40 THE SCIENCE OF LOGIC. 



distinct treatises : The Book on the Categories, 

 tcaTfjyopiai, Aristotelis Liber de Praedicamentis ; the Book on 

 Judgment, fitftXlov irepl cp/Arjveias, Liber de Interpretatione ; the 

 (two books of) Prior Analytics, dva\vn/ca irporepa, Analytica 

 Priora (libri duo] ; the (two books of) Posterior Analytics, 

 ava\vTiKa va-repa, Analytica Posteriora (libri dud] ; the (eight 

 books of) Topics, TOTTLKCL, Topicorum Libri Octo ; and the Sophis 

 tical Arguments, irepl aofyiaTiKtov eXeyxwv, De Sophisticis Elen- 

 chis. These separate tracts were all grouped together under the 

 common title of (Aristotle s) Organon, ofryavov, a name first given 

 them by Diogenes of Laerte. 



The Book on the Categories treats of Simple Apprehension and 

 Concepts. The De Interpretatione deals with Judgment, affirmation 

 and enunciation, denial, subject and predicate. The two books of 

 Prior Analytics deal with the formal side of Inference, the canons 

 of the Syllogism ; the Posterior Analytics, the Topics, and the 

 Sophistical Arguments investigate the material side of the reason 

 ing process, the syllogism as Demonstrative, as Probable, and as 

 Erroneous, respectively. * 



In Aristotle s theory of logic, Demonstration, as the ideally 

 perfect means of reaching Science, is his supreme concern. His 

 view of logic is, therefore, not the narrower but the wider view. 

 He paid more attention, however, to the application of the syllo 

 gisms to the necessary matter of metaphysics and mathematics 

 than to the contingent matter of physical phenomena and the con 

 crete facts of social life. His theory, therefore, as developed in 

 after times, especially by the scholastic philosophers of the Middle 

 Ages, tended towards a predominantly deductive and formal treat 

 ment of our thought processes. 



The advances made in the physical sciences in the seventeenth 

 and subsequent centuries led men to concentrate their attention 

 more carefully on the mental processes by which we gradually 

 bring to light from isolated observation and experience of in 

 dividual facts a knowledge of general truths. Hence the promi 

 nence universally accorded to Induction in the numerous logical 

 treatises which saw the light during the course of the last century. 

 Nor have the results of the analysis of those processes which lead to 

 the discovery and establishment of the general truths of the posi 

 tive sciences been yet moulded into any one definite or generally 

 accepted theory of induction. 



1 C/. JOSEPH, op. cit. t pp. 348, 357-363- 



