24 SIGNS AND THEIR LAWS. [CHAP. II, 



CHAPTER II. 



OF SIGNS IN GENERAL, AND OF THE SIGNS APPROPRIATE TO THE 

 SCIENCE OF LOGIC IN PARTICULAR ; ALSO OF THE LAWS TO WHICH 

 THAT CLASS OF SIGNS ARE SUBJECT. 



1. ^T^HAT Language is an instrument of human reason, and 

 -*- not merely a medium for the expression of thought, is a 

 truth generally admitted. It is proposed in this chapter to in- 

 quire what it is that renders Language thus subservient to the 

 most important of our intellectual faculties. In the various 

 steps of this inquiry we shall be led to consider the constitution 

 of Language, considered as a system adapted to an end or pur- 

 pose ; to investigate its elements ; to seek to determine their mu- 

 tual relation and dependence ; and to inquire in what manner they 

 contribute to the attainment of the end to which, as co-ordinate 

 parts of a system, they have respect. 



In proceeding to these inquiries, it will not be necessary to 

 enter into the discussion of that famous question of the schools, 

 whether Language is to be regarded as an essential instrument 

 of reasoning, or whether, on the other hand, it is possible for us 

 to reason without its aid. I suppose this question to be beside 

 the design of the present treatise, for the following reason, viz., 

 that it is the business of Science to investigate laws ; and that, 

 whether we regard signs as the representatives of things and of 

 their relations, or as the representatives of the conceptions and 

 operations of the human intellect, in studying the laws of signs, 

 we are in effect studying the manifested laws of reasoning. If 

 there exists a difference between the two inquiries, it is one which 

 does not affect the scientific expressions of formal law, which are 

 the object of investigation in the present stage of this work, but 

 relates only to the mode in which those results are presented to 

 the mental regard. For though in investigating the laws of signs, 

 d posteriori, the immediate subject of examination is Language, 

 with the rules which govern its use ; while in making the internal 



