tenable (675-6). Proper and improper sense of Probability. The former assumes a world of such a kind that the possibility of an "otherwise" is in principle excluded (676-8).
General objections to absolute truth. In these there is nothing positive which I on my side am unable to accept (678-9). This shown in the case (i) of Irrationalism (679-80), and (2) of Pluralism and Realism (680-4). So far as these differ from my view, is that difference really anything positive (680-1)? A compromise through Relativism is not possible (681-2). But I can understand Realism and Pluralism as urging nothing positive which is not accepted and included in my view. And that view can explain the existence of these other views (682-4). Recapitulation (684).
How can a lower and subordinate truth seem more probable than one admittedly higher? This difficulty calls for examination (684-5). An explanatory digression on higher and lower truths (685-6). The above difficulty comes mainly from a false assumption as to the superiority of the " real world " of events, and from the (per haps unconscious) misplacing of a higher truth on this misleading level (686-8). The above illustrated in two aspects (688-90).
ESSAY IX ESSAY IX A NOTE ON ANALYSIS (pp. 691-694) A fundamental issue avoided by the Realist (691). A mistaken dilemma. No relational view has ultimate truth (691). The "fact of relatedness" must be, and yet is not, dealt with (692). The empirical evidence against Analysis as yielding ultimate truth is ignored. Terms and relations are abstractions, and they never are given in immediate experience (693-4).
The category of Whole and Parts is not everywhere applicable, nor is it ultimately valid (694).
ESSAY X A NOTE ON IMPLICATION (pp. 695-698) There is no sense in Implication unless it is indirect and through a whole. And there is no Implication (proper) where or so far as the whole is merely immediate (695).
The meaning of Implication rests on the fact of Immediate Experi ence. And all predication, being relational, is irrational except so far as conditional. Implication in the end is nonsense apart from that which is both below and above the discursive stage of mind and truth. No self-subsistent entity can imply another (695-7).
CONTENTS XXVli Implication cannot be one-sided unless there is abstraction from or alteration of conditions (697). "A before B" is really reciprocal. Nor is there incompatibility between "before" and "after" except under some condition (698).
ESSAY XI ON THE POSSIBLE AND THE ACTUAL (pp. 699-712) The enquiry limited. The Possible may be opposed in three senses to the Actual, according as that is (i) not grounded, or (n) grounded fully, or (in) both at once. The second sense is the main one (699).
The above illustrated. There is only one genuine Individual (699- 7oi). The Actual is not the same as what " exists," nor is it always based on Existence (701-2); nor is such a position saved by an appeal to the distinction between relative and absolute possibility (702-3).
As against what is " imaginary," that which " exists " may be merely possible (703). And within the world of Truth the possible is still opposed to the actual (703-5)- Why Logic can not be consistent ultimately (705).
Designation— what (706). Recapitulation (706-7). Possible and Actual within a grounded whole (707). The above contrasted with an opposite view (707-10). The world as a mere "And" or "Together" of independent entities (708). But on any such view there is really no "world" at all, and possibility can have in the end no meaning (708-10). Reality and Truth— their true relation stated (711-12).
ESSAY XII ON THEORETICAL AND PRACTICAL ACTIVITY (pp. 713-728) There is no such thing as a mere theoretical or mere practical activity (713-14). All theoretical activity is also practical (714-15). And all practical activity has a theoretical side and contains an idea and a judgment (715)- This position explained and defended against some errors (716-17). (i) In Practice the judgment has different levels (717). (ii) But its essence is not to anticipate a future fact — even if any reference at all to the future is essential (717-19). And any appeal here to a lower stage of experience is useless (719-20). Further, Judgment can not consist in a mere passage to the future (720-21). " Practice for practice' sake" as a gospel. Recapitulation (721-2).
How far and in what sense is the distinction of "theoretical" and "practical" legitimate and useful? The answer to this question explained and illustrated (722-4). Religion as the unity of one- sidednesses (724-5).
XXV111 CONTENTS A summary statement of some views which I advocate on Truth, Activity, and Practice (725^8). Truth as Anticipation and Predic tion, and as Experiment and Verification (726-7). Philosophy, its limits and genuine task (727-8).
