54 THE SCIENCE OF LOGIC. 



immaterial existence ; or existence in a sphere created by the imagination of 

 a novelist, poet, or storyteller ; but it is always something over and above the 

 mere logical existence of the object before the minds of those who think 

 of it. 



What the appropriate realm is, in which the objects denoted 

 by a term are to be sought, either the connotation of the term 

 itself, or the context in which it is used, will tell us. The con 

 notation usually includes some attribute which serves to indicate 

 or reveal the realm within which the objects are to be sought, to 

 which the term is correctly applicable : man, the sphere of ma 

 terial reality ; dragon, the sphere of writings and traditions refer 

 ring to fanciful beliefs ; lion rampant, the domain of heraldry, etc. 

 When the connotation leaves this ambiguous, the context in which 

 the term is used in rational discourse will generally reveal the 

 appropriate realm and remove all ambiguity. 



But there is in the next place this very important considera 

 tion, that in ordinary rational intercourse, people, when employing 

 concepts and terms as subjects of their judgments and .proposi- 

 tions, do not usually have in mind the whole realm of objects to 

 which those concepts and terms are correctly applicable, but only 

 a more or less limited portion of this realm. And such limitation 

 is usually tacit, not expressed. Using general terms, we are 

 constantly taking it for granted that people will understand their 

 application as limited by time, place, and other such circum 

 stances. W r hen we say, &quot; Everybody is talking about it,&quot; we 

 usually mean not everybody in the world, but all within certain 

 more or less narrow limits of space. If we make such statements 

 as that &quot; Europeans are short-lived,&quot; we shall be understood to 

 refer not to all European living things but to European human 

 beings only. 



Now this more or less limited sphere, within which people tacitly 

 understand their statements to apply, is called the UNIVERSE OF 

 DISCOURSE. It may be only a portion of the whole realm of 

 things within which the term would find correct application, or it 

 may be identical with this realm. Since its extent is not deter 

 mined by the connotation of the term, it is not easy for logic to 

 deal with it ; yet logic must demand, in the interests of truth 

 as in the case of connotation that these conventional limitations 

 should not vary throughout a given reasoning process. 



As in regard to intension, so now in regard to extension, we shall find it 

 convenient to retain for the latter word the wider or generic meaning of 



