THIRD SUB-DIVISION OF LOGIC.
THE DOCTRINE OF THE NOTION.
160.] The Notion is the principle of freedom, the power of
substance self-realised. It is a systematic whole, in which each of its
constituent functions is the very total which the notion is, and is put
as indissolubly one with it. Thus in its self-identity it has original
and complete determinateness.
The position taken up by the notion is that of absolute idealism.
Philosophy is a knowledge through notions because it sees that what
on other grades of consciousness is taken to have Being, and to be
naturally or immediately independent, is but a constituent stage in the
Idea. In the logic of understanding, the notion is generally reckoned
a mere form of thought, and treated as a general conception. It is to
this inferior view of the notion that the assertion refers, so often
urged on behalf of the heart and sentiment, that notions as such are
something dead, empty, and abstract. The case is really quite the
reverse. The notion is, on the contrary, the principle of all life, and
thus possesses at the same time a character of thorough concreteness.
That it is so follows from the whole logical movement up to this point,
and need not be here proved. The contrast between form and content,
which is thus used to criticise the notion when it is alleged to be
merely formal, has, like all the other contrasts upheld by reflection,
been already left behind and overcome dialectically or through itself.
The notion, in short, is what contains all the earlier categories of
thought merged in it. It certainly is a form, but an infinite and
creative form, which includes, but at the same time releases from
itself, the fulness of all content. And so too the notion may, if it
be wished, be styled abstract, if the name concrete is restricted to
the concrete facts of sense or of immediate perception. For the notion
is not palpable to the touch, and when we are engaged with it, hearing
and seeing must quite fail us. And yet, as it was before remarked, the
notion is a true concrete; for the reason that it involves Being and
Essence, and the total wealth of these two spheres with them, merged in
the unity of thought.
If, as was said at an earlier point, the different stages of the
logical idea are to be treated as a series of definitions of the
Absolute, the definition which now results for us is that the Absolute
is the Notion. That necessitates a higher estimate of the notion,
however, than is found in formal conceptualist Logic, where the notion
is a mere form of our subjective thought, with no original content of
its own. But if Speculative Logic thus attaches a meaning to the term
notion so very different from that usually given, it may be asked why
the same word should be employed in two contrary acceptations, and an
occasion thus given for confusion and misconception. The answer is
that, great as the interval is between the speculative notion and the
notion of Formal Logic, a closer examination shows that the deeper
meaning is not so foreign to the general usages of language as it
seems at first sight. We speak of the deduction of a content from the
notion, _e.g._ of the specific provisions of the law of property from
the notion of property; and so again we speak of tracing back these
material details to the notion. We thus recognise that the notion is no
mere form without a content of its own: for if it were, there would be
in the one case nothing to deduce from such a form, and in the other
case to trace a given body of fact back to the empty form of the notion
would only rob the fact of its specific character, without making it
understood.
161.] The onward movement of the notion is no longer either
a transition into, or a reflection on something else, but
Development. For in the notion, the elements distinguished are
without more ado at the same time declared to be identical with one
another and with the whole, and the specific character of each is a
free being of the whole notion.
* * * * *
Transition into something else is the dialectical process within the
range of Being: reflection (bringing something else into light), in
the range of Essence. The movement of the Notion is _development_: by
which that only is explicit which is already implicitly present. In
the world of nature it is organic life that corresponds to the grade
of the notion. Thus _e.g._ the plant is developed from its germ. The
germ virtually involves the whole plant, but does so only ideally or in
thought: and it would therefore be a mistake to regard the development
of the root, stem, leaves, and other different parts of the plant, as
meaning that they were _realiter_ present, but in a very minute form,
in the germ. That is the so-called 'box-within-box' hypothesis; a
theory which commits the mistake of supposing an actual existence of
what is at first found only as a postulate of the completed thought.
The truth of the hypothesis on the other hand lies in its perceiving
that in the process of development the notion keeps to itself and
only gives rise to alteration of form, without making any addition in
point of content. It is this nature of the notion--this manifestation
of itself in its process as a development of its own self,--which is
chiefly in view with those who speak of innate ideas, or who, like
Plato, describe all learning merely as reminiscence. Of course that
again does not mean that everything which is embodied in a mind, after
that mind has been formed by instruction, had been present in that mind
beforehand, in its definitely expanded shape.
The movement of the notion is as it were to be looked upon merely as
play: the other which it sets up is in reality not an other. Or, as
it is expressed in the teaching of Christianity: not merely has God
created a world which confronts Him as an other; He has also from all
eternity begotten a Son in whom He, a Spirit, is at home with Himself.
162.] The doctrine of the notion is divided into three parts. (1) The
first is the doctrine of the Subjective or Formal Notion.
(2) The second is the doctrine of the notion invested with the
character of immediacy, or of Objectivity. (3) The third is the
doctrine of the Idea, the subject-object, the unity of notion
and objectivity, the absolute truth.
The Common Logic covers only the matters which come before us here
as a portion of the third part of the whole system, together with
the so-called Laws of Thought, which we have already met; and in the
Applied Logic it adds a little about cognition. This is combined with
psychological, metaphysical, and all sorts of empirical materials,
which were introduced because, when all was done, those forms of
thought could not be made to do all that was required of them. But
with these additions the science lost its unity of aim. Then there was
a further circumstance against the Common Logic. Those forms, which
at least do belong to the proper domain of Logic, are supposed to be
categories of conscious thought only, of thought too in the character
of understanding, not of reason.
