- Ultimate belief
- Belief Be*lief", n. [OE. bileafe, bileve; cf. AS. gele['a]fa.
See {Believe}.]
1. Assent to a proposition or affirmation, or the acceptance
of a fact, opinion, or assertion as real or true, without
immediate personal knowledge; reliance upon word or
testimony; partial or full assurance without positive
knowledge or absolute certainty; persuasion; conviction;
confidence; as, belief of a witness; the belief of our
senses.
[1913 Webster]
Belief admits of all degrees, from the slightest suspicion to the fullest assurance. --Reid. [1913 Webster]
2. (Theol.) A persuasion of the truths of religion; faith. [1913 Webster]
No man can attain [to] belief by the bare contemplation of heaven and earth. --Hooker. [1913 Webster]
3. The thing believed; the object of belief. [1913 Webster]
Superstitious prophecies are not only the belief of fools, but the talk sometimes of wise men. --Bacon. [1913 Webster]
4. A tenet, or the body of tenets, held by the advocates of any class of views; doctrine; creed. [1913 Webster]
In the heat of persecution to which Christian belief was subject upon its first promulgation. --Hooker. [1913 Webster]
{Ultimate belief}, a first principle incapable of proof; an intuitive truth; an intuition. --Sir W. Hamilton. [1913 Webster]
Syn: Credence; trust; reliance; assurance; opinion. [1913 Webster]
The Collaborative International Dictionary of English. 2000.
