CHAP. XI.] OF SECONDARY PROPOSITIONS. 159 



CHAPTER XI. 



OF SECONDARY PROPOSITIONS, AND OF THE PRINCIPLES OF THEIR 

 SYMBOLICAL EXPRESSION. 



1. r I THE doctrine has already been established in Chap, iv., 

 -*- that every logical proposition may be referred to one or 

 the other of two great classes, viz., Primary Propositions and 

 Secondary Propositions. The former of these classes has been 

 discussed in the preceding chapters of this work, and we are now 

 led to the consideration of Secondary Propositions, i. e. of Propo- 

 sitions concerning, or relating to, other propositions regarded as 

 true or false. The investigation upon which we are entering will, 

 in its general order and progress, resemble that which we have al- 

 ready conducted. The two inquiries differ as to the subjects of 

 thought which they recognise, not as to the formal and scientific 

 laws which they reveal, or the methods or processes which are 

 founded upon those laws. Probability would in some measure fa- 

 vour the expectation of such a result. It consists with all that we 

 know of the uniformity of Nature, and all that we believe of the im- 

 mutable constancy of the Author of Nature, to suppose, that in the 

 mind, which has been endowed with such high capabilities, not 

 only for converse with surrounding scenes, but for the knowledge 

 of itself, and for reflection upon the laws of its own constitution, 

 there should exist a harmony and uniformity not less real than 

 that which the study of the physical sciences makes known to us. 

 Anticipations such as this are never to be made the primary rule 

 of our inquiries, nor are they in any degree to divert us from 

 those labours of patient research by which we ascertain what is 

 the actual constitution of things within the particular province 

 submitted to investigation. But when the grounds of resem- 

 blance have been properly and independently determined, it is 

 not inconsistent, even with purely scientific ends, to make that 

 resemblance a subject of meditation, to trace its extent, and to 

 receive the intimations of truth, yet undiscovered, which it may 



