Context

In Section 6, the author argued that the beliefs formed as the result of causal reasoning are the result of custom and habit. In Sections 7 through 9, the author explored various aspects of belief: its nature, its causes, and the effects on belief by the relations of resemblance and contiguity, as well as by “education.” The author had claimed in Section 9 that more than half of our beliefs are the result of having heard ideas repeated by others in a way that enlivens them in our own minds to the point of belief. This section ends the discussion of belief by turning to its influence on our actions and passions.

Background

The topic of the influence of belief on human actions and passions is original to the author.

The Treatise

1. Although philosophers hold that education is “a fallacious ground of assent to any opinion,” they are likely to reject novel systems like those of the author because of education’s influence on them. The author thinks that his account of belief and of causal reasoning may meet this fate, and he expects to make few converts to his system despite the fact that his argument appear to himself to be “perfectly conclusive.” Moreover, there is a prima facie reason to resist the system, because it rests the great bulk of our reasoning, as well as our actions and passions, on something as apparently insignificant as custom and habit. The author will try to counter this objection by discussing issues that properly should only arise in his consideration of the passions in Book II and his projected, but not executed, treatment of beauty. [In the “Advertisement,” the author wrote of possibly treating “criticism” in an extension of the Treatise.]

2. The “chief spring and moving principle” of all human actions, implanted by nature, is “a perception of good or evil, or in other words, of pain and pleasure.” Pain and pleasure may appear either in an impression or in an idea, and these two ways of appearing differ very much. While impressions “always actuate the soul, and that in the highest degree,” ideas sometimes do not. This difference is attributed to nature’s caution, in that it is a compromise between two extremes. One extreme is to be moved only by impressions, which put us at all times in danger of great calamities. Although we might foresee the bad consequences of rash actions, we would have no motivation to avoid them. This is only provided by ideas. The opposite extreme would be to act on every idea, since the mind is populated with too many of them, particularly with ideas that are images of good and evil. We would never enjoy a moment’s peace if we were to act on every idea.

3. Thus, nature has chosen a middle course, so that ideas of good and evil have some, but not entire, influence on our actions. Pure fictions have no efficacy, but what we believe exists or will exist does, and the influence of such belief on our actions approaches that of impressions. “The effect, then, of belief is to raise up a simple idea to an equality with our impressions, and bestow upon it a like influence on our passions.” The only way this can occur, the author claims, is if the force and vivacity of the idea is increased to rival that of an impression. The reason the explanation must appeal to force and vivacity is that these two factors are the only ones that distinguish impressions from ideas when the ideas first arise. So difference in degrees of force is the source of the differences in the effects of ideas and impressions, while removal of those differences is the source of the resemblance of the efficacy of ideas and impressions. So, if the increased force of an idea makes it approach that of an impression, the idea will have a similar effect on action as does the impression, and if an idea has a similar effect on action as an impression, it must be because it approaches the impression in force. “Belief, therefore, since it causes an idea to imitate the effects of the impressions, must make it resemble them in these qualities, and is nothing but a more vivid and intense conception of any idea.” This conclusion provides additional support for the system and may help to explain how causal reasoning can affect the operation of the will and of the passions. [This account of belief was initially given in Section 5, paragraph 7, and was discussed in detail in Section 7.]

4. Belief [in the existence of objects] is almost always needed to excite our passions [and thus motivate us to act]. The passions, in turn, have a great influence on belief. Not only do pleasurable passions incite us to beliefs, but painful ones often do so as well. Examples are cowards and melancholics, both of whom interpret their experience in terms of their painful passions “When any affecting object is presented, it gives the alarm, and excites immediately a degree of its proper passion; especially in persons who are naturally inclin’d to that passion.” After the object has excited the relevant passion, the passion “passes by an easy transition to the imagination,” thereby enlivening the relevant idea. This explains why people are more easily persuaded by a dramatic, rather than a more moderate, presentation by a quack. The astonishment produced by his claims “spreads itself over the whole soul, and so vivifies and enlivens the idea, that it resembles the inferences we draw from experience.” This process is a “mystery,” which the author states has already been discussed a bit and will be discussed further in a later part of the Treatise. [The author had discussed Sections 8 and 9 the way in which religious beliefs are enlivened. There is no evident discussion of this phenomenon later in the Treatise, though there is a section of the Enquiry concerning miracles that delves into the matter.]

5. The preceding account of the influence of belief on the passions will help the reader understand the present account of its influence on the imagination. What is incredible to us does not give us any pleasure, as with the case of a habitual liar. Even poets, who are by their profession liars, attempt to give an air of reality to the scenes they present, and if they are totally unrealistic, they give little satisfaction. “In short, we may observe, that even when ideas have no manner of influence on the will and passions, truth and reality are still requisite, in order to make them entertaining to the imagination.”

