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noun

Scepticism n. See Skepticism.

Skepticism n. (Written also scepticism)

An undecided, inquiring state of mind; doubt; uncertainty. "That momentary amazement, and irresolution, and confusion, which is the result of skepticism."

(Metaph.) The doctrine that no fact or principle can be certainly known; the tenet that all knowledge is uncertain; Pyrrohonism; universal doubt; the position that no fact or truth, however worthy of confidence, can be established on philosophical grounds; critical investigation or inquiry, as opposed to the positive assumption or assertion of certain principles.

(Theol.) A doubting of the truth of revelation, or a denial of the divine origin of the Christian religion, or of the being, perfections, or truth of God. "Let no... secret skepticism lead any one to doubt whether this blessed prospect will be realized."

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Etymology of 'Scepticism'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Scepticism" Quotes from Famous Books

... contradiction. This is the only comprehensive satire ever written, for it is utterly independent of time, place, and manners. Faust gives us the natural history of the human intellect, Mephistopheles being merely the projected impersonation of that scepticism which is the invariable result of a purely intellectual culture. These four books are the only ones in which universal facts of human nature and experience are ideally represented. They can, therefore, never be ...

— The Function Of The Poet And Other Essays • James Russell Lowell

... explaining,—a lot of explaining. Mr. Twist didn't like to think so, but Anna-Felicitas's recent conduct seemed to him almost artful. It seemed to him older than her years. It seemed to justify the lawyer's scepticism when he described the twins to him as children. That ...

— Christopher and Columbus • Countess Elizabeth Von Arnim

... the time, Hume undertook to write a History of England, which, with all its errors and faults, still ranks among the best efforts of English historians. Like the French philosophers, Hume was an infidel, and his scepticism appears in his writings; but, unlike them—for they were stanch reformers in government as well as infidels in faith—he who was an infidel was also an aristocrat in sentiment, and a consistent Tory his life long. In his history, with all the artifices of a philosopher, ...

— English Literature, Considered as an Interpreter of English History - Designed as a Manual of Instruction • Henry Coppee

... self-preservation and of self-destruction are equally powerful in this world. The devil will hold his empire over humanity until a limit of time which is still unknown. You laugh? You do not believe in the devil? Scepticism as to the devil is a French idea, and it is also a frivolous idea. Do you know who the devil is? Do you know his name? Although you don't know his name you make a mockery of his form, following the example of Voltaire. You sneer at his hoofs, at his tail, at his horns—all of them the produce ...

— The Idiot • (AKA Feodor Dostoevsky) Fyodor Dostoyevsky

... enjoy the favour of our middle classes, those who best represent their rather narrow ideas, their somewhat prescribed views, their rather superficial scepticism, and their at times somewhat excessive egoism, display profound alarm at this new power which they see growing; and to combat the disorder in men's minds they are addressing despairing appeals to those moral forces of the ...

— The Crowd • Gustave le Bon

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