Note 61 — Chapter XXI · EUTHYDEMUS.

See the instructive and original chapter on the generation, sources, and growth of Belief, in Mr. Bain’s work, ‘Emotions and Will,’ p. 568 seq. After laying down the fundamental characteristic of Belief, as referable altogether to intended action, either certain to come, or contingent under supposed circumstances, and after enumerating the different Sources of Belief. — 1. Intuitive or Instinctive. 2. Experience. 3. The Influence of the Emotions (sect. x. p. 579) — Mr. Bain says: “Having in our constitution primordial fountains of activity in the spontaneous and voluntary impulses, we follow the first clue that experience gives us, and accept the indication with the whole force of these natural promptings. Being under the strongest impulses to act somehow, an animal accepts any lead that is presented, and if successful, abides by that lead with unshaken confidence. This is that instinct of credulity so commonly attributed to the infant mind. It is not the single instance, or the repetition of two or three, that makes up the strong tone of confidence; it is the mind’s own active determination, finding some definite vent in the gratification of its ends, and abiding by the discovery with the whole energy of the character, until the occurrence of some check, failure, or contradiction. The force of belief, therefore, is not one rising from zero to a full development by slow degrees, according to the length of the experience. We must treat it rather as a strong primitive manifestation, derived from the natural activity of the system, and taking its direction and rectification from experience (p. 583). The anticipation of nature, so strenuously repudiated by Bacon, is the offspring of this characteristic of the mental system. With the active tendency at its maximum, and the exercise of intelligence and acquired knowledge at the minimum, there can issue nothing but a quantity of rash enterprises. The respectable name generalisation, implying the best products of enlightened scientific research, has also a different meaning, expressing one of the most erroneous impulses and crudest determinations of untutored human nature. To extend some familiar and narrow experience, so as to comprehend cases the most distant, is a piece of mere reckless instinct, demanding severe discipline for its correction. I have mentioned the case of our supposing all other minds constituted like our own. The veriest infant has got this length in the career of fallacy. Sound belief, instead of being a pacific and gentle growth, is in reality the battering of a series of strongholds, the conquering of a country in hostile occupation. This is a fact common both to the individual and to the race. Observation is unanimous on the point. It will probably be long ere the last of the delusions attributable to this method of believing first and proving afterwards can be eradicated from humanity.” [3rd ed., p. 505 seq.]