The preceding logical categories, those viz. of Being and Essence, are,
it is true, no mere logical modes or entities: they are proved to be
notions in their transition or their dialectical element, and in their
return into themselves and totality. But they are only in a modified
form notions (cp. §§ 84 and 112), notions rudimentary, or, what is
the same thing, notions for us. The antithetical term into which each
category passes, or in which it shines, so producing correlation, is
not characterised as a particular. The third, in which they return
to unity, is not characterised as a subject or an individual: nor is
there any explicit statement that the category: is identical in its
antithesis,--in other words, its freedom is not expressly stated: and
all this because the category is not universality.--What generally
passes current under the name of a notion is a mode of understanding,
or, even, a mere general representation, and therefore, in short, a
finite mode of thought (cp. § 62).
The Logic of the Notion is usually treated as a science of form only,
and understood to deal with the form of notion, judgment, and syllogism
as form, without in the least touching the question whether anything
is true. The answer to that question is supposed to depend on the
content only. If the logical forms of the notion were really dead and
inert receptacles of conceptions and thoughts, careless of what they
contained, knowledge about them would be an idle curiosity which the
truth might dispense with. On the contrary they really are, as forms
of the notion, the vital spirit of the actual world. That only is
true of the actual which is true in virtue of these forms, through
them and in them. As yet, however, the truth of these forms has never
been considered or examined on their own account any more than their
necessary interconnexion.
A.--THE SUBJECTIVE NOTION.
(a) _The Notion as Notion._
163.] The Notion as Notion contains the three following 'moments' or
functional parts. (1) The first is _Universality_--meaning that it
is in free equality with itself in its specific character. (2) The
second is Particularity--that is, the specific character, in
which the universal continues serenely equal to itself. (3) The third
is Individuality--meaning the reflection-into-self of the
specific characters of universality and particularity;--which negative
self-unity has complete and original determinateness, without any loss
to its self-identity or universality.
Individual and actual are the same thing: only the former has issued
from the notion, and is thus, as a universal, stated expressly as a
negative identity with itself. The actual, because it is at first no
more than a potential or immediate unity of essence and existence,
_may_ possibly have effect: but the individuality of the notion is
the very source of effectiveness, effective moreover no longer as the
cause is, with a show of effecting something else, but effective of
itself.--Individuality, however, is not to be understood to mean the
immediate or natural individual, as when we speak of individual things
or individual men: for that special phase of individuality does not
appear till we come to the judgment. Every function and 'moment' of
the notion is itself the whole notion (§ 160); but the individual or
subject is the notion expressly put as a totality.
(1) The notion is generally associated in our minds with abstract
generality, and on that account it is often described as a general
conception. We speak, accordingly, of the notions of colour, plant,
animal, &c. They are supposed to be arrived at by neglecting the
particular features which distinguish the different colours, plants,
and animals from each other, and by retaining those common to them all.
This is the aspect of the notion which is familiar to understanding;
and feeling is in the right when it stigmatises such hollow and empty
notions as mere phantoms and shadows. But the universal of the notion
is not a mere sum of features common to several things, confronted
by a particular which enjoys an existence of its own. It is, on the
contrary, self-particularising or self-specifying, and with undimmed
clearness finds itself at home in its antithesis. For the sake both of
cognition and of our practical conduct, it is of the utmost importance
that the real universal should not be confused with what is merely held
in common. All those charges which the devotees of feeling make against
thought, and especially against philosophic thought, and the reiterated
statement that it is dangerous to carry thought to what they call too
great lengths, originate in the confusion of these two things.
The universal in its true and comprehensive meaning is a thought
which, as we know, cost thousands of years to make it enter into the
consciousness of men. The thought did not gain its full recognition
till the days of Christianity. The Greeks, in other respects so
advanced, knew neither God nor even man in their true universality.
The gods of the Greeks were only particular powers of the mind; and
the universal God, the God of all nations, was to the Athenians still
a God concealed. They believed in the same way that an absolute gulf
separated themselves from the barbarians. Man as man was not then
recognised to be of infinite worth and to have infinite rights.
The question has been asked, why slavery has vanished from modern
Europe. One special circumstance after another has been adduced in
explanation of this phenomenon. But the real ground why there are
no more slaves in Christian Europe is only to be found in the very
principle of Christianity itself, the religion of absolute freedom.
Only in Christendom is man respected as man, in his infinitude and
universality. What the slave is without, is the recognition that he is
a person: and the principle of personality is universality. The master
looks upon his slave not as a person, but as a selfless thing. The
slave is not himself reckoned an 'I';--his 'I' is his master.
The distinction referred to above between what is merely in common, and
what is truly universal, is strikingly expressed by Rousseau in his
famous 'Contrat Social,' when he says that the laws of a state must
spring from the universal will (_volonté générale,_) but need not on
that account be the will of all (_volonté de tous._) Rousseau would
have made a sounder contribution towards a theory of the state, if he
had always keep this distinction in sight. The general will is the
notion of the will: and the laws are the special clauses of this will
and based upon the notion of it.
(2) We add a remark upon the account of the origin and formation of
notions which is usually given in the Logic of Understanding. It is
not _we_ who frame the notions. The notion is not something which
is originated at all. No doubt the notion is not mere Being, or the
immediate: it involves mediation, but the mediation lies in itself. In
other words, the notion is what is mediated through itself and with
itself. It is a mistake to imagine that the objects which form the
content of our mental ideas come first and that our subjective agency
then supervenes, and by the aforesaid operation of abstraction, and
by colligating the points possessed in common by the objects, frames
notions of them. Rather the notion is the genuine first; and things
are what they are through the action of the notion, immanent in them,
and revealing itself in them. In religious language we express this
by saying that God created the world out of nothing. In other words,
the world and finite things have issued from the fulness of the divine
thoughts and the divine decrees. Thus religion recognises thought and
(more exactly) the notion to be the infinite form, or the free creative
activity, which can realise itself without the help of a matter that
exists outside it.
