Mental Processes in Man. 329 



inference, the phenomena being simply associated together. 

 If, however, there is any attempt at explanation, correct or 

 incorrect, there is so far a conceptual element. In a little 

 fishing-village on our south coast, a benevolent lady 

 presented the fishermen with a Fitzroy barometer. I 

 happened shortly after to remark to one of the men that 

 the summer had been unusually stormy. " Yes, sir," he 

 said, " it has. But then, you see, the weather hasn't no 

 chance against that new glass." Here there was an 

 attempted explanation of the phenomena. The falling 

 glass was conceived as somehow causing bad weather. 



It is hard to draw the line between perceptual and con- 

 ceptual inferences, or rather to say, in this or that case, to 

 which class the inference belongs, because man, through 

 language, lives in a conceptual atmosphere. Moreover, 

 the same result may, in different cases, be reached by per- 

 ceptual or by conceptual inference. A child who had seen 

 a great number of ascending balloons might, on seeing a 

 balloon, expect it to ascend by a perceptual inference ; but 

 a man, knowing that the balloon was full of a gas lighter 

 than air, might expect it to ascend through the exercise of 

 conceptual inference. And just as in adult civilized life 

 our constructs have more and more conceptual elements 

 built into them, so do our inferences become more and 

 more reasoned. It is probable that in an adult English- 

 man every inference has a larger or smaller dose of the 

 conceptual element. 



With the development of language we state our in- 

 ferences in the form of propositions, and call them 

 judgments. " Every proposition," says Mr. Sully,* " is 

 made up of two principal parts : (1) .the subject, or the 

 name of that about which something is asserted ; (2) the 

 predicate, or the name of that which is asserted. Thus, 

 when we affirm, ' This knife is blunt,' we affirm or 

 predicate the fact of being blunt of a certain subject, 

 namely, ' this knife.' Similarly, when we say, ' Air 

 corrodes,' we assert or predicate the power of corroding of 



* " Outlines of Psychology," p. 392. 



