754 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



tion, which, is inevitable, follows certain lines, namely, of sim- 

 plicity, necessity, regularity. As he puts it, we are prejudiced in 

 favor of certain aspects of the world, and impose them upon the 

 phenomena with which we come in contact. 



This brings us again to the active side of belief. To quote 

 Prof. Royce again: "Every one is certain to be prejudiced, 

 simply because he does not merely receive experience, but him- 

 self acts, himself makes experience." That is, everybody makes 

 his own belief, his own knowledge to some degree. And if we 

 will only watch closely our own mental movements during the 

 process of coming to a decision, we shall see how true this is. 

 During such a process there is a period of balancing one side 

 against the other, of more or less keen scrutiny of reasons, of 

 swift discussion back and forth, accompanied by a tension and 

 excitement rising to the height of exaltation. There is perhaps no 

 attitude in which the mind shows greater activity than this of 

 questioning. We have many times felt the drop that comes 

 with decision. The swift and agile leaping back and forth, the 

 piercing looks cast on this side and on that, are all stopped, 

 sometimes for very weariness, but almost always with a slight 

 sense of depression, like settling after flight. The act of de- 

 ciding, of accepting one of two alternatives, does really seem, 

 at the moment of doing it, like a lower form of action. It is 

 not intellectual, but volitional. I am quite sure no man ever 

 chose a sweetheart without a little sense of coming down from 

 the freedom and daring of uncertainty. It is like the feeling 

 we may imagine a cloud to have on condensing into rain. It 

 has become effective at the cost of freedom and elasticity. This 

 condensing, dampening turn of conception is belief, and it is 

 our will, our activity, the momentum of our life that bring it 

 to pass. 



Though belief is thus primarily an expression of the instinc- 

 tive force of life, determined by intelligence and choice, what we 

 may believe is a matter of circumstance. To believe what one 

 has never heard of is manifestly impossible. Further, inasmuch 

 as belief means laying hold on a conception, accepting it as a 

 basis of action, it is necessary not only to have the matter come 

 before one's mind, but also to attend to it to see it clearly. 

 Hume was right in insisting on the liveliness, clearness, perma- 

 nence, and firmness of the conception that is believed. We do not 

 as a rule believe our dreams, but let a dream recur again and 

 again, and few of us will be able to refuse it credence. Many 

 things come to be believed by their traditional weight of authority. 

 The creeds of Christendom have come down to us with the force 

 of centuries behind them. They are accepted in their traditional 

 form chiefly because by multitudinous repetitions they have been 