164.] The notion is concrete out and out: because the negative
unity with itself, as characterisation pure and entire, which is
individuality, is just what constitutes its self-relation, its
universality. The functions or 'moments' of the notion are to this
extent indissoluble. The categories of 'reflection' are expected to be
severally apprehended and separately accepted as current, apart from
their opposites. But in the notion, where their identity is expressly
assumed, each of its functions can be immediately apprehended only from
and with the rest.
Universality, particularity, and individuality are, taken in the
abstract, the same as identity, difference, and ground. But the
universal is the self-identical, with the express qualification,
that it simultaneously contains the particular and the individual.
Again, the particular is the different or the specific character, but
with the qualification that it is in itself universal and is as an
individual. Similarly the individual must be understood to be a subject
or substratum, which involves the genus and species in itself and
possesses a substantial existence. Such is the explicit or realised
inseparability of the functions of the notion in their difference (§
160)--what may be called the clearness of the notion, in which each
distinction causes no dimness or interruption, but is quite as much
transparent.
No complaint is oftener made against the notion than that it is
_abstract._ Of course it is abstract, if abstract means that the medium
in which the notion exists is thought in general and not the sensible
thing in its empirical concreteness. It is abstract also, because the
notion falls short of the idea. To this extent the subjective notion
is still formal. This however does not mean that it ought to have
or receive another content than its own. It is itself the absolute
form, and so is all specific character, but as that character is in
its truth. Although it be abstract therefore, it is the concrete,
concrete altogether, the subject as such. The absolutely concrete is
the mind (see end of § 159)--the notion when it _exists_ as notion
distinguishing itself from its objectivity, which notwithstanding the
distinction still continues to be its own. Everything else which is
concrete, however rich it be, is not so intensely identical with itself
and therefore not so concrete on its own part,--least of all what is
commonly supposed to be concrete, but is only a congeries held together
by external influence.--What are called notions, and in fact specific
notions, such as man, house, animal, &c, are simply denotations
and abstract representations. These abstractions retain out of all
the functions of the notion only that of universality; they leave
particularity and individuality out of account and have no development
in these directions. By so doing they just miss the notion.
165.] It is the element of Individuality which first explicitly
differentiates the elements of the notion. Individuality is the
negative reflection of the notion into itself, and it is in that way at
first the free differentiating of it as the first negation, by which
the specific character of the notion is realised, but under the form
of particularity. That is to say, the different elements are in the
first place only qualified as the several elements of the notion, and,
secondly, their identity is no less explicitly stated, the one being
said to be the other. This realised particularity of the notion is the
Judgment.
The ordinary classification of notions, as _clear, distinct_ and
_adequate,_ is no part of the notion; it belongs to psychology.
Notions, in fact, are here synonymous with mental representations;
a _clear_ notion is an abstract simple representation: a _distinct_
notion is one where, in addition to the simplicity, there is one 'mark'
or character emphasised as a sign for subjective cognition. There is
no more striking mark of the formalism and decay of Logic than the
favourite category of the 'mark.' The _adequate_ notion comes nearer
the notion proper, or even the Idea: but after all it expresses only
the formal circumstance that a notion or representation agrees with its
object, that is, with an external thing.--The division into what are
called _subordinate_ and _co-ordinate_ notions implies a mechanical
distinction of universal from particular which allows only a mere
correlation of them in external comparison. Again, an enumeration
of such kinds as _contrary_ and _contradictory, affirmative_ and
_negative_ notions, &c, is only a chance-directed gleaning of logical
forms which properly belong to the sphere of Being or Essence, (where
they have been already examined,) and which have nothing to do with
the specific notional character as such. The true distinctions in the
notion, universal, particular, and individual, may be said also to
constitute species of it, but only when they are kept severed from
each other by external reflection. The immanent differentiating and
specifying of the notion come to sight in the judgment: for to judge is
to specify the notion.
(b) _The Judgment._
166.] The Judgment is the notion in its particularity, as a
connexion which is also a distinguishing of its functions, which are
put as independent and yet as identical with themselves, not with one
another.
One's first impression about the Judgment is the independence of the
two extremes, the subject and the predicate. The former we take to be
a thing or term _per se,_ and the predicate a general term outside
the said subject and somewhere in our heads. The next point is for us
to bring the latter into combination with the former, and in this way
frame a Judgment. The copula 'is' however enunciates the predicate _of_
the subject, and so that external subjective subsumption is again put
in abeyance, and the Judgment taken as a determination of the object
itself.--The etymological meaning of the Judgment (_Urtheil_) in
German goes deeper, as it were declaring the unity of the notion to be
primary, and its distinction to be the original partition. And that is
what the Judgment really is.
In its abstract terms a Judgment is expressible in the proposition:
'The individual is the universal.' These are the terms under which
the subject and the predicate first confront each other, when the
functions of the notion are taken in their immediate character or
first abstraction. [Propositions such as, 'The particular is the
universal,' and 'The individual is the particular,' belong to the
further specialisation of the judgment.] It shows a strange want
of observation in the logic-books, that in none of them is the fact
stated, that in _every_ judgment there is such a statement made, as,
The individual is the universal, or still more definitely, The subject
is the predicate: (_e.g._ God is absolute spirit). No doubt there is
also a distinction between terms like individual and universal, subject
and predicate: but it is none the less the universal fact, that every
judgment states them to be identical.
The copula 'is' springs from the nature of the notion, to be
self-identical even in parting with its own. The individual and
universal are _its_ constituents, and therefore characters which
cannot be isolated. The earlier categories (of reflection) in their
correlations also refer to one another: but their interconnexion is
only 'having' and not 'being,' _i.e._ it is not the identity which is
realised as identity or universality. In the judgment, therefore, for
the first time there is seen the genuine particularity of the notion:
for it is the speciality or distinguishing of the latter, without
thereby losing universality.
