‘ Knowledge ’ in the Strict Sense of the Term

Abstract

How completely Hume’s interest centred in his doctrine of belief, and how easily he satisfied himself in the treatment of all questions not directly bound up with it, is significantly shown in the quite perfunctory manner in which he disposes of the problems of knowledge proper in the four pages¹ which make up Section I of Part iii, Book I. For it is not merely that the issues are dealt with in such brief compass. He has not cared to give his mind to them; he has been content to treat them in language which is merely popular, and which on closer scrutiny is found to be confused and misleading.