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Full Idea
Belief consists merely in a certain feeling or sentiment; in something, that depends not on the will, but must arise from certain determinate causes and principles, of which we are not master.
Gist of Idea
Belief is a feeling, independent of the will, which arises from uncontrolled and unknown causes
Source
David Hume (Treatise of Human Nature, + Appendix [1740], Appen p.2)
Book Ref
Hume,David: 'A Treatise of Human Nature', ed/tr. Selby-Bigge/Nidditch [OUP 1978], p.624
A Reaction
This is the opposite of Descartes' 'doxastic voluntarism' (i.e. we choose what to believe). If you want to become a Christian, steep yourself in religious literature, and the company of religious people. It will probably work.
| 15755 | Hume needs a notion which includes degrees of resemblance [Shoemaker on Hume] |
| 16946 | Causation is just invariance, as long as it is described in general terms [Quine on Hume] |
| 15250 | If impressions, memories and ideas only differ in vivacity, nothing says it is memory, or repetition [Whitehead on Hume] |
| 20189 | Belief is a feeling, independent of the will, which arises from uncontrolled and unknown causes [Hume] |
| 21309 | A proposition cannot be intelligible or consistent, if the perceptions are not so [Hume] |
| 21311 | Are self and substance the same? Then how can self remain if substance changes? [Hume] |
| 21312 | Perceptions are distinct, so no connection between them can ever be discovered [Hume] |
| 21308 | We have no impression of the self, and we therefore have no idea of it [Hume] |
| 21310 | Does an oyster with one perception have a self? Would lots of perceptions change that? [Hume] |
| 5323 | Experiences are logically separate, but factually linked by simultaneity or a feeling of continuousness [Ayer on Hume] |
| 23115 | We have no natural love of mankind, other than through various relationships [Hume] |