An imbecile habit has arisen in modern controversy of saying that such and such a creed can be held in one age but cannot be held in another.  Some dogma, we are told, was credible in the twelfth century, but is not credible in the twentieth.  You might as well say that a certain philosophy can be believed on Mondays, but cannot be believed on Tuesdays.  You might as well say of a view of the cosmos that it was suitable to half-past three, but not suitable to half-past four.  What a man can believe depends upon his philosophy, not upon the clock or century.  If a man believes in unalterable natural law, he cannot believe in any miracle in any age.  If a man believes in a will behind law, he can believe in any miracle in any age.  Suppose, for the sake of argument, we are concerned with a case of thaumaturgic healing.  A materialist of the twelfth century could not believe it any more than a materialist of the twentieth century.  But a Christian Scientist of the twentieth century can believe it as much as a Christian of the twelfth century.  It is simply a matter of a man’s theory of things.

- Orthodoxy, G. K. Chesterton