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CHAPTER VII. 



OF CLASSIFICATION, AS SUBSIDIARY TO 

 INDUCTION. 



1. THERE is, as we have frequently remarked 

 in this work, a classification of things, which is inse- 

 parable from the fact of giving them general names. 

 Every name which connotes an attribute, divides, by 

 that very fact, all things whatever into two classes, 

 those which have the attribute and those which have 

 not; those of which the name can be predicated, and 

 those of which it cannot. And the division thus 

 made is not merely a division of such things as actu- 

 ally exist, or are known to exist, but of all such as 

 may hereafter be discovered, and even of all such as 

 can be imagined. 



On this kind of Classification we have nothing to 

 add to what has previously been said. The Classifica- 

 tion which requires to be discussed as a separate 

 act of the mind, is altogether different. In the one, 

 the arrangement of objects in groups, and distribution 

 of them into compartments, is a mere incidental effect 

 consequent upon the use of names given for another 

 purpose, namely that of simply expressing some of 

 their qualities. In the other, the arrangement and 

 distribution are the main object, and the naming is 

 secondary to, and purposely conforms itself to, 

 instead of governing, that more important operation. 



Classification, thus regarded, is a contrivance for 

 the best possible ordering of the ideas of objects in 

 our minds; for causing the ideas to accompany or 

 succeed one another in such a way as shall give us: 



