or sentiment, different from the loose reveries of the fancy. In this
consists the whole nature of belief. For as there is no matter of fact
which we believe so firmly that we cannot conceive the contrary, there
would be no difference between the conception assented to and that which
is rejected, were it not for some sentiment which distinguishes the one
from the other. If I see a billiard-ball moving towards another, on a
smooth table, I can easily conceive it to stop upon contact. This
conception implies no contradiction; but still it feels very differently
from that conception by which I represent to myself the impulse and the
communication of motion from one ball to another.

40. Were we to attempt a _definition_ of this sentiment, we should,
perhaps, find it a very difficult, if not an impossible task; in the
same manner as if we should endeavour to define the feeling of cold or
passion of anger, to a creature who never had any experience of these
sentiments. Belief is the true and proper name of this feeling; and no
one is ever at a loss to know the meaning of that term; because every
man is every moment conscious of the sentiment represented by it. It may
not, however, be improper to attempt a _description_ of this sentiment;
in hopes we may, by that means, arrive at some analogies, which may
afford a more perfect explication of it. I say, then, that belief is
nothing but a more vivid, lively, forcible, firm, steady conception of
an object, than what the imagination alone is ever able to attain. This
variety of terms, which may seem so unphilosophical, is intended only to
express that act of the mind, which renders realities, or what is taken
for such, more present to us than fictions, causes them to weigh more in
the thought, and gives them a superior influence on the passions and
imagination. Provided we agree about the thing, it is needless to
dispute about the terms. The imagination has the command over all its
ideas, and can join and mix and vary them, in all the ways possible. It