THE THEORY OF SYLLOGISM, ETC. 



91 



I think, that the words universal and particular can be better described for this system than 

 in the usual way, both as to terms and propositions. A term enters universally, when, in 

 order to verify the proposition by induction, every instance of the name must be examined : 

 particularly, when the verification may be attained without it. A proposition is universal, 

 when every instance in the universe must be examined before it can be inductively verified : 

 particular, when the verification may be attained without. So that the phrases • universal 

 proposition, 1 and ' particular proposition, 1 refer to all things in the universe of the proposition ; 

 while • universal term 1 and ' particular term 1 refer to all things contained in a term, or portion 

 of that universe. The introduction of contraries does, in fact, introduce a third term into the 

 proposition ; the universe, or summum genus, be it the whole universe of thought, or a 

 conceivably separable portion of it. And it is to be particularly remembered, that every 

 term is supposed to be part only of the universe : that is, to have an existing contrary in that 

 universe. 



In the inductive examination above alluded to, we suppose that we do not know before- 

 hand which instances of the universe are Xs and which are Ys ; nor, in selecting* an instance 

 from the universe, can we say that that instance is not an X, till we have examined it with all 

 the Xs. In verifying X))Y, we have then to examine every instance of the universe to 

 see whether it be X, but only when it is X need we examine further to see whether it be F: 

 Ys may never be ascertained to be such, since, by reason of their not being Xs, the examination 

 may never take in those Fs. Hence X))Y is a universal proposition in which X is 

 universal and F particular. Again, in X)(Y or 'some things are neither Xs nor Fs, 1 the^rs^ 

 instance of the universe which is carried through all the Xs and all the Fs, and found to agree 

 with no one instance of either, verifies all that the proposition asserts : hence the proposition is 

 particular, and its terms both universal. 



I can now correct a symbolic want of my former writings, though the thing to be signified 



* That is, we do not suppose, as it were, that every instance 

 is ticketed in its place in the universe as X or x, Y or y, but 

 that each instance taken from the universe has its own uni- 

 verse-mark, and that we must then, in order to find if that 

 instance be an X, examine a separate index of Xs, to see if 



that mark occur. The ticketing of the instances, first men- 

 tioned, is the representative of the supposition on which some 

 have discovered that the syllogism concludes in what was 

 already known before the premises could be asserted. 



12—2 