THE PRINCIPLES OF LOGIC BOOK I— JUDGMENT CHAPTER I THE GENERAL NATURE OF JUDGMENT § I. It is impossible, before we have studied Logic, to know at what point our study should begin. And, after we have studied it, our uncertainty may remain. In the absence of any accepted order I shall offer no apology for beginning with Judgment. If we incur the reproach of starting in the middle, we may at least hope to touch the centre of the subject.1 The present chapter will deal with the question of judgment in general. It will (i) give some account of the sense in which the term is to be used; it will (n) criticize, in the second place, a considerable number of erroneous views; and will end (in) with some remarks on the development of the function.
I. In a book of this kind our arrangement must be arbi trary. The general doctrine we are at once to lay down, really rests on the evidence of the following chapters. If it holds throughout the main phenomena of the subject, while each other view is in conflict with some of them, it seems likely to be the true view. But it can not, for this reason, be put forward at first, except provisionally.
Judgment presents problems of a serious nature to both psychology and metaphysics. Its relation to other psychical phenomena, their entangled development from the primary basis of soul-life, and the implication of the volitional with the intellectual side of our nature on the one hand, and on the other hand the difference of subject and object, and the question as to the existence of any mental activity, may be indicated as we pass. But it will be our object, so far as is possible, to avoid these problems. We do not mainly want to ask, How does judgment stand to other psychical states, and in ultimate reality what must be said of it. Our desire i 2 THE PRINCIPLES OF LOGIC BOOK I is to take it, so far as we can, as a given mental function; to discover the general character which it bears, and further to fix the more special sense in which we are to use it.
§ 2. I shall pass to the latter task at once. Judgment, in the strict sense, does not exist where there exists no knowl edge of truth and falsehood; and, since truth and falsehood depend on the relation of our ideas to reality, you can not have judgment proper without ideas. And perhaps thus much is obvious. But the point I am going on to, is not so obvious. Not only are we unable to judge before we use ideas, but, strictly speaking, we can not judge till we use them as ideas2. We must have become aware that they are not realities, that they are mere ideas, signs of an existence other than them selves. Ideas are not ideas until they are symbols, and, before we use symbols, we can not judge.
§3. We are used to the saying, "This is nothing real, it is a mere idea." And we reply that an idea, within my head, and as a state of my mind, is as stubborn a fact as any outward object. The answer is well-nigh as familiar as the saying, and my complaint is that in the end it grows much too familiar. In England at all events we have lived too long in the psychological attitude3. We take it for granted and as a matter of course that, like sensations and emotions, ideas are phenomena. And, considering these phenomena as psy chical facts, we have tried (with what success I will not ask) to distinguish between ideas and sensations. But, intent on this, we have as good as forgotten the way in which logic uses ideas. We have not seen that in judgment no fact ever is just that which it means, or can mean what it is; and we have not learnt that, wherever we have truth or falsehood, it is the signification we use, and not the existence. We never assert the fact in our heads, but something else which that fact stands for And if an idea were treated as a psychical reality, if it were taken by itself as an actual phenomenon, then it would not represent either truth or falsehood. When we use it in judgment, it must be referred away from itself. If it is not the idea of some existence, then, despite its own emphatic actu ality, its content remains but " a mere idea." It is a something which, in relation to the reality we mean, is nothing at all. § 4. For logical purposes ideas are symbols, and they are CHAP. I THE GENERAL NATURE OF JUDGMENT 3 nothing but symbols.4 And, at the risk of common-place, before I go on, I must try to say what a symbol is.
In all that is we can distinguish two sides, (i) existence and (ii) content. In other words we perceive both that it is and what it is. But in anything that is a symbol we have also a third side, its signification, or that which it means5. We need not dwell on the two first aspects, for we are not con cerned with the metaphysical problems which they involve. For a fact to exist, we shall agree, it must be something. It is not real unless it has a character which is different or distinguishable from that of other facts. And this, which makes it what it is, we call its content. We may take as an instance any common perception. The complex of quali ties and relations it contains, makes up its content, or that which it is; and, while recognizing this, we recognize also, and in addition, that it is. Every kind of fact must possess these two sides of existence and content, and we propose to say no more about them here.
But there is a class of facts which possess an other and additional third side. They have a meaning; and by a sign we understand any sort of fact which is used with a mean ing. The meaning may be part of the original content,6 or it may have been discovered and even added by a further extension. Still this makes no difference. Take anything which can stand for anything else, and you have a sign. Besides its own private existence and content, it has this third aspect. Thus every flower exists and has its own qualities, but not all have a meaning. Some signify nothing, while others stand generally for the kind which they repre sent, while others again go on to remind us of hope or love. But the flower can never itself be what it means.