* * * * *
Judgments are generally looked upon as combinations of notions, and,
be it added, of heterogeneous notions. This theory of judgment is
correct, so far as it implies that it is the notion which forms the
presupposition of the judgment, and which in the judgment comes up
under the form of difference. But on the other hand, it is false to
speak of notions differing in kind. The notion, although concrete,
is still as a notion essentially one, and the functions which it
contains are not different kinds of it. It is equally false to speak
of a combination of the two sides in the judgment, if we understand
the term 'combination' to imply the independent existence of the
combining members apart from the combination. The same external view
of their nature is more forcibly apparent when judgments are described
as produced by the ascription of a predicate to the subject. Language
like this looks upon the subject as self-subsistent outside, and the
predicate as found somewhere in our head. Such a conception of the
relation between subject and predicate however is at once contradicted
by the copula 'is.' By saying 'This rose is red,' or 'This picture
is beautiful,' we declare, that it is not we who from outside attach
beauty to the picture or redness to the rose, but that these are the
characteristics proper to these objects. An additional fault in the
way in which Formal Logic conceives the judgment is, that it makes
the judgment look as if it were something merely contingent, and
does not offer any proof for the advance from notion on to judgment.
For the notion does not, as understanding supposes, stand still in
its own immobility. It is rather an infinite form, of boundless
activity, as it were the _punctum saliens_ of all vitality, and
thereby self-differentiating. This disruption of the notion into the
difference of its constituent functions',--a disruption imposed by the
native act of the notion, is the judgment. A judgment therefore means
the particularising of the notion. No doubt the notion is implicitly
the particular. But in the notion as notion the particular is not yet
explicit, and still remains in transparent unity with the universal.
Thus, for example, as we remarked before (§ 160, note), the germ of a
plant contains its particular, such as root, branches, leaves, &c.:
but these details are at first present only potentially, and are not
realised till the germ uncloses. This unclosing is, as it were, the
judgment of the plant. The illustration may also serve to show how
neither the notion nor the judgment are merely found in our head, or
merely framed by us. The notion is the very heart of things, and makes
them what they are. To form a notion of an object means therefore to
become aware of its notion: and when we proceed to a criticism or
judgment of the object, we are not performing a subjective act, and
merely ascribing this or that predicate to the object. We are, on the
contrary, observing the object in the specific character imposed by its
notion.
167.] The Judgment is usually taken in a subjective sense as an
operation and a form, occurring merely in self-conscious thought. This
distinction, however, has no existence on purely logical principles,
by which the judgment is taken in the quite universal signification
that all things are a judgment. That is to say, they are individuals,
which are a universality or inner nature in themselves,--a universal
which is individualised. Their universality and individuality are
distinguished, but the one is at the same time identical with the other.
The interpretation of the judgment, according to which it is assumed
to be merely subjective, as if _we_ ascribed a predicate to a subject,
is contradicted by the decidedly objective expression of the judgment.
The rose _is_ red; Gold _is_ a metal. It is not by us that something
is first ascribed to them.--A judgment is however distinguished from a
proposition. The latter contains a statement about the subject, which
does not stand to it in any universal relationship, but expresses some
single action, or some state, or the like. Thus, 'Caesar was born at
Rome in such and such a year, waged war in Gaul for ten years, crossed
the Rubicon, &c.,' are propositions, but not judgments. Again it is
absurd to say that such statements as, 'I slept well last night,' or
'Present arms!' may be turned into the form of a judgment. 'A carriage
is passing by'--would be a judgment, and a subjective one at best, only
if it were doubtful, whether the passing object was a carriage, or
whether it and not rather the point of observation was in motion:--in
short, only if it were desired to specify a conception which was still
short of appropriate specification.
168.] The judgment is an expression of finitude. Things from its point
of view are said to be finite, because they are a judgment, because
their definite being and their universal nature, (their body and their
soul,) though united indeed (otherwise the things would be nothing),
are still elements in the constitution which are already different and
also in any case separable.
169.] The abstract terms of the judgment, 'The individual is the
universal,' present the subject (as negatively self-relating) as what
is immediately _concrete,_ while the predicate is what is _abstract,_
indeterminate, in short, the universal. But the two elements are
connected together by an 'is': and thus the predicate (in its
universality) must also contain the speciality of the subject, must,
in short, have particularity: and so is realised the identity between
subject and predicate; which, being thus unaffected by this difference
in form, is the content.
It is the predicate which first gives the subject, which till then was
on its own account a bare mental representation or an empty name, its
specific character and content. In judgments like 'God is the most
real of all things,' or 'The Absolute is the self-identical,' God and
the Absolute are mere names; what they _are_ we only learn in the
predicate. What the subject may be in other respects, as a concrete
thing, is no concern of _this_ judgment. (Cp. § 31.)
To define the subject as that of which something is said, and the
predicate as what is said about it, is mere trifling. It gives no
information about the distinction between the two. In point of
thought, the subject is primarily the individual, and the predicate
the universal. As the judgment receives further development, the
subject ceases to be merely the immediate individual, and the predicate
merely the abstract universal: the former acquires the additional
significations of particular and universal,--the latter the additional
significations of particular and individual. Thus while the same names
are given to the two terms of the judgment, their meaning passes
through a series of changes.
170.] We now go closer into the speciality of subject and predicate.
The subject as negative self-relation (§§ 163, 166) is the stable
substratum in which the predicate has its subsistence and where it
is ideally present. The predicate, as the phrase is, _inheres_ in
the subject. Further, as the subject is in general and immediately
concrete, the specific connotation of the predicate is only one of the
numerous characters of the subject. Thus the subject is ampler and
wider than the predicate.
Conversely, the predicate as universal is self-subsistent, and
indifferent whether this subject is or not. The predicate outflanks
the subject, subsuming it under itself: and hence on its side is wider
than the subject. The specific content of the predicate (§ 169) alone
constitutes the identity of the two.
