120 REASONING. 



All men are mortal, 



Socrates is a man, 

 therefore 



Socrates is mortal, 

 the subject and predicate of the major premiss are connotative terms, 

 denoting objects and connoting attributes. The assertion in the major 

 premiss is, that along with one of the two sets of attributes, we always 

 find the other : that the attributes connoted by " man" never exist un- 

 less conjoined with the attribute called mortality. The assertion in the 

 minor premiss is that the individual named Socrates possesses the 

 former attributes ; and it is concluded that he possesses also the atti-i- 

 bute mortality. Or, if both the premisses are general propositions, as 



All men are m6rtal, 



All kings are men, 

 therefore 



All kings are mortal, 



the minor premiss asserts that the attributes denoted by kingship only 

 exist in conjunction with those signified by the word man. The major 

 asserts as before, that the last-mentioned attiibutes are never found 

 without the attribute of mortality. The conclusion is, that wherever 

 the atti-ibutes of kingship are found, that of mortality is found also. 



If the major premiss were negative, as. No men are gods, it would 

 assert, not that the attributes connoted by " Man" never exist without, 

 but that they never exist with, those connoted by " God :" fi-om which, 

 together with the minor premiss, it is concluded, that the same incom- 

 patibility exists between the atti-ibutes constituting a god and those con- 

 stituting a king. In a similar manner we might analyze any other ex- 

 ample of the syllogism. 



If we generalize this process, and look out for the principle or law 

 involved in every such inference, and presupposed in every syllogism 

 the propositions of which are anything more than merely verbal ; we 

 find, not the umneaning dictum de omni et nullo, but a fundamental 

 principle, or rather two principles, strikingly resembling the axioms of 

 mathematics. The first, which is the principle of afiinnative syllo- 

 gisms, is, that things which coexist with the same thing, coexist with 

 one another. The second is the principle of negative syllogisms, and 

 is to this effect ; that a thing which coexists with another thing, with 

 which other a third thing does not coexist, is not coexistent with that 

 third thing. These axioms manifestly relate to facts, and not to con- 

 ventions : and one or other of them is the gi-ound of the legitimacy of 

 every argument in which facts and not conventions are the matter treat- 

 ed of. 



§ 4. It only remains to translate this exposition of the syllogism 

 from the one into the other of the two languages in which we foiTnerly 

 remarked* that all propositions, and of course therefore all combina- 

 tions of propositions, might be expressed. We observed that a propo- 

 sition might be considered in two difterent lights ; as a portion of our 

 knowledge of nature, or as a memorandum for our guidance. Under 

 the former, or speculative aspect, an affirmative general proposition is 

 an assertion of a speculative truth, viz., that whatever has a certain at- 

 * Supra, p. 157. 



