Q0249

David Hume

A verified English rendering from the curated archive.

English

A wise man proportions his belief to the evidence.
Thinker David Hume
School Skepticism
Source Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding X
Theme Knowledge
Another quotation More from this thinker

Source context

This English passage is associated with Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding X, within the tradition of Skepticism. The wording below is a verified rendering prepared for careful reading rather than a claim of unique translation authority.

A short reading

Read in the register of knowledge, the sentence asks the reader to test an assumption rather than to collect a slogan. In David Hume's wider work, similar claims are usually offered as prompts for judgment: what would have to be true for the sentence to hold, and what would follow if it did?

How to cite this quotation

APA: David Hume. (n.d.). A wise man proportions his belief to the evidence. In Philosophy Blind Box. https://www.philosophydef.com/quotes/q0249

MLA: David Hume. “A wise man proportions his belief to the….” Philosophy Blind Box, https://www.philosophydef.com/quotes/q0249.

Chicago: David Hume. “A wise man proportions his belief to the….” Philosophy Blind Box. Accessed 2026. https://www.philosophydef.com/quotes/q0249.

Same thinker

More from David Hume

  1. Reason is, and ought only to be the slave of the passions, and can never pretend to any other office than to serve and obey them.
  2. For my part, when I enter most intimately into what I call myself, I always stumble on some particular perception or other.
  3. Reason is wholly inactive, and can never be the source of so active a principle as conscience, or a sense of morals.
  4. Reason is, and ought only to be the slave of the passions.
  5. Custom, then, is the great guide of human life.

All quotations by David Hume

Same theme

More on knowledge

  1. What I do not know, I do not claim to know.
  2. No one errs willingly.
  3. What then is time? If no one asks me, I know; if I wish to explain it to one who asks, I do not know.
  4. What do I know?
  5. Once in a lifetime, everything must be doubted.

Browse the knowledge theme