117 



ORGANON. 



OROANON. 



Logicians clearly peroeire the value of the syllogistic forms 

 M mn aid aud a formal help in analysing the reasoning process in a 

 given cane : they also see or feel that the reasoning urocea* in itself 

 u not knowledge, but they see that it U a means to Knowledge. Its 

 barrennea* in itself is confounded with its productive powers when 

 exercised on a material, and hence they have come to confound its 

 operating energies with iU products ; as if a man should confound 

 his tools with that which is produced by his tools operating on his 

 materials, 



A pure logic will lead all men to a metaphysic, for a pure logic has 

 its use in its applications. A metaphyuc, as a system, if it does not 

 contain a logic, will lead to the results of most systems of nietaphysic, 

 that is, to none at all. 



Thu* it appears that the study of logic is perhaps the proper intro- 

 duction to a nielaphysic ; and it were much to be wished that all who 

 hare written <>n the latter had first been subjected to the discipline of 

 the former. 



The forms of the SYLLOGISM are considered under that article, 

 consistently with the plan of this work. In the mean time, till \vo 

 hare some system of logic in our language which is founded upon and 

 grows out of some philosophical system, it is better for the student to 

 study only a purely formal logic, which is independent of any philoso- 

 phical system, and to apply it to his various studies. 



The question, What is Logic ? has been a matter of much dispute. 

 It has been disputed whether logic is a science or an art, or both an 

 idle question, which may be safely left undecided. It is more im- 

 portant to determine what U comprehended in the term logic, and 

 this has partly been attempted here. It is also of some importance to 

 how that the notions of this science do not appear to have been very 

 exact among the Greeks and Romans, which may be one cause of the 

 traditional confusion as to the limits of logic, which has been so 

 common in modern times. It may be also useful to show what logic 

 is conceived to be by some modern writers. 



There is no definition of logic in the extant works of Aristotle ; and 

 U we deduce from his Organon, as we now have it, our notion of what 

 the term comprehends, we shall find that it contains a great deal which 

 does not belong to logic as it has been understood by those who have 

 formed the most exact notions of it. If we should attempt to 

 ascertain what logic is from the writings of all who have written on 

 logic, it will be found impossible to form any exact notion of its limits 

 and objects. 



Dialectic is distinguished by Cicero (' Topica," 2) from Topic. " All 

 exact argumentation," he observes, " consists of two parts, one com- 

 prehending invention (unam inveniendi), and the other judgment 

 (alteram judicandi)." He assigns to Aristotle pre-eminence in both, 

 and speaks of the Stoics as having especially applied themselves to the 

 latter, which they named Dialectic. But the dialectic of the Stoics was 

 certainly not confined to pure logic, as appears from what Cicero says 

 in his treatise ' On the Orator ' (ii. 38), and also from the statement of 

 the Stoical opinions as to dialectic by Diogenes Laertius, in his Life of 

 Zeno of Citium. The Stoic dialectic seems to have comprehended 

 logic and more, as will hereafter appear ; and yet it comprehended leaa 

 than the logic of the Peripatetics.* 



In Dr. Whately's treatise, as may be collected from a comparison of 

 various passages, logic seems to be convertible with syllogistic. To 

 rcaton, in the strict sense of the word, is to make use of arguments 

 (p. 18) ; an argument, when regularly expressed, is a syllogism 

 (p. 55) ; and logic is the science and the art of reasoning (p. 1) ; from 

 which it follows that to syllogise and to reason are convertible, and 

 that logic is the theory of the syllogism (p. 73).t This seems to be 

 the meaning of the author, and if such be the proper notion of logic, it 

 must be admitted that the boundaries of the science are very limited 

 indeed. But limited as they really are, in this view of the subject, the 

 exercise of reducing argumentation to syllogistic forms still contains 

 more than those may be inclined to suppose who have not been 

 disciplined in this practice. 



It may be worth while to notice what Dr. Whately says of the word 

 argumrnt. " Every argument," he observes, " consists of two parts, 

 that which is proved, and that by means of which it is proved ;" and 

 he adds in a note, that this is the strict technical sense of the word 

 argument, but that in jnipular use argument is often employed to 

 denote the latter of those two parts alone. But this is a mistake : thu 

 popular use is the correct use, as it is in many other cases. When a 

 man is said to use a good argument, he urges or suggests something 

 which is either proved or universally admitted, and the goodness of 

 his argument consists in its being applicable to the matter in hand, and 

 obviously comprehending within it something which it is his object to 

 establish or prove. He who argues well, possesses the inventive 



* Bee also the threefold dlrtalon of Philosophy by Diogenes Laertlus (Pro- 

 vmium). Into Physic (fv<), Ethlo (;*), and Dialectic (3iXit,). Zeno of 

 Eles was coruidrrcd u the founder of dialectic. 



f Dr. Whatoly says, " The third operation of the mind, namely, reasoning 

 (or dljcoorae) expressed In wordu, in arfumml ; and an argument itatcd at fuli 

 lenflh and in IU regular form, U called a syllogism ; the third i*rtof logic there- 

 fore trcati of the tyllogum," The other two part*, which arc briefly t. 

