Human Understanding. 



judgment is that faculty which is giv- 

 en man to supply the want of clear and 

 certain knowledge, where that cannot be 

 had. It consists in putting ideas togeth- 

 er, or seperating them from one another 

 in the mind, when their certain agree- 

 ment or disagreement is not perceived, 

 but presumed to be so ; which is, as the 

 word imports, taken to be so before it 

 certainly appears. 



Hence the understanding doth not on- 

 ly know certain truth, but also judges of 

 probability* Probability is always con- 

 versant about propositions whereof we 

 have no certainty, as in knowledge, but 

 only some inducements to receive them 

 as true ; such as their conformity to our 

 own knowledge, observation and experi- 

 ence ; and the entertainment the mind 

 gives this sort of propositions is called 

 assent, opinion or belief. 



Of probability there are various de- 

 grees, from a moral certainty to the 

 slightest degree of evidence ; and the 

 degrees of assent are proportionably va- 

 rious, from the least deviation from the 

 equilibrium to the lowest degree upon 

 the scale of evidence, and even to amor- 

 al impossibility* 