6. An examination of all the relevant phenomena shows that the only effect of truth in “all works of genius” is to make it more easy for the mind to accept (or harder for it to reject) the ideas presented by them. The author’s system explains this in terms of the increase of force and vivacity, and this is enough to explain “all the influence of belief upon the fancy.” In particular, surrogates for truth and reality are sufficient to influence the imagination. For the poets, the stand-in for truth is what they call “a poetical system of things.“ Familiar names from mythology, such as ‘Mars’ and ‘Jupiter,” make an easy entry into the imagination due to their frequent repetition, in the same way in which education inculcates belief. Similarly, poets use the names of historical figures to get this effect. Their goal is not to make the readers and listeners believe that their stories are true, but rather to make them easier to swallow. On the other hand, comics do not need this nod to reality, because their stories are so familiar that they are easily entertained even though recognized to be false.

7. The mixture of fact and fiction in the stories of the poets shows that the imagination can be satisfied without belief, but at the same time it provides “very strong confirmation” of the account of belief given by the author. The factual element makes the story go down more easily and make a deeper impression than would a purely fictional account. Because there is a causal relation that ties the story together, the factual parts can follow the causal chain and confer force and vivacity on the fictional parts, as if by “so many pipes or canals.” Although the connection between fact and fiction is, so to speak, accidental, and so does not “amount to perfect assurance,” it comes close. “Belief must please the imagination by means of the force and vivacity which attends it; since every idea, which has force and vivacity, is found to be agreeable to that faculty.”

8. In confirmation of his thesis about the influence of belief on imagination, the author notes that not only does belief enliven the imagination and the passions, but the imagination and passions influence belief. When a thought is presented in a particularly vivid way, it is difficult to withhold belief, so much so that this vivacity creates an effect stronger than that of custom or of experience. Not only does the imagination of an author or a companion fire our belief, but it can even inspire them to belief.

9. A further observation is the progression from a lively imagination to madness. In the latter case, belief is the result of ideas that are so vivid as to be indistinguishable from the truth and thus leads to action as much as the truth does. In such cases, there is no need for the standard means of enlivening ideas, a present impression and a customary transition of it to an idea, as is the case with causal reasoning. So vivid are the ideas of the mad that their vivacity matches that of the results of causal reasoning and may even be as vivid as present impressions of the senses.

10. One thing that the effects of poetry and those of madness have in common is that the vivacity they confer on ideas is not due to connections in objects but to “the present temper and dispositions of the person.” But this increase in vivacity is tempered by a difference in feeling between the ideas enlivened by poetry and ideas resulting from reasoning about matters of fact, no matter how low the probability of the latter may be. The two can always be distinguished. This holds the emotions elicited by the poetry and for the corresponding ideas. Although any passion may be evoked by poetry, it always differs from those that result from “belief and reality.” Although passions which in real life are disagreeable can invoke great entertainment in fiction, the reason is that there is it is less solid and only has the agreeable effect of “exciting the spirits and rouzing the attention.” This difference in passions is reflected in the corresponding ideas. When the vivacity of an idea results in a constant conjunction conjoined to a current impression [as with causal relations], it is more forcible than an idea evoked by poetry, even though the mind may not appear to be moved as much. Despite its more dramatic effects on the mind, there remains a deficiency in feeling when an eloquent passage moves us. “There is something weak and imperfect amidst all the seeming vehemence of thought and sentiment, which attends the fictions of poetry.”

11. The author states that he will later make further comparison of poetical enthusiasm and serious conviction [but he never does]. His only observation at this point is that reflection and general rules play a major part in the case of serious conviction. [The general rules apparently are generalizations about what objects can be connected together in reality. For more on general rules, see Section 13, where they are deemed an “unphilosophical” kind of probability.] Any ideas may be connected together in the imagination, but ideas of what is real can only be connected in a single way. So poetry can only make us “lend ourselves” to the fictional story, but the lack of a causal connection makes them feel different from ideas that are based on memory and custom. Although they are somewhat of the same kind, fictional ideas are “much inferior” to ideas of reality, “both in its causes and effects.”

12. Similarly, thinking about general ideas is what keeps us from forming beliefs upon every enlivening of ideas. There are times when the force of one idea is less than that of another, yet the former is a case of full conviction and the latter not. We are fully convinced in an opinion when there is no opposite probability. But in such cases, there may be a lack of force due to a deficiency in resemblance or contiguity. For example, an object twenty feet away looks smaller than an object ten feet away, and this is a forceful appearance. But the understanding, through the use of general rules, corrects this appearance and convinces us that it is in fact of the same size.

The Enquiry

The relation between belief and action is not discussed in the Enquiry.

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