just of that intensity which subsequent experience will justify? Our instincts are implanted in us for good purposes, and are intended to act immediately and unconsciously. They are, however, subject to control, and have to be brought into accordance with what we believe to be true and right. In other departments of psychology we do not assume that every spontaneous prompting of nature is to be left just as we find it, or even that on the average, omitting individual variations, it is set at that pitch that will be found in the end to be the best when we come to think about it and assign its rules. Take, for example, the case of resentment. Here we have an instinctive tendency, and one that on the whole is good in its results. But moralists are agreed that almost all our efforts at self-control are to be directed towards subduing it and keeping it in its right direction. It is assumed to be given as a sort of rough protection, and to be set, if one might so express oneself, at too high a pitch to be deliberately and consciously acted on in society. May not something of this kind be the case also with our belief? I only make a passing reference to this point here, as on the theory of Probability adopted in this work it does not appear to be at all material to the science. But it seems a strong argument against the expediency of commencing the study of the science from the subjective side, or even of assigning any great degree of prominence to this side.
That men do not believe in exact accordance with this theory must have struck almost every one, but this has probably been considered as mere exception and irregularity; the assumption being made that on the average, and in far the majority of cases, they do so believe. As stated above, it is very doubtful whether the tendency which has just been discussed is not so widely prevalent that it might with far more propriety be called the rule than the exception. And it may be better that this should be so: many good results may follow from that cheerful disposition which induces a man sometimes to go on trying after some great good, the chance of which he overvalues. He will keep on through trouble and disappointment, without serious harm perhaps, when the cool and calculating bystander sees plainly that his ‘measure of belief’ is much higher than it should be. So, too, the tendency also so common, of underrating the chance of a great evil may also work for good. By many men death might be looked upon as an almost infinite evil, at least they would so regard it themselves; suppose they kept this contingency constantly before them at its right value, how would it be possible to get through the practical work of life? Men would be stopping indoors because if they went out they might be murdered or bitten by a mad dog. To say this is not to advocate a return to our instincts; indeed when we have once reached the critical and conscious state, it is hardly possible to do so; but it should be noticed that the advantage gained by correcting them is at best but a balanced one.[3] What is most to our present purpose, it
suggests the inexpediency of attempting to found an exact theory on what may afterwards prove to be a mere instinct, unauthorized in its full extent by experience.
§ 11. It may be replied, that though people, as a matter of fact, do not apportion belief in this exact way, yet they ought to do so. The purport of this remark will be examined presently; it need only be said here that it grants all that is now contended for. For it admits that the degree of our belief is capable of modification, and may need it. But in accordance with what is the belief to be modified?[** TN: space] obviously in accordance with experience; it cannot be trusted to by itself, but the fraction at which it is to be rated must be determined by the comparative frequency of the events to which it refers. Experience then furnishing the standard, it is surely most reasonable to start from this experience, and to found the theory of our processes upon it.