648 PSYCHOLOGY. 



of them as a single system of successive terms united by 

 the same relation.* 



Now whenever we become thus conscious, we may be- 

 come aware of an additional relation which is of the highest 

 intellectual importance, inasmuch as upon it the whole 

 structure of logic is reared. The principle of mediate predi- 

 cation or suhsumption is only the axiom of skipped inter- 

 mediaries applied to a series of successive predications. It 

 expresses the fact that any earlier term in the series stands 

 to any later term in the same relation in which it stands 

 to any intermediate term ; in other words, that ivliatever 

 has an attribute has all tJie attributes of that attribute ; or more 

 briefly still, that ivhatever is of a kind is of that kind's kind. 

 A little explanation of this statement will bring out all 

 that it involves. 



We learned in the chapter on Reasoning what our 

 great motive is for abstracting attributes and predicating 

 them. It is that our varying practical purposes require 

 us to lay hold of difi"erent angles of the reality at diiferent 

 times. But for these we should be satisfied to * see it 

 whole,' and alwaj's alike. The purpose, however, makes 

 one aspect essential ; so, to avoid dispersion of the atten- 

 tion, we treat the reality as if for the time being it were 

 nothing but that aspect, and we let its supernumerary de- 

 terminations go. In short, we substitute the as23ect for 

 the whole real thing. For our purpose the aspect can be 

 substituted for the whole, and the two treated as the same ; 

 and the word is (which couples the whole with its aspect 

 or attribute in the categoric judgment) expresses (among 

 other things) the identifying operation performed. The 

 predication-series a is &, & is c, c is c?, . . . . closely resembles 

 for certain practical purposes the equation-series a =b, 

 b =:= c, c ^ d, etc. 



But what is our purpose in predicating ? Ultimately, 

 it may be anything we please ; but proximately and im- 

 mediately, it is always the gratification of a certain curi- 



* This apprehension of them as forming a single system is what Mr. 

 Bradley means by the act of construction which underlies all reasoning. 

 The awareness, which then supervenes, of the additional relation of which 

 I speak in the next paragraph of my text, is what this author calls tha 

 act of inspection. Cf. Principles of Logic, bk. ii. pt. i. chap. in. 



