180 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[No. 226. 



DO CONJUNCTIONS JOIN PROPOSITIONS ONLY ? 



(Vol. viii., pp. 514. 629.) 



As my name appears to have been referred to 

 by two of your correspondents, Mr. Ingeeby and 

 II. C. K., in connexion with, the above question, 

 I request to be permitted to state my real views 

 upon it, together with the grounds upon which 

 they rest. In doing this I can only directly refer 

 to the observations of H. C. K., not having seen 

 those of Mr. Ingleby to which he makes allusion. 



Admitting that there are many conjunctions 

 which connect propositions only, I am unable to 

 coincide with the view of my friend Dr. Latham 

 and other grammarians, that the property is uni- 

 versal. And I agree with Mr. Ingleby, as quoted 

 by II. C. K., in thinking that the incorrectness of 

 that view may be proved. We possess the power 

 of conceiving of any distinct classes of things, as 

 "trees," "flowers," &c. And we possess the power 

 of connecting such conceptions in thought, so as 

 to form, for instance, the conception of that col- 

 lection of things which consists of " trees and 

 flowers " together. If Ave possess the power of 

 performing this mental operation, we have clearly 

 also the power of expressing it by a sign. This 

 sign is the conjunction "and." It is assumed, 

 what consciousness indeed makes evident, that 

 the power of forming conceptions is antecedent 

 to that of forming judgments expressed by pro- 

 positions. 



But even if we proceed to form a judgment, as 

 "trees and flowers exist," it may still be shown 

 that the conjunction "and" connects the sub- 

 stantives "trees," "flowers," and not propositions. 

 For if we reduce the given proposition to the 

 form, " trees exist and flowers exist," the con- 

 junction becomes wholly superfluous. It adds 

 nothing whatever to the meaning of the separate 

 propositions, "trees exist," "flowers exist." Omit, 

 however, the conjunction between the substan- 

 tives in the original proposition, and the sense is 

 wholly lost. What meaning can we attach, ex- 

 cept by a convention, to the form of words "trees 

 flowers exist." Now there is, I conceive, no more 

 obvious principle in grammar than that the doc- 

 trine of the elements of speech should be founded 

 upon the examination of instances in which they 

 have a real meaning — in which their employment 

 is essential, not accidental. 



It is doubtless one of the consequences of the 

 neglect of this principle, that the older gram- 

 marians have made it a part of the definition of 

 a conjunction, that it is a Avord " devoid of signi- 

 fication" (cpoDVT) &(tt)ixos). See references in Harris, 

 p. 240. Were the philosophy of grammar founded, 

 as alone it truly can be, upon the laAvs of thought, 

 I venture to think that such statements Avould no 

 longer be accepted. 



If the views which I have expressed needed 

 confirmation, they would to my own mind derive 

 it from the circumstance, that on applying to the 

 original proposition that " mathematical analysis 

 of logic " to which II. C. K. refers (not, I think, 

 Avithout a shade of scorn), it is resolved into the 

 elementary propositions, " trees exist," " flowers 

 exist," unconnected by any sign. 



Let us take, as a second example, the propo- 

 sition, " All trees are endogens or exogens." If 

 the subject, " all trees," is to be retained, there is, 

 I conceive, but one way in Avhich the above pro- 

 position can mentally be formed. We form the 

 conception of that collection of things which com- 

 prises endogens and exogens together, and we 

 refer, by an act of judgment, " all ti-ees " to that 

 collection. And thus the subject " all trees," re- 

 maining unchanged, the conjunction "or" connects 

 the terms of the predicate, as the conjunction 

 " and " in the previous example connected those 

 of the subject. I am prepared to show that this 

 is the only view of the proposition consistent Avith 

 its strictly logical use. If II. C. K. insist upon 

 the resolution " any tree is an endogen, or it is an 

 exogen," I Avould ask him to define the word "it." 

 He cannot interpret it as "any tree," for the reso- 

 lution would then be invalid. It must be applied 

 to a particular tree, and then the proposition re- 

 solved is really a " singular " one, and not the 

 proposition Avhose subject is " all trees." 



Not only do conjunctions in certain cases couple 

 words, but in so doing they manifest the dominion 

 of mental laws and the operation of mental pro- 

 cesses, Avhich, though never yet recognised by 

 grammarians and logicians, form an indispensable 

 part of the only basis upon which logic as a science 

 can rest. And however strange the assertion may 

 appear, I do not hesitate to affirm that the science 

 thus established is a mathematict 1 one. I do not 

 by this mean that its subject is the same as that 

 of arithmetic or geometry- It is not the quan- 

 titative element to Avhich the term is intended to 

 refer. But I hold, with, I believe, an increasing 

 school of mathematicians, • that the processes of 

 mathematics, as such, do not depend upon the 

 nature of the subjects to which they are applied, 

 but upon the nature of the laws to AAdiich those 

 subjects, Avhen they pass under the dominion of 

 human thought, become obedient. Now the ulti- 

 mate laws of the processes which are subsidiary 

 to general reasoning, such as attention, concep- 

 tion, abstraction, as Avell as of those processes 

 Avhich are more immediately involved in inference, 

 are such as to admit, of perfect and connected de- 

 velopment in a mathematical form alone. We may 

 indeed, Avithout any systematic investigation of 

 those laAvs, collect together a system of rules and 

 canons, and investigate their common principle. 

 This the genius of Aristotle has done. But we 

 cannot thus establish general methods. Above all, 