171.] At first, subject, predicate, and the specific content or the
identity are, even in their relation, still put in the judgment
as different and divergent. By implication, however, that is, in
their notion, they are identical. For the subject is a concrete
totality,--which means not any indefinite multiplicity, but
individuality alone, the particular and the universal in an identity:
and the predicate too is the very same unity (§ 170).--The copula
again, even while stating the identity of subject and predicate,
does so at first only by an abstract 'is.' Conformably to such an
identity the subject has to be _put_ also in the characteristic of the
predicate. By this means the latter also receives the characteristic of
the former: so that the copula receives its full complement and full
force. Such is the continuous specification by which the judgment,
through a copula charged with content, comes to be a syllogism. As it
is primarily exhibited in the judgment, this gradual specification
consists in giving to an originally abstract, sensuous universality the
specific character of allness, of species, of genus, and finally of the
developed universality of the notion.
After we are made aware of this continuous specification of the
judgment, we can see a meaning and an interconnexion in what are
usually stated as the kinds of judgment. Not only does the ordinary
enumeration seem purely casual, but it is also superficial, and even
bewildering in its statement of their distinctions. The distinction
between positive, categorical and assertory judgments, is either a pure
invention of fancy, or is left undetermined. On the right theory, the
different judgments follow necessarily from one another, and present
the continuous specification of the notion; for the judgment itself is
nothing but the notion specified.
When we look at the two preceding spheres of Being and Essence, we see
that the specified notions as judgments are reproductions of these
spheres, but put in the simplicity of relation peculiar to the notion.
* * * * *
The various kinds of judgment are no empirical aggregate. They are
a systematic whole based on a principle; and it was one of Kant's
great merits to have first emphasised the necessity of showing
this. His proposed division, according to the headings in his table
of categories, into judgments of quality, quantity, relation and
modality, can not be called satisfactory, partly from the merely formal
application of this categorical rubric, partly on account of their
content. Still it rests upon a true perception of the fact that the
different species of judgment derive their features from the universal
forms of the logical idea itself. If we follow this clue, it will
supply us with three chief kinds of judgment parallel to the stages
of Being, Essence, and Notion. The second of these kinds, as required
by the character of Essence, which is the stage of differentiation,
must be doubled. We find the inner ground for this systematisation of
judgments in the circumstance that when the Notion, which is the unity
of Being and Essence in a comprehensive thought, unfolds, as it does in
the judgment, it must reproduce these two stages in a transformation
proper to the notion. The notion itself meanwhile is seen to mould and
form the genuine grade of judgment.
Far from occupying the same level, and being of equal value, the
different species of judgment form a series of steps, the difference
of which rests upon the logical significance of the predicate. That
judgments differ in value is evident even in our ordinary ways of
thinking. We should not hesitate to ascribe a very slight faculty of
judgment to a person who habitually framed only such judgments as,
'This wall is green,' 'This stove is hot.' On the other hand we should
credit with a genuine capacity of judgment the person whose criticisms
dealt with such questions as whether a certain work of art was
beautiful, whether a certain action was good, and so on. In judgments
of the first-mentioned kind the content forms only an abstract quality,
the presence of which can be sufficiently detected by immediate
perception. To pronounce a work of art to be beautiful, or an action to
be good, requires on the contrary a comparison of the objects with what
they ought to be, _i.e._ with their notion.
(α) Qualitative Judgment.
172.] The immediate judgment is the judgment of definite Being. The
subject is invested with a universality as its predicate, which is
an immediate, and therefore a sensible quality. It may be (1) a
Positive judgment: The individual is a particular. But the
individual is not a particular: or in more precise language, such
a single quality is not congruous with the concrete nature of the
subject. This is (2) a Negative judgment.
It is one of the fundamental assumptions of dogmatic Logic that
Qualitative judgments such as, 'The rose is red,' or 'is not red,' can
contain _truth. Correct_ they may be, _i.e._ in the limited circle
of perception, of finite conception and thought: that depends on the
content, which likewise is finite, and, on its own merits, untrue.
Truth, however, as opposed to correctness, depends solely on the form,
viz. on the notion as it is put and the reality corresponding to it.
But truth of that stamp is not found in the Qualitative judgment.
In common life the terms _truth_ and _correctness_ are often treated
as synonymous: we speak of the truth of a content, when we are only
thinking of its correctness. Correctness, generally speaking, concerns
only the formal coincidence between our conception and its content,
whatever the constitution of this content may be. Truth, on the
contrary, lies in the coincidence of the object with itself, that is,
with its notion. That a person is sick, or that some one has committed
a theft, may certainly be correct. But the content is untrue. A sick
body is not in harmony with the notion of body, and there is a want
of congruity between theft and the notion of human conduct. These
instances may show that an immediate judgment, in which an abstract
quality is predicated of an immediately individual thing, however
correct it may be, cannot contain truth. The subject and predicate of
it do not stand to each other in the relation of reality and notion.
We may add that the untruth of the immediate judgment lies in the
incongruity between its form and content. To say 'This rose is red,'
involves (in virtue of the copula 'is') the coincidence of subject and
predicate. The rose however is a concrete thing, and so is not red
only: it has also an odour, a specific form, and many other features
not implied in the predicate red. The predicate on its part is an
abstract universal, and does not apply to the rose alone. There are
other flowers and other objects which are red too. The subject and
predicate in the immediate judgment touch, as it were, only in a single
point, but do not cover each other. The case is different with the
notional judgment. In pronouncing an action to be good, we frame a
notional judgment. Here, as we at once perceive, there is a closer and
a more intimate relation than in the immediate judgment. The predicate
in the latter is some abstract quality which may or may not be applied
to the subject. In the judgment of the notion the predicate is, as it
were, the soul of the subject, by which the subject, as the body of
this soul, is characterised through and through.
