Faith

"...I don't think that miracles ever confound a realist.  Nor is it miracles that bring a realist to religion.  If he is an unbeliever, a true realist will always find the strength and ability not to believe in a miracle, and if he is confronted with a miracle as an irrefutable fact, he will rather disbelieve his own senses than accept that fact.

Or he may concede the fact and explain it away as a natural phenomenon until then unknown.  In a realist, it is not miracles that generate faith, but faith that generates miracles.  Once a realist becomes a believer, however, his very realism will make him accept the existence of miracles.

The apostle Thomas said he would not believe until he saw, and when he saw, he said: "My Lord and my God!"  Was it a miracle that made him believe?  Most likely not.  He believed only because he wanted to believe, and possibly he already believed in the secret recesses of his being while he was saying, "Except that I shall see, I shall not believe."

(Dostoevsky, The Brothers Karamazov)