LOGIC AS THE ESSENCE OF PHILOSOPHY 39 



I think, essentially a product of logical confusion, but it 

 seems in some way to stand for the conception of 

 " qualities of Reality as a whole." Mr Bradley has 

 worked out a theory according to which, in all judgment, 

 we are ascribing a predicate to Reality as a whole ; and 

 this theory is derived from Hegel. Now the traditional 

 logic holds that every proposition ascribes a predicate to a 

 subject, and from this it easily follows that there can be 

 only one subject, the Absolute, for if there were two, the 

 proposition that there were two would not ascribe a 

 predicate to either. Thus Hegel's doctrine, that philo- 

 sophical propositions must be of the form, " the Absolute 

 is such-and-such," depends upon the traditional belief in 

 the universality of the subject-predicate form. This 

 belief, being traditional, scarcely self-conscious, and not 

 supposed to be important, operates underground, and 

 is assumed in arguments which, like the refutation of 

 relations, appear at first sight such as to establish its 

 truth. This is the most important respect in which 

 Hegel uncritically assumes the traditional logic. Other 

 less important respects though important enough to be 

 the source of such essentially Hegelian conceptions as 

 the " concrete universal ' and the " union of identity in 

 difference " will be found where he explicitly deals with 

 formal logic. 1 



There is quite another direction in which a large 



1 See the translation by H. S. Macran, Hegets Doctrine of Formal 

 Logic, Oxford, 1912. Hegel's argument in this portion of his "Logic'' 

 depends throughout upon confusing the " is " of predication, as in 

 "Socrates is mortal," with the "is" of identity, as in "Socrates is the 

 philosopher who drank the hemlock." Owing to this confusion, he thinks 

 that " Socrates " and " mortal " must be identical. Seeing that they are 

 different, he does not infer, as others would, that there is a mistake some- 

 where, but that they exhibit " identity in difference." Again, Socrates is 

 particular, " mortal " is universal. Therefore, he says, since Socrates is 

 mortal, it follows that the particular is the universal taking the " is " to 