 Dr. Whateljr, are c. 1, "Of the operation! of the mind and of terms;" and 

 c. 1, " Of proposition!," but they are very Incomplete, and, u we think, very 

 t In logical precision. There is a Supplement to c. 1. 



faculty as defined by Cicero. It is his business to establish one or 

 more things, and to command the assent of his hearers by presenting 

 t<> their minds such propositions as only need to be presented in 

 to command assent, and which aru comprehensive enough to embrace 

 the particular things which he has to establish. The argument , in the 

 popular sense, is the premises of the syllogism ; or it is the middle 

 term ; and it is accordingly explained by Cicero (' Topica,' 2) to be 

 " ratio, qua) rei dubitc facial fidem," the muon, which gives credibility 

 to a thing that is doubtful. Of course that which in proved, or ,to be 

 cannot be an argument within Cicero's meaning of the term. 

 I >r. \Vhatcly himself says, " that which is used to prove the qm 

 if stated tail (as is often done in common discourse), is i ..11.- I thr 

 return." But it is equally the reason whether placed first 

 is called the rttuon with strict technical propriety, whatever may be 

 the place which it occupies in discourse. The proper name for tin- 

 syllogism is argumentation, of which the two premises are the argu- 

 ment ; and this is the sense in which ancient logical writers < > 

 stood argumentation and argument. 



The meaning of the term Logic is explained by Kant with his usual 

 clearness. Logic is the science of the laws of thought Logic n 

 considered from two points of view, as General or Special 

 logic comprehends only the necessary laws of thought, without which 

 there can be no exercise of the Understanding, and it has no n-f 

 to any difference in the objects to which it is applied. Special logic 

 comprehends the rules of thinking rightly on any given 

 General logic again is either Pure or Applied logic. In the former wo 

 abstract from all empirical conditions under which our understanding 

 is exercised, as for instance, the influence of the senses, imagin 

 memory, &c. A General and Pure Logic has consequently only to 

 deal with pure d priori principles, and is a canon of the Understanding 

 aud of the Reason, but only in respect to the formal part of ita use ; 

 the matter which is its object may be either empirical or transcen- 

 dental. A General Logic is called Applied when it has reference to 

 the rules of the exercise of the Understanding under the subjective 

 empirical conditions, which we learn from psychology. It has con- 

 sequently empirical principles, though it is so far General that it has 

 reference to the exercise of the understanding without any distinction 

 of objects. In General Logic consequently, the part which compre- 

 hends the pure doctrine of the Reason must be absolutely sep 

 from that which is Applied, though still General Logic. The first 

 part only is properly a science, though brief and dry, as the regular 

 exhibition of an elementary view of the Understanding must be. In 

 this science then logicians must always bear two rules in mind : 



1. As General Logic, it abstracts from everything which the under- 

 standing contains as knowledge, aud from all differences in its u! 



and it has only to do with the pure form of thought. 



2. As Pure Logic, it has no empirical principles, and consequently 

 derives nothing (as has been sometimes supposed) from psychology, 

 which therefore has no influence at all on the canon of the under- 

 standing. It is a demonstrated science, and everything in it must bo 

 absolutely A priori true. (Kant, ' Critik der Reinen Veruunft,' p. 55, 

 &c.,ed. 1828.) 



By Applied Logic, Kant understands an exhibition of the under- 

 standing and the rules of its necessary exercise in concnt", namely, 

 under those accidental conditions of the subject which may assist or 

 impede its exercise, and all which are only empirical data. It treats of 

 attention, its impedimenta and consequences, the origin of error, the 

 state of doubt, conviction, &c. 



General logic then abstracts from all our knowledge, that i- 

 all relation of our knowledge to an object, and contemplates only tin- 

 logical form in the relation of the parts of our knowledge to one 

 another, that is, the form of thought generally. So far as truth is 

 concerned, since logic is conversant only about the general and neces- 

 sary rules of thought, the criterion of its truth must lie in these rules ; 

 and whatever contradicts them is false, for logic would then con- 

 tradict itself. Yet though a logic may be consistent, that is, not 

 self-contradictory, yet it may be contradictory to the object : 

 sequently the bare logical criterion of truth, namely, the conformity 

 of knowledge with the general and formal laws of thought and of the 

 reason, is the comlilio .i'/c </ud non, and consequently the n< 

 condition of all truth. Further however logic cannot go, and am 

 which affects not the form, but the matter, logic has no means of 

 detecting. 



A recent German writer has viewed logic in a somewhat different 

 light, and given it a wider range. The difficulty of presenting any- 

 thing like an adequate view of the principles of Hegel by a few 

 extracts must l>e the apology for this imperfect attempt; thoobsi inity 

 of the exposition, if such it shall appear, may be partly though not 

 entirely due to ourselves. 



" That which is generally understood by the term logic, is \ 

 altogether independent of any metaphysical signification. In its 

 present condition this science has no subject-matter (inhalt) in the sense 

 in which Bubject-umtter is considered as a reality and as a truth in 

 the ordinary acceptation of the term. But it is not for thi n . <M 

 formal irienec which is devoid of truth. The n :-'"<> of Inn li ho 

 must not be sought for in that material which people expect to find in 

 logic, and to the want of which its unsatisfactory nature is usually 

 attributed ; but the emptiness of logical forma rather lies in the way 



