310 THE SCIENCE OF LOGIC 



and flew away. &quot; But,&quot; replied the servant, &quot; if you had shouted 

 to the stork at dinner he would have shown his other leg too.&quot; 



The fallacy a dicto simpliciter ad dictum secundum quid is 

 generally regarded as the converse of the one just explained. 

 It consists essentially in the assumption that what holds true 

 normally, as a general rule, will be true always, and without quali 

 fication, of any individual case or cases, irrespective of special 

 circumstances that may alter these cases. Here &quot; simpliciter &quot; 

 means &quot;generally speaking &quot;. The &quot;moral &quot; universal, admitting 

 of exceptions, is misinterpreted as a strict, necessary universal, 

 and applied to the exceptions. It is forgotten that &quot; circum 

 stances alter cases &quot;. Some special case is wrongly regarded as an 

 instance of a principle, when the case in question is not really an 

 instance, owing to the presence in it of special conditions not 

 contemplated by the principle. It is the illicit application of a 

 general rule to a special case which does not fall under the rule. 

 The fallacy, therefore, occurs in the process which is the special 

 function of the syllogism : the application of general principles to 

 particular cases. And it can be committed by misinterpreting 

 either the scope of the principle or the nature of the case. &quot; The 

 employment of labour is beneficial to the community, therefore it 

 will benefit the community to find some occupation or other, no 

 matter how useless, for unemployed workmen.&quot; &quot;Water boils at 

 1 00 centigrade ; therefore it will cook an egg in a few minutes 

 at the top of Mont Blanc.&quot; &quot; It is unjust to interfere with a 

 man s private property ; therefore State interference with land 

 tenure, by compulsory sale or otherwise, is unjust.&quot; &quot; Thou shalt 

 not kill ; therefore war is never lawful ; or the killing of animals 

 for human food.&quot; &quot;What you bought yesterday you ate to 

 day ; you bought raw meat yesterday ; therefore you ate raw 

 meat to-day.&quot; &quot;This piece of raw meat,&quot; remarks De Morgan 

 in his Logic, 1 &quot; has remained uncooked, as fresh as ever, a pro 

 digious time. It was raw when Reisch mentioned it in the Mar 

 garita Philosophica in 1496 ; and Dr. Whately found it in just 

 the same state in 1826.&quot; What is predicated about the subject 

 in the major premiss is true of that subject &quot; simpliciter&quot; but not 

 of that subject &quot;secundum quid&quot; i.e. in its state of rawness. 



The fallacy a dicto simpliciter ad dictum secundum quid is 

 commonly identified nowadays with the fallacy of the accident, 

 and the fallacy a dicto secundum quid ad dictum simpliciter is 

 1 p. 251. 



