62 NAMES AND PKOPOSITIONS. 



things similar to itself. And as, whenever two objects are jointly concern- 

 ed in a phenomenon, this constitutes a relation between those objects, so, 

 if we suppose a second pair of objects concerned in a second phenomenon, 

 the slightest resemblance between the two phenomena is sufficient to ad- 

 mit of its being said that the two relations resemble ; provided, of course, 

 the points of resemblance are found in those portions of the two phenom- 

 ena respectively which are connoted by the relative names. 



While speaking of resemblance, it is necessary to take notice of an am- 

 biguity of language, against which scarcely any one is sufficiently on his 

 guard. Resemblance, when it exists in the highest degree of all, amount- 

 ing to undistinguishableness, is often called identity, and the two similar 

 things are said to be the same. I say often, not always; for we do not say 

 that two visible objects, two persons, for instance, are the same, because 

 they are so much alike that one might be mistaken for the other : but we 

 constantly use this mode of expression when speaking of feelings ; as when 

 I say that the sight of any object gives me the same sensation or emotion 

 to-day that it did yesterday, or the same which it gives to some other per- 

 son. This is evidently an incorrect application of the word same; for the 

 feeling which I had yesterday is gone, never to return ; what I have to- 

 day is another feeling, exactly like the former, perhaps, but distinct from it; 

 and it is evident that two different persons can not be experiencing the 

 same feeling, in the sense in which we say that they are both sitting at the 

 same table. By a similar ambiguity we say, that two persons are ill of the 

 same disease ; that two persons hold the same office ; not in the sense in 

 which we say that they are engaged in the same adventure, or sailing in 

 the same ship, but in the sense that they fill offices exactly similar, though, 

 perhaps, in distant places. Great confusion of ideas is often produced, and 

 many fallacies engendered, in otherwise enlightened understandings, by 

 not being sufficiently alive to the fact (in itself not always to be avoided), 

 that they use the same name to express ideas so different as those of iden- 

 tity and undistinguishable resemblance. Among modern writers, Arch- 

 bishop Whately stands almost alone in having drawn attention to this dis- 

 tinction, and to the ambiguity connected with it. 



Several relations, generally called by other names, are really cases of 

 resemblance. As, for example, equality ; which is but another word for 

 the exact resemblance commonly called identity, considered as subsisting 

 between things in respect of their quantity. And this example forms a 

 suitable transition to the third and last of the three heads under which, as 

 already remarked, Attributes are commonly arranged. 



V. Quantity. 



§ 12. Let us imagine two things, between which there is no difference 

 (that is, no dissimilarity), except in quantity alone ; for instance, a gallon 

 of water, and more than a gallon of water. A gallon of water, like any 

 other external object, makes its presence known to us by a set of sensa- 

 tions which it excites. Ten gallons of water are also an external object, 

 making its presence known to us in a similar manner; and as we do not 

 mistake ten gallons of water for a gallon of water, it is plain that the set 

 of sensations is more or less different in the two cases. In like manner, 

 a gallon of water, and a gallon of wine, are two external objects, making 

 their presence known by two sets of sensations, which sensations are dif- 

 ferent from each other. In the first case, however, we say that the differ- 

 ence is in quantity ; in the last there is a difference in quality, while the 



