the
Church in all times, are to be consulted what doctrine he hath
established before we give credit to a pretended miracle or prophet.
And when that is done, the thing they pretend to be a miracle, we must
both see it done and use all means possible to consider whether it
be really done; and not only so, but whether it be such as no man
can do the like by his natural power, but that it requires the
immediate hand of God. And in this also we must have recourse to God's
lieutenant, to whom in all doubtful cases we have submitted our
private judgements. For example, if a man pretend that after certain
words spoken over a piece of bread, that presently God hath made it
not bread, but a god, or a man, or both, and nevertheless it looketh
still as like bread as ever it did, there is no reason for any man
to think it really done, nor consequently to fear him till he
enquire of God by his vicar or lieutenant whether it be done or not.
If he say not, then followeth that which Moses, saith "he hath
spoken it presumptuously; thou shalt not fear him."* If he say it is
done, then he is not to contradict it. So also if we see not, but only
hear tell of a miracle, we are to consult the lawful Church; that is
to say, the lawful head thereof, how far we are to give credit to
the relators of it. And this is chiefly the case of men that in
these days live under Christian sovereigns. For in these times I do
not know one man that ever saw any such wondrous work, done by the
charm or at the word or prayer of a man, that a man endued but with
a mediocrity of reason would think supernatural: and the question is
no more whether what we see done be a miracle; whether the miracle
we hear, or read of, were a real work, and not the act of a tongue
or pen; but in plain terms, whether the report be true, or a lie. In