SPEECH, 171 



of vitality which constitutes the vis formativa. Now, this 

 element of vitality is the element of conceptual ideation, 

 already exhibited in every denominative term. 



Therefore, for the sake at once of clearness and of brevity, 

 I will hereafter speak of predication as material and formal. 

 By material predication I will mean conceptual denomination, 

 whereby, in the mere act of bestowing a connotative term, we 

 are virtually predicating of the thing thus designated some 

 fact, quality, or relation, which the name bestowed is intended 

 to indicate. By formal predication I will mean the apposition 

 of denominative terms, with the intention of setting forth some 

 relation which is thus expressed as subsisting between them. 

 But, as already observed, I regard this distinction as artificial. 

 Psychologically speaking, there is no line of demarcation be- 

 tween these two kinds of predication. Whether I say " Fool," 

 or " Thou art a fool," I am similarly assigning the subject of 

 my remark to a certain category of men : I am similarly 

 giving expression to my judgment with regard to the qualities 

 presented by one particular man. The distinction, then, 

 between what I call material and formal predication is merely 

 a distinction in rhetoric : as a matter of psychology there is 

 no distinction at all. 



If to all this it should be objected, in accordance with the 

 psychological doctrines set forth by Mr. Mivart, above quoted, 

 that a judgment as embodied in a proposition differs from a 

 concept as embodied in a name in respect of the copula, and 

 therefore in presenting the idea of existence as existence ; I 

 answer, in the first place, that every concept must necessarily 

 present this idea however implicitly ; and, in the next place, 

 that however explicitly it may be stated as a judgment, it is 

 not of more conceptual value than that of any other quality 

 belonging to a subject. As regards the first point, when an 

 object, a quality, an action, &c., is named, it is thereby 

 abstracted as a distinct creation of thought, separated out 

 from other things, and made to stand before the mind as a 

 distinct entity (see Chapter IV.). Therefore, in the very act 

 of naming we are virtually predicating existence of the thing 



