224 MYSTICISM AND LOGIC 



denotation, in such phrases as " the author of Waverley.'* 

 The meaning will be a certain complex, consisting (at 

 least) of authorship and Waverley with some relation ; 

 the denotation will be Scott. Similarly " featherless 

 bipeds *' will have a complex meaning, containing as 

 constituents the presence of two feet and the absence of 

 feathers, while its denotation will be the class of men. 

 Thus when we say ** Scott is the author of Waverley " or 

 " men are the same as featherless bipeds," we are assert- 

 ing an identity of denotation, and this assertion is worth 

 making because of the diversity of meaning.^ I believe 

 that the duality of meaning and denotation, though 

 capable of a true interpretation, is misleading if taken as 

 fundamental. The denotation, I believe, is not a con- 

 stituent of the proposition, except in the case of proper 

 names, i.e. of words which do not assign a property to 

 an object, but merely and solely name it. And I should 

 hold further that, in this sense, there are only two words 

 which are strictly proper names of particulars, namely, 

 " I " and " this."2 



One reason for not believing the denotation to be a con- 

 stituent of the proposition is that we may know the pro- 

 position even when we are not acquainted with the 

 denotation. The proposition " the author of Waverley 

 is a novelist " was known to people who did not know 

 that, " the author of Waverley " denoted Scott. This 

 reason has been already sufficiently emphasised. 



A second reason is that propositions concerning " the 

 so-and-so " are possible even when " the so-and-so " has 

 no denotation. Take, e.g. " the golden mountain does 

 not exist " or '* the round square is self-contradictory." 



^ This view has been recently advocated by Miss E. E. C. Jones, 

 " A New Law of Thought and its Implications," Mind, Jajiuary, 191 1. 



I shDuld now exclude " I " from proper names in the strict sense, 

 and retain only " this" [1917]. 