173.] This negation of a particular quality, which is the first
negation, still leaves the connexion of the subject with the predicate
subsisting. The predicate is in that manner a sort of relative
universal, of which a special phase only has been negatived. [To say,
that the rose is not red, implies that it is still coloured--in the
first place with another colour; which however would be only one more
positive judgment.] The individual however is not a universal. Hence
(3) the judgment suffers disruption into one of two forms. It is either
(a) the Identical judgment, an empty identical relation stating
that the individual is the individual; or it is (b) what is called the
Infinite judgment, in which we are presented with the total
incompatibility of subject and predicate.
Examples of the latter are: 'The mind is no elephant:' 'A lion is
no table;' propositions which are correct but absurd, exactly like
the identical propositions: 'A lion is a lion;' 'Mind is mind.'
Propositions like these are undoubtedly the truth of the immediate, or,
as it is called, Qualitative judgment. But they are not judgments at
all, and can only occur in a subjective thought where even an untrue
abstraction may hold its ground.--In their objective aspect, these
latter judgments express the nature of what is, or of sensible things,
which, as they declare, suffer disruption into an empty identity on the
one hand, and on the other a fully-charged relation--only that this
relation is the qualitative antagonism of the things related, their
total incongruity.
* * * * *
The negatively-infinite judgment, in which the subject has no relation
whatever to the predicate, gets its place in the Formal Logic solely as
a nonsensical curiosity. But the infinite judgment is not really a mere
casual form adopted by subjective thought. It exhibits the proximate
result of the dialectical process in the immediate judgments preceding
(the positive and simply-negative), and distinctly displays their
finitude and untruth. Crime may be quoted as an objective instance of
the negatively-infinite judgment. The person committing a crime, such
as a theft, does not, as in a suit about civil rights, merely deny
the particular right of another person to some one definite thing.
He denies the right of that person in general, and therefore he is
not merely forced to restore what he has stolen, but is punished in
addition, because he has violated law as law, _i.e._ law in general.
The civil-law suit on the contrary is an instance of the negative
judgment pure and simple where merely the particular law is violated,
whilst law in general is so far acknowledged. Such a dispute is
precisely paralleled by a negative judgment, like, 'This flower is not
red:' by which we merely deny the particular colour of the flower, but
not its colour in general, which may be blue, yellow, or any other.
Similarly death, as a negatively-infinite judgment, is distinguished
from disease as simply-negative. In disease, merely this or that
function of life is checked or negatived: in death, as we ordinarily
say, body and soul part, _i.e._ subject and predicate utterly diverge.
(ß) _Judgment of Reflection._
174.] The individual put as individual (_i.e._ as reflected-into-self)
into the judgment, has a predicate, in comparison with which the
subject, as self-relating, continues to be still _an other_ thing.--In
existence the subject ceases to be immediately qualitative, it is in
correlation, and inter-connexion with an other thing,--with an external
world. In this way the universality of the predicate comes to signify
this relativity--(_e.g._) useful, or dangerous; weight or acidity; or
again, instinct; are examples of such relative predicates.
The Judgment of Reflection is distinguished from the Qualitative
judgment by the circumstance that its predicate is not an immediate
or abstract quality, but of such a kind as to exhibit the subject
as in relation to something else. When we say, _e.g._ 'This rose is
red.' we regard the subject in its immediate individuality, and
without reference to anything else. If, on the other hand, we frame
the judgment, 'This plant is medicinal,' we regard the subject, plant,
as standing in connexion with something else (the sickness which it
cures), by means of its predicate (its medicinality). The case is the
same with judgments like: This body is elastic: This instrument is
useful: This punishment has a deterrent influence. In every one of
these instances the predicate is some category of reflection. They all
exhibit an advance beyond the immediate individuality of the subject,
but none of them goes so far as to indicate the adequate notion of it.
It is in this mode of judgment that ordinary _raisonnement_ luxuriates.
The greater the concreteness of the object in question, the more points
of view does it offer to reflection; by which however its proper nature
or notion is not exhausted.
175.] (1) Firstly then the subject, the individual as individual (in
the Singular judgment), is a universal. But (2) secondly, in
this relation it is elevated above its singularity. This enlargement is
external, due to subjective reflection, and at first is an indefinite
number of particulars. (This is seen in the Particular judgment,
which is obviously negative as well as positive: the individual is
divided in itself: partly it is self-related, partly related to
something else.) (3) Thirdly, Some are the universal: particularity is
thus enlarged to universality: or universality is modified through the
individuality of the subject, and appears as allness Community,
the ordinary universality of reflection.
* * * * *
The subject, receiving, as in the Singular judgment, a universal
predicate, is carried out beyond its mere individual self. To say,
'This plant is wholesome,' implies not only that this single plant is
wholesome, but that some or several are so. We have thus the particular
judgment (some plants are wholesome, some men are inventive, &c). By
means of particularity the immediate individual comes to lose its
independence, and enters into an inter-connexion with something else.
Man, as _this_ man, is not this single man alone: he stands beside
other men and becomes one in the crowd, just by this means however he
belongs to his universal, and is consequently raised.--The particular
judgment is as much negative as positive. If only some bodies are
elastic, it is evident that the rest are not elastic.
On this fact again depends the advance to the third form of the
Reflective judgment, viz. the judgment of allness (all men are mortal,
all metals conduct electricity). It is as 'all' that the universal
is in the first instance generally encountered by reflection. The
individuals form for reflection the foundation, and it is only our
subjective action which collects and describes them as 'all.' So far
the universal has the aspect of an external fastening, that holds
together a number of independent individuals, which have not the least
affinity towards it. This semblance of indifference is however unreal:
for the universal is the ground and foundation, the root, and substance
of the individual. If _e.g._ we take Caius, Titus, Sempronius, and
the other inhabitants of a town or country, the fact that all of them
are men is not merely something which they have in common, but their
universal or kind, without which these individuals would not be at all.
