According to Hume ‘When either good or evil is uncertain it gives rise to fear or hope, according to the degrees of uncertainty on one side or the other.’ Hume thought that when an outcome is uncertain the ‘pro and con of the question alternately prevail’ and it is this oscillation between joy, when we think of a desired outcome occurring, and grief when we doubt whether it will that creates the specific sentiment of hope. Correspondingly, for a grievous outcome, the uncertainty generates fear. Hume admits that a grievous outcome may be certain, yet if the mind has not the ‘courage to fix upon it’, or does not know quite what form it may take, the resulting sentiment feels the same as fear. If Hume is right the religious coupling of faith and hope is misleading, since if your faith makes you certain of a desirable outcome, there is no room for the uncertainty that generates hope. Hope is (ideally) replaced by the calm expectation of the outcome.