A feeling is termed a 'belief/ or is said to include an element of 'belief/ when its datum is a proposition, and its subjective form includes, as the defining element in its emotional pattern, a certain form, or eternal object, associated with some gradation of intensity. This eternal object is 'beliefcharacter/ When this character enters into the emotional pattern, then, according to the intensity involved, the feeling, whatever else it be, is to some degree a belief.
This variation in the intensity of belief-character is insisted on by Locke in his Essay. He writes (IV, XV, 3) : The entertainment the mind gives this sort of propositions is called "belief/' "assent/' or "opinion/' which is the admitting or receiving any proposition for true, upon arguments or proofs that are found to persuade us to receive it as true, without certain knowledge that it is so.
And herein lies the difference between probability and certainty, faith and knowledge, that in all thef parts of knowledge there is intuition; each immediate idea, each step has its visible and certain connection: in belief not so.
[409] Locke's distinction between certainty and uncertain belief is admirable. But it is not nearly so important as it looks. For it is not the immediate intuition that we are usually concerned with. We only have its recollection recorded in words. Whether the verbal record of a recollection recalls to our minds a true proposition must always be a matter of great uncertainty. Accordingly our attitude towards an immediate intuition must be that of the gladiators, "morituri te salutamus," as we pass into the limbo where we rely upon the uncertain record. It must be understood that we are not speaking of the objective probability of a proposition, expressing its relation to certain other propositions. Comparative firmness of belief is a psychological fact which may, or may not, be justified by the objective evidence. This belief-character takes various forms from its fusion with consciousness derived from the various types of intellectual feelings.