The case is very different with that superficial generality falsely
so called, which really means only what attaches, or is common, to
all the individuals. It has been remarked, for example, that men,
in contradistinction from the lower animals, possess in common the
appendage of ear-lobes. It is evident, however, that the absence of
these ear-lobes in one man or another would not affect the rest of
his being, character, or capacities: whereas it would be nonsense
to suppose that Caius, without being a man, would still be brave,
learned, &c. The individual man is what he is in particular, only in so
far as he is before all things a man as man and in general. And that
generality is not something external to, or something in addition to
other abstract qualities, or to mere features discovered by reflection.
It is what permeates and includes in it everything particular.
176.] The subject being thus likewise characterised as a universal,
there is an express identification of subject and predicate, by which
at the same time the speciality of the judgment form is deprived of
all importance. This unity of the content (the content being the
universality which is identical with the negative reflection-in-self of
the subject) makes the connexion in judgment a necessary one.
The advance from the reflective judgment of allness to the judgment
of necessity is found in our usual modes of thought, when we say that
whatever appertains to all, appertains to the species, and is therefore
necessary. To say all plants, or all men, is the same thing as to say
_the_ plant, or _the_ man.
(γ) _Judgment of Necessity._
177.] The Judgment of Necessity, _i.e._ of the identity of the content
in its difference (1), contains, in the predicate, partly the substance
or nature of the subject, the concrete universal, the _genus_; partly,
seeing that this universal also contains the specific character as
negative, the predicate represents the exclusive essential character,
the _species._ This is the Categorical judgment.
(2) Conformably to their substantiality, the two terms receive the
aspect of independent actuality. Their identity is then inward only;
and thus the actuality of the one is at the same time not its own, but
the being of the other. This is the Hypothetical judgment.
(3) If, in this self-surrender and self-alienation of the notion,
its inner identity is at the same time explicitly put, the universal
is the genus which is self-identical in its mutually-exclusive
individualities. This judgment, which has this universal for both its
terms, the one time as a universal, the other time as the circle of
its self-excluding particularisation in which the 'either--or' as much
as the 'as well as' stands for the genus, is the Disjunctive
judgment. Universality, at first as a genus, and now also as the
circuit of its species, is thus described and expressly put as a
totality.
* * * * *
The Categorical judgment (such as 'Gold is a metal,' 'The rose is a
plant') is the un-mediated judgment of necessity, and finds within the
sphere of Essence its parallel in the relation of substance. All things
are a Categorical judgment. In other words, they have their substantial
nature, forming their fixed and unchangeable substratum. It is only
when things are studied from the point of view of their kind, and as
with necessity determined by the kind, that the judgment first begins
to be real. It betrays a defective logical training to place upon the
same level judgments like 'gold is dear,' and judgments like 'gold
is a metal.' That 'gold is dear' is a matter of external connexion
between it and our wants or inclinations, the costs of obtaining it,
and other circumstances. Gold remains the same as it was, though that
external reference is altered or removed. Metalleity, on the contrary,
constitutes the substantial nature of gold, apart from which it, and
all else that is in it, or can be predicated of it, would be unable to
subsist. The same is the case if we say, 'Caius is a man.' We express
by that, that whatever else he may be, has worth and meaning, only when
it corresponds to his substantial nature or manhood.
But even the Categorical judgment is to a certain extent defective. It
fails to give due place to the function or element of particularity.
Thus 'gold is a metal,' it is true; but so are silver, copper, iron:
and metalleity as such has no leanings to any of its particular
species. In these circumstances we must advance from the Categorical to
the Hypothetical judgment, which may be expressed in the formula: If
_A_ is, _B_ is. The present case exhibits the same advance as formerly
took place from the relation of substance to the relation of cause. In
the Hypothetical judgment the specific character of the content shows
itself mediated and dependent on something else: and this is exactly
the relation of cause and effect. And if we were to give a general
interpretation to the Hypothetical judgment, we should say that it
expressly realises the universal in its particularising. This brings
us to the third form of the Judgment of Necessity, the Disjunctive
judgment. _A_ is either _B_ or _C_ or _D._ A work of poetic art is
either epic or lyric or dramatic. Colour is either yellow or blue or
red. The two terms in the Disjunctive judgment are identical. The genus
is the sum total of the species, and the sum total of the species
is the genus. This unity of the universal and the particular is the
notion: and it is the notion which, as we now see, forms the content of
the judgment.
(δ) _Judgment of the Notion._
178.] The Judgment of the Notion has for its content the notion, the
totality in simple form, the universal with its complete speciality.
The subject is, (1) in the first place, an individual, which has
for its predicate the reflection of the particular existence on its
universal; or the judgment states the agreement or disagreement of
these two aspects. That is, the predicate is such a term as good, true,
correct. This is the Assertory judgment.
Judgments, such as whether an object, action, &c. is good, bad, true,
beautiful, &c, are those to which even ordinary language first applies
the name of judgment. We should never ascribe judgment to a person who
framed positive or negative judgments like, This rose is red, This
picture is red, green, dusty, &c.
The Assertory judgment, although rejected by society as out of place
when it claims authority on its own showing, has however been made the
single and all-essential form of doctrine, even in philosophy, through
the influence of the principle of immediate knowledge and faith. In the
so-called philosophic works which maintain this principle, we may read
hundreds and hundreds of assertions about reason, knowledge, thought,
&c. which, now that external authority counts for little, seek to
accredit themselves by an endless restatement of the same thesis.
