资料来源 : Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913)

Ultimate \Ul"ti*mate\, a. [LL. ultimatus last, extreme, fr. L.
   ultimare to come to an end, fr. ultimus the farthest, last,
   superl. from the same source as ulterior. See {Ulterior}, and
   cf. {Ultimatum}.]
   1. Farthest; most remote in space or time; extreme; last;
      final.

            My harbor, and my ultimate repose.    --Milton.

            Many actions apt to procure fame are not conductive
            to this our ultimate happiness.       --Addison.

   2. Last in a train of progression or consequences; tended
      toward by all that precedes; arrived at, as the last
      result; final.

            Those ultimate truths and those universal laws of
            thought which we can not rationally contradict.
                                                  --Coleridge.

   3. Incapable of further analysis; incapable of further
      division or separation; constituent; elemental; as, an
      ultimate constituent of matter.

   {Ultimate analysis} (Chem.), organic analysis. See under
      {Organic}.

   {Ultimate belief}. See under {Belief}.

   {Ultimate ratio} (Math.), the limiting value of a ratio, or
      that toward which a series tends, and which it does not
      pass.

   Syn: Final; conclusive. See {Final}.

Belief \Be*lief"\, n. [OE. bileafe, bileve; cf. AS. gele['a]fa.
   See {Believe}.]
   1. Assent to a proposition or affirmation, or the acceptance
      of a fact, opinion, or assertion as real or true, without
      immediate personal knowledge; reliance upon word or
      testimony; partial or full assurance without positive
      knowledge or absolute certainty; persuasion; conviction;
      confidence; as, belief of a witness; the belief of our
      senses.

            Belief admits of all degrees, from the slightest
            suspicion to the fullest assurance.   --Reid.

   2. (Theol.) A persuasion of the truths of religion; faith.

            No man can attain [to] belief by the bare
            contemplation of heaven and earth.    --Hooker.

   3. The thing believed; the object of belief.

            Superstitious prophecies are not only the belief of
            fools, but the talk sometimes of wise men. --Bacon.

   4. A tenet, or the body of tenets, held by the advocates of
      any class of views; doctrine; creed.

            In the heat of persecution to which Christian belief
            was subject upon its first promulgation. --Hooker.

   {Ultimate belief}, a first principle incapable of proof; an
      intuitive truth; an intuition. --Sir W. Hamilton.

   Syn: Credence; trust; reliance; assurance; opinion.