NAMES. 33 



collective name can not be predicated of each separately, but only of all 

 :aken together. " The VGth regiment of foot in the British army," which 

 s a collective name, is not a general but an individual name ; for though it 

 •lan be predicated of a multitude of individual soldiers taken jointly, it can 

 lot be predicated of them severally. We may say, Jones is a soldier, and 

 Thompson is a soldier, and Smith is a soldier, but we can not say, Jones is 

 ;he Yetli regiment, and Thompson is the 16th. regiment, and Smith is the 

 '6th regiment. We can only say, Jones, and Thompson, and Smith, and 

 Jrown, and so forth (enumerating all the soldiers), are the V6th regiment. 

 "The Yeth regiment" is a collective name, but not a general one: "a 

 legiment" is both a collective and a general name. General with respect 

 to all individual regiments, of each of which separately it can be affirmed : 

 (oUective with respect to the individual soldiers of whom any regiment is 

 composed. 



§ 4. The second general division of names is into concrete and abstract. 

 A concrete name is a name which stands for a thing; an abstract name is 

 a name which stands for an attribute of a thing. Thus John, the sea, this 

 t ihle, are names of things. White, also, is a name of a thing, or rather of 

 t lings. Whiteness, again, is the name of a quality or attribute of those 

 t lings. Man is a name of many things; humanity is a name of an attri- 

 l ute of those things. Old is a name of things : old age is a name of one 

 cf their attributes. 



I have used the words concrete and abstract in the sense annexed to 

 t lem by the schoolmen, who, notwithstanding the imperfections of their 

 j:hilosophy, were unrivaled in the construction of technical language, and 

 V hose definitions, in logic at least, though they never went more than a lit- 

 t e way into the subject, have seldom, I think, been altered but to be spoil- 

 el. A practice, however, has grown up in more modern times, which, if 

 n^t introduced by Locke, has gained currency chiefly from his example, ofj 

 a iplying the expression "abstract name" to all names which are the result!' 

 o : abstraction or generalization, and consequently to all general names, in-l 

 s ead of confining it to the names of attributes. The metaphysicians of the 

 Condillac school — whose admiration of Locke, passing over the profound- 

 ei t speculations of that truly original genius, usually fastens with peculiar 

 e; gerness upon his weakest points — have gone on imitating him in this 

 a )use of language, until there is now some difficulty in restoring the word 

 t( its original signification. A more wanton alteration in the meaning of a 

 w 3rd is rarely to be met with ; for the expression general name, the exact 

 e( uivalent of which exists in all languages I am acquainted with, was ai- 

 re ady available for the purpose to which abstract has been misappropri- 

 a1 ad, while the misappropriation leaves that important class of words, the 

 n; mes of attributes, without any compact distinctive aj^pellation. The old 

 a( ceptation, however, has not gone so completely out of use as to deprive 

 tl ose who still adhere to it of all chance of being understood. By abstract, 

 tl en, I shall always, in Logic proper, mean the opposite of concrete; by an 

 al stract name, the name of an attribute ; by a concrete name, the name of 

 ai object. 



Do abstract names belong to the class of general, or to that of singular 

 ni mes ? Some of them are certainly general. I mean those which are 

 ni mes not of one single and definite attribute, but of a class of attributes. 

 Si ch is the word color, which is a name common to whiteness, redness, 

 et !. Such is even the word whiteness, in respect of the different shades of 



3 



