532 



FALLACIES. 



electoral system from corruption and 

 intimidation. Persuasive influence, 

 acting through the conscience of the 

 voter, and carrying his heart and 

 mind with it, is beneficial ; therefore 

 (it is pretended) coercive influence, 

 which compels him to forget that he 

 is a moral agent, or to act in opposi- 

 tion to his moral convictions, ought 

 not to be placed under restraint. 



Another word which is often turned 

 into an instrument of the fallacy of 

 ambiguity is Theory. In its most 

 proper acceptation, theory means the 

 completed result of philosophical in- 

 duction from experience. In that 

 sense, there are erroneous as well as 

 true theories, for induction may be 

 incorrectly performed, but theory of 

 some sort is the necessary result of 

 knowing anything of a subject, and 

 having put one's knowledge into the 

 form of general propositions for the 

 guidance of practice. In this, the 

 proper sense of the word. Theory is 

 the explanation of practice. In an- 

 other and a more vulgar sense, theory 

 means any mere fiction of the ima- 

 gination, endeavouring to conceive 

 how a thing may possibly have been 

 produced, instead of examining how 

 it was produced. In this sense only 

 are theory and theorists unsafe guides; 

 but because of this, ridicule or dis- 

 credit is attempted to be attached to 

 theory in its proper sense, that is, to 

 legitimate generalisation, the end and 

 aim of all philosophy ; and a conclu- 

 sion is represented as worthless, just 

 because that has been done which, if 

 done correctly, constitutes the highest 

 worth that a principle for the guid- 

 ance of practice can possess, namely, 

 to comprehend in a few words the 

 real law on which a phenomenon de- 

 pends, or some property or relation 

 which is universally- true of it. 



" The Church " is sometimes under- 

 stood to mean the clergy alone, some- 

 times the whole body of believers, or 

 at least of communicants. The de- 

 clamations respecting the inviolability 

 of Church property are indebted for 

 the greater part of their apparent 



force to this ambiguity. The clergy, 

 being called the Church, are supposed 

 to be the real owners of what is called 

 Church property, whereas they are in 

 truth only the managing members of 

 a much larger body of proprietors, 

 and enjoy on their own part a mere 

 usufruct, not extending beyond a life 

 interest. 



The following is a Stoical argument 

 taken from Cicero, De Finihus, book 

 the third : " Quod est bonum, omne 

 laudabile est. Quod autem laudabile 

 est, omne honestum est. Bonum 

 igitur quod est, honestum est." Here 

 the ambiguous word is laudabile, which 

 in the minor premise means anything 

 which mankind are accustomed, on 

 good grounds, to admire or value ; 

 as beauty, for instance, or good for- 

 tune ; but in the major it denotes 

 exclusively moral qualities. In much 

 the same manner the Stoics endea- 

 voured logically to justify as philo- 

 sophical truths their figurative and 

 rhetorical expressions of ethical senti- 

 ment : as that the virtuous man is 

 alone free, alone beautiful, alone a 

 king, &c. Whoever has virtue has 

 Good, (because it has been previously 

 determined not to call anything else 

 good;) but, again. Good necessarily 

 includes freedom, beauty, and even 

 kingship, all these being good things ; 

 therefore whoever has virtue has all 

 these. 



The following is an argument of 

 Descartes to prove, in his d priori 

 manner, the being of a God. The 

 conception, says he, of an infinite 

 Being proves the real existence of 

 such a being. For if there is not 

 really any such being, / must have 

 made the conception ; but if I could 

 make it, I can also unmake it ; which 

 evidently is not true ; therefore there 

 must be, externally to myself, an 

 archetype, from which the conception 

 was derived. In this argument (which, 

 it may be observed, would equally 

 prove the real existence of ghosts and 

 of witches) the ambiguity is in the 

 pronoun /, by which, in one place, is 

 to be understood my wiU, in another 



