Full Idea
The three views one could adopt concerning axioms are that they are self-evident truths, or that they are arbitrary stipulations, or that they are fallible attempts to describe how things are.
Gist of Idea
Axioms are either self-evident, or stipulations, or fallible attempts
Source
James Robert Brown (Philosophy of Mathematics [1999], Ch.10)
Book Reference
Brown,James Robert: 'Philosophy of Mathematics' [Routledge 2002], p.170
A Reaction
Presumably modern platonists like the third version, with others choosing the second, and hardly anyone now having the confidence to embrace the first.