A symbol is a fact which stands for something else, and by this, we may say, it both loses and gains, is degraded and exalted. In its use as a symbol it forgoes individuality, and self-existence. It is not the main point that this rose or forget-me-not, and none other, has been chosen. We give it, or we take it, for the sake of its meaning; and that may prove true or false long after the flower has perished. The word dies as it is spoken, but the particular sound of the mere pulsation was nothing to our minds. Its existence was 4 THE PRINCIPLES OF LOGIC BOOK I lost in the speech and the significance. The paper and the ink are facts unique and with definite qualities. They are the same in all points with none other in the world. But, in reading, we apprehend not paper or ink, but what they represent; and, so long as only they stand for this, their private existence is a matter of indifference. A fact taken as a symbol ceases so far to be fact. It no longer can be said to exist for its own sake, its individuality is lost in its universal meaning. It is no more a substantive, but be comes the adjective that holds of another. But, on the other hand, the change is not all loss. By merging its own quality in a wider meaning, it can pass beyond itself and stand for others. It gains admission and influence in a world which it otherwise could not enter. The paper and ink cut the throats of men, and the sound of a breath may shake the world.
We may state the sum briefly. A sign is any fact that has a meaning, and meaning consists of a part of the content (original or acquired), cut off, fixed by the mind, and con sidered apart from the existence of the sign.* § 5. I must be permitted at this point to make a digression, which the reader may omit, if he does not need it. Through out this volume I do not intend to use the word " symbol " as distinct from "sign," though there is a difference which elsewhere might become of importance. A symbol is certainly always a sign, but the term may be appropriated to signs of a very special character. In contrast with a symbol a sign may be arbitrary. It can not, of course, be devoid of meaning, for, in that case, it would be unable to stand for anything. But it may stand for that with which internally it is not con nected, and with which it has been joined by arbitrary chance. But even when signs have a natural meaning, when their content carries us direct to the object of which they are used, yet, if we take symbol in a narrow sense, a natural sign need not be a symbol. We may restrict the term to *It would not be correct to add, "and referred away to another real subject"; for where we think without judging, and where we deny, that description would not be applicable. Nor is it the same thing to have an idea, and to judge it possible. To think of a chimsera is to think of it as real, but not to judge it even possible. And it is not until we have found that all meaning must be adjectival, that with every idea we have even the suggestion of a real subject other than itself.7 CHAP. I THE GENERAL NATURE OF JUDGMENT 5 secondary signs. For example a lion is the symbol of courage, and a fox of cunning, but it would be impossible to say that the idea of a fox stands for cunning directly. We mean by it first the animal called a fox, and we then use this meaning to stand as the sign for one quality of the fox. Just as the image or presentation of a fox is taken by us in one part of its content, and referred away to another subject, so this meaning itself suffers further mutilation: one part of its content is fixed by the mind and referred further on to a second subject, viz. the quality in general, wherever found. It makes no difference whether we begin with an image or a sensible perception, for the perception itself, before it can be used, must be taken ideally, recognized, that is, in one part of its content. And the distinction again between the symbolism that is unconscious, and that which is reflective, does not touch the main principle.
In order to obviate possible objections, I have thought it best to make these remarks; but since I propose to use sign and symbol quite indifferently, the discussion has hardly any bearing on my argument.
