TERMS. 41 



in perfect community, none before nor after the others. 

 In our words and symbols we cannot observe this natural 

 condition ; we must name one quality first and another 

 second, just as some one must be the first to sign a petition, 

 or to walk foremost in a procession. In nature there is 

 no such precedence. 



A little reflection will show that knowledge in the 

 highest perfection would consist in the simultaneous 

 possession of a multitude of facts. To comprehend a 

 science perfectly we should have every fact present with 

 every other fact. We must write a book and we must 

 read it successively word by word, but how infinitely 

 hfgher would be our powers of thought if we could 

 grasp the whole in one collective act of consciousness. 

 Compared with the brutes we do possess some slight 

 approximation to such power, and it is just conceivable 

 that in the indefinite future mind may acquire a vast 

 increase of capacity, and be less restricted to the piece- 

 meal examination of a subject. But I wish here to 

 make plain that there is no logical foundation for the 

 successive character of thought and reasoning unavoidable 

 under our present mental conditions. The fact that we 

 must think of one thing first, and another second, is a 

 logical weakness and imperfection. We must describe 

 metal as ' hard and opaque,' or ' opaque and hard/ but 

 in the metal itself there is no such difference of order ; 

 the properties are simultaneous and coextensive in 

 existence. 



Setting aside all grammatical peculiarities which render 

 a substantive less moveable than an adjective, and dis- 

 regarding any meaning indicated by emphasis or marked 

 order of words, we may state, as a general law of logic, 

 that AB is identical with BA. 



AB = BA 



