NAMES AND PROPOSITIONS. 



tuted. The name, therefore, is said 

 to signify the subjects directly^ the 

 attributes indirectly ; it denotes the 

 subjects, and iiriplies, or involves, or 

 indicates, or as we shall say hence- 

 forth connotes, the attributes. It is 

 a connotative name. 



Connotative * names have hence 

 been also called denominative, because 

 the subject which they denote is de- 

 nominated by, or receives a name 

 from, the attribute which they con- 

 note. Snow, and other objects, re- 

 ceive the name white, because they 

 possess the attribute which is called 

 whiteness ; Peter, James, and others 

 receive the name man because they 

 possess the attributes which are con- 

 sidered to constitute humanity. The 

 attribute, or attributes, may therefore 

 be said to denominate those objects, 

 or to give them a common name. 



It has been seen that all concrete 

 general names are connotative. Even 

 abstract names, though the names 

 only of attributes, may in some in- 

 stances be justly considered as con- 

 notative ; for attributes themselves 

 may have attributes ascribed to them ; 

 and a word which denotes attributes 

 may connote an attribute of those 

 attributes. Of this description, for 

 example, is such a word as fault; 

 equivalent to hud or hurtful quality. 

 This word is a name common to many 

 attributes, and connotes hurtfulness, 

 an attribute of those various attri- 

 butes. When, for example, we say 

 that slowness, in a horse, is a fault, 

 we do not mean that the slow move- 

 ment, the actual change of place of 

 the slow horse, is a bad thing, but 

 that the property or peculiarity of 

 the horse, from which it derives that 



* Archbishop Whately, who, in the later 

 editions of iiis Elements of Logic, aided in 

 reviving the important di-tinc ion tieiit- d 

 of in the text, proposes Lheteim ''Attribu- 

 tive" as a subsiitute for " Connutaiive " 

 (p. 22, 9th ed.). The expression is, in itself, 

 appropriate; but as it has not the advan- 

 tage of being connected with an}' vetb, of 

 so markedly distinctive a character as "to 

 connote," it is not, I think, fitted to supply 

 the place of the word Connotative in scien- 

 tific use. 



name, the quality of being a slow 

 mover, is an undesirable peculiarity. 



In regard to those concrete names 

 which are not general but individual, 

 a distinction must be made. 



Proper names are not connotative : 

 they denote the individuals who are 

 called by them ; but they do not 

 indicate or imply any attributes as 

 belonging to those individuals. When 

 we name a child by the name of Paul, 

 or a dog by the name Caesar, these 

 names are simply marks used to en- 

 able those individuals to be made 

 subjects of discourse. It may be 

 said, indeed, that we must have had 

 some reason for giving them those 

 names rather than any others ; and 

 this is true ; but the name, once 

 given, is independent of the reason. 

 A man may have been named John, 

 because that was the name of his 

 father ; a town may have been named 

 Dartmouth, because it is situated at 

 the mouth of the Dart. But it is no 

 part of the signification of the word 

 John, that the father of the person 

 so called bore the same name ; nor 

 even of the word Dartmouth, to be 

 situated at the mouth of the Dart, 

 If sand should choke up the mouth of 

 the river, or an earthquake change its 

 course, and remove it to a distance 

 from the town, the name of the town 

 would not necessarily be changed. 

 That fact, therefore, can form no 

 part of the signification of the word ; 

 for otherwise, when the fact c«m- 

 fessedly ceased to be true, no one 

 would any longer think of applying 

 the name. Proper names are attached 

 to the objects themselves, and are not 

 dependent on the continuance of any 

 attribute of the object. 



But there is another kind of names, 



which, although they are individual 



names, that is, predicable only of one 



object, are really connotative. For, 



though we may give to an individual 



a name utterly unmeaning, which we 



I call a proper name, — a word which 



I answers the purpose of showing what 



thing it is we are talking about, but 



1 not of telling anything about it ; yet 