§ 6. We might say that, in the end, there are no signs save ideas, but what I here wish to insist on, is that, for logic at least, all ideas are signs. Each we know exists as a psychical fact, and with particular qualities and relations. It has its speciality as an event in my mind. It is a hard individual, so unique that it not only differs from all others, but even from itself at subsequent moments. And this char acter it must bear when confined to the two aspects of ex istence and content. But just so long as, and because, it keeps to this character, it is for logic no idea at all. It be comes one first when it begins to exist for the sake of its meaning. And its meaning, we may repeat, is a part of the content, used without regard to the rest, or the existence. I have the " idea " of a horse, and that is a fact in my mind, existing in relation with the congeries of sensations and emotions and feelings, which make my momentary state. It has again particular traits of its own, which may be difficult to seize, but which, we are bound to suppose, are present. It is doubtless unique, the same with no other, nor yet with itself, but alone in the world of its fleeting moment. But, for logic, and in a matter of truth and falsehood, the case is 6 THE PRINCIPLES OF LOGIC BOOK I quite changed. The " idea " has here become an universal, since everything else is subordinate to the meaning. That con nection of attributes we recognize as horse, is one part of the content of the unique horse-image, and this fragmentary part of the psychical event is all that in logic we know of or care for. Using this we treat the rest as husk and dross, which mat ters nothing to us, and makes no difference to the rest. The " idea," if that is the psychical state, is in logic a symbol. But it is better to say, the idea is the meaning, for existence and un essential content are wholly discarded. The idea, in the sense of mental image, is a sign of the idea in the sense of meaning.8 § 7. These two senses of idea, as the symbol and the symbolized, the image and its meaning, are of course known to all of us. But the reason why I dwell on this obvious distinction, is that in much of our thinking it is systematically disregarded. " How can any one," we are asked, " be so foolish as to think that ideas are universal, when every single idea can be seen to be particular, or talk of an idea which remains the same, when the actual idea at each moment varies, and we have in fact not one identical but many similars? " But how can any one, we feel tempted to reply, suppose that these obvious objections are unknown to us? When I talk of an idea which is the same amid change, I do not speak of that psychical event which is in ceaseless flux, but of one portion of the content which the mind has fixed, and which is not in any sense an event in time. I am talking of the meaning, not the series of symbols, the gold, so to speak, not the fleeting series of transitory notes. The belief in uni versal ideas does not involve the conviction that abstrac tions exist, even as facts in my head. The mental event is unique and particular, but the meaning in its use is cut off from the existence, and from the rest of the fluctuating content. It loses its relation to the particular symbol; it stands as an adjective, to be referred to some subject, but indifferent in itself to every special subject.
The ambiguity of " idea " may be exhibited thus. Thesis, On the one hand no possible idea can be that which it means. Antithesis, On the other hand no idea is anything but just what it means. In the thesis the idea is the psychical image; in the antithesis the idea is the logical signification. In the CHAP. I THE GENERAL NATURE OF JUDGMENT 7 first it is the whole sign, but in the second it is nothing but the symbolized. In the sequel I intend to use idea mainly in the sense of meaning* § 8. For logical purposes the psychological distinction of idea and sensation may be said to be irrelevant, while the distinction of idea and fact is vital. The image, or psycho logical idea, is for logic nothing but a sensible reality. It is on a level with the mere sensations of the senses. For both are facts and neither is a meaning. Neither is cut from a mutilated presentation, and fixed as a connection. Neither is indifferent to its place in the stream of psychi cal events, its time and relations to the presented congeries. Neither is an adjective to be referred from its existence, to live on strange soils, under other skies and through chang ing seasons. The lives of both are so entangled with their environment, so one with their setting of sensuous particulars, that their character is destroyed if but one thread is broken. Fleeting and self -destructive as is their very endurance, wholly delusive their supposed individuality, misleading and deceptive their claim to reality, yet in some sense and some how they are. They have existence; they are not thought but given.f But an idea, if we use idea of the meaning, is neither given nor presented but is taken. It can not as such exist. It can not ever be an event, with a place in the series of time or space. It can be a fact no more inside our heads than it can outside them. And, if you take this mere * There are psychological difficulties as to universal ideas, and we feel them more, the more abstract the ideas become. The existence and the amount, of the particular imagery or sensuous environment, give rise to questions. But these questions need not be considered here, for they have no logical importance whatever. I assume, after Berkeley, that the mental fact contains always an irrelevant sensuous setting, however hard it may be to bring this always to consciousness. But I must repeat that this is not a vital question. It is a mistake in principle to try to defend the reality of universals by an attempt to show them as psychical events existing in one moment. For if the universal we use in logic had actual existence as a fact in my mind, at all events I could not use it as that fact. You must at any rate abstract from the existence and external relations, and how much further the abstraction is to go seems hardly an important or vital issue.
fThis statement is subject to correction by Chapter II.9 8 THE PRINCIPLES OF LOGIC BOOK I idea by itself, it is an adjective divorced, a parasite cut loose, a spirit without a body seeking rest in another, an abstraction from the concrete, a mere possibility which by itself is nothing.
§ 9. These paradoxical shadows and ghosts of fact are the ideas we spoke of, when we said, Without ideas no judg ment; and, before we proceed, we may try to show briefly that in predication we do not use the mental fact, but only the meaning. The full evidence for this truth must however be sought in the whole of what follows.
(i) In the first place it is clear that the idea, which we use as the predicate of a judgment, is not my mental state as such. " The whale is a mammal " does not qualify real whales by my mammal-image. For that belongs to me, and is an event in my history; and, unless I am Jonah, it can not enter into an actual whale. We need not dwell on this point, for the absurdity is patent. If I am asked, Have you got the idea of a sea-serpent? I answer, Yes. And again, if I am asked, But do you believe in it, Is there a sea-serpent? I understand the difference. The enquiry is not made about my psychical fact. No one wishes to know if that exists outside of my head; and still less to know if it really exists inside. For the latter is assumed, and we can not doubt it. In short the contention that in judgment the idea is my own state as such, would be simply preposterous.
(ii) But is it possible, secondly, that the idea should be the image, not indeed as my private psychical event, but still as regards the whole content of that image? We have a mental fact, the idea of mammal. Admit first that, as it exists and inhabits my world, we do not predicate it. Is there another possibility? The idea perhaps might be used apart from its own existence, and in abstraction from its relations to my psychical phenomena, and yet it might keep, without any deduction, its own internal content. The " mammal " in my head is, we know, not bare mammal, but is clothed with par ticulars and qualified by characters other than mammality; and these may vary with the various appearances of the image.* * I may point out that, even in this sense, the idea is a product of abstraction. Its individuality (if it has such) is conferred on it by an act of thought. It is given in a congeries of related phenomena, and, as an individual image, results from a mutilation of this fact (Vid. inf. Chap. II.).
CHAP. I THE GENERAL NATURE OF JUDGMENT 9 And we may ask, Is this whole, image used in judgment? Is this the meaning? But the answer must be negative.
We have ideas of redness, of a foul smell, of a horse, and of death; and, as we call them up more or less distinctly, there is a kind of redness, a sort of ofTensiveness, some image of a horse, and some appearance of mortality, which rises before us. And should we be asked, Are roses red? Has coal gas a foul smell? Is that white beast a horse? Is it true that he is dead? we should answer, Yes, our ideas are all true, and are attributed to the reality. But the idea of redness may have been that of a lobster, of a smell that of castor-oil, the imaged horse may have been a black horse, and death perhaps a withered flower. And these ideas are not true, nor did we apply them. What we really applied was that part of their content which our minds had fixed as the general meaning.
It may be desirable (as in various senses various writers have told us) that the predicate should be determinate, but in practice this need can not always be satisfied. I may surely judge that a berry is poisonous, though in what way I know not, and though " poisonous " implies some traits which I do not attribute to this poison. I surely may believe that AB is bad, though I do not know his vices, and have images which are probably quite inapplicable. I may be sure that a book is bound in leather or in cloth, thought the sort of leather or cloth I must imagine I can not say exists. The details I have never known, or at any rate, have forgot ten them. But of the universal meaning I am absolutely sure, and it is this which I predicate.
The extreme importance of these obvious distinctions must excuse the inordinate space I allot to them. Our whole theory of judgment will support and exemplify them; but I will add yet a few more trivial illustrations. In denying that iron is yellow, do I say that it is not yellow like gold, or topaze, or do I say that it is not any kind of yellow? When I assert, " It is a man or a woman or a child," am I reasonably answered by, " There are other possibilities. It may be an Indian or a girl "? When I ask, Is he ill? do I naturally look for " Oh no, he has cholera "? Is the effect of, " If he has left me then I am undone," removed by " Be happy, it was by the coach that he deserted you "?
IO THE PRINCIPLES OF LOGIC BOOK I The idea in judgment is the universal meaning; it is not ever the occasional imagery, and still less can it be the whole psychical event.
§ 10. We now know what to understand by a logical idea, and may briefly, and in anticipation of the sequel, dog matically state what judgment does with it. We must avoid, so far as may be, the psychological and metaphysical dif ficulties that rise on us.
Judgment proper is the act which refers an ideal content (recognized as such) to a reality beyond the act.10 This sounds perhaps much harder than it is.
The ideal content is the logical idea, the meaning as just defined. It is recognized as such, when we know that, by itself, it is not a fact but a wandering adjective11. In the act of assertion we transfer this adjective to, and unite it with, a real substantive. And we perceive at the same time, that the relation thus set up is neither made by the act, nor merely holds within it or by right of it, but is real both independent of and beyond it.*