179.] On the part of its at first un-mediated subject, the Assertory
judgment does not contain the relation of particular with universal
which is expressed in the predicate. This judgment is consequently
a mere subjective particularity, and is confronted by a contrary
assertion with equal right, or rather want of right. It is therefore
at once turned into (2) a Problematical judgment. But when we
explicitly attach the objective particularity to the subject and make
its speciality the constitutive feature of its existence, the subject
(3) then expresses the connexion of that objective particularity with
its constitution, _i.e._ with its genus; and thus expresses what
forms the content of the predicate (see § 178). [This (_the immediate
individuality_) house (_the genus,_) being so and so constituted
(_particularity,_) is good or bad.] This is the Apodictic
judgment. All things are a genus (_i.e._ have a meaning and purpose) in
an _individual_ actuality of a _particular_ constitution. And they are
finite, because the particular in them may and also may not conform to
the universal.
180.] In this manner subject and predicate are each the whole judgment.
The immediate constitution of the subject is at first exhibited as
the intermediating ground, where the individuality of the actual
thing meets with its universality, and in this way as the ground of
the judgment. What has been really made explicit is the oneness of
subject and predicate, as the notion itself, filling up the empty 'is'
of the copula. While its constituent elements are at the same time
distinguished as subject and predicate, the notion is put as their
unity, as the connexion which serves to intermediate them: in short, as
the Syllogism.
(c) _The Syllogism._
181.] The Syllogism brings the notion and the judgment into one.
It is notion,--being the simple identity into which the distinctions of
form in the judgment have retired. It is judgment,--because it is at
the same time set in reality, that is, put in the distinction of its
terms. The Syllogism is the reasonable, and everything reasonable.
Even the ordinary theories represent the Syllogism to be the form of
reasonableness, but only a subjective form; and no inter-connexion
whatever is shown to exist between it and any other reasonable content,
such as a reasonable principle, a reasonable action, idea, &c. The name
of reason is much and often heard, and appealed to: but no one thinks
of explaining its specific character, or saying what it is,--least of
all that it has any connexion with Syllogism. But formal Syllogism
really presents what is reasonable in such a reasonless way that it
has nothing to do with any reasonable matter. But as the matter in
question can only be rational in virtue of the same quality by which
thought is reason, it can be made so by the form only: and that
form is Syllogism. And what is a Syllogism but an explicit putting,
_i.e._ realising of the notion, at first in form only, as stated
above? Accordingly the Syllogism is the essential ground of whatever
is true: and at the present stage the definition of the Absolute is
that it is the Syllogism, or stating the principle in a proposition:
Everything is a Syllogism. Everything is a notion, the existence of
which is the differentiation of its members or functions, so that the
universal nature of the Notion gives itself external reality by means
of particularity, and thereby, and as a negative reflection-into-self,
makes itself an individual. Or, conversely: the actual thing is an
individual, which by means of particularity rises to universality and
makes itself identical with itself.--The actual is one: but it is also
the divergence from each other of the constituent elements of the
notion; and the Syllogism represents the orbit of intermediation of its
elements, by which it realises its unity.
The Syllogism, like the notion and the judgment, is usually described
as a form merely of our subjective thinking. The Syllogism, it is said,
is the process of proving the judgment. And certainly the judgment does
in every case refer us to the Syllogism. The step from the one to the
other however is not brought about by our subjective action, but by the
judgment itself which puts itself as Syllogism, and in the conclusion
returns to the unity of the notion. The precise point by which we
pass to the Syllogism is found in the Apodictic judgment. In it we
have an individual which by means of its qualities connects itself
with its universal or notion. Here we see the particular becoming the
mediating mean between the individual and the universal. This gives
the fundamental form of the Syllogism, the gradual specification of
which, formally considered, consists in the fact that universal and
individual also occupy this place of mean. This again paves the way for
the passage from subjectivity to objectivity.
182.] In the 'immediate' Syllogism the several aspects of the notion
confront one another abstractly, and stand in an external relation
only. We have first the two extremes, which are Individuality and
Universality; and then the notion, as the mean for locking the two
together, is in like manner only abstract Particularity. In this way
the extremes are put as independent and without affinity either towards
one another or towards their mean. Such a Syllogism contains reason,
but in utter notionlessness,--the formal Syllogism of Understanding. In
it the subject is coupled with an _other_ character; or the universal
by this mediation subsumes a subject external to it. In the rational
Syllogism, on the contrary, the subject is by means of the mediation
coupled with itself. In this manner it first comes to be a subject: or,
in the subject we have the first germ of the rational Syllogism.
In the following examination, the Syllogism of Understanding, according
to the interpretation usually put upon it, is expressed in its
subjective shape; the shape which it has when _we_ are said to make
such Syllogisms. And it really is only a subjective syllogising. Such
Syllogism however has also an objective meaning; it expresses only the
finitude of things, but does so in the specific mode which the form
has here reached. In the case of finite things their subjectivity,
being only thinghood, is separable from their properties or their
particularity, but also separable from their universality: not only
when the universality is the bare quality of the thing and its external
inter-connexion with other things, but also when it is its genus and
notion.
* * * * *
On the above-mentioned theory of syllogism, as the rational form _par
excellence,_ reason has been defined as the faculty of syllogising,
whilst understanding is defined as the faculty of forming notions. We
might object to the conception on which this depends, and according to
which the mind is merely a sum of forces or faculties existing side
by side. But apart from that objection, we may observe in regard to
the parallelism of understanding with the notion, as well as of reason
with syllogism, that the notion is as little a mere category of the
understanding as the syllogism is without qualification definable
as rational. For, in the first place, what the Formal Logic usually
examines in its theory of syllogism, is really nothing but the mere
syllogism of understanding, which has no claim to the honour of being
made a form of rationality, still less to be held as the embodiment of
all reason. The notion, in the second place, so far from being a form
of understanding, owes its degradation to such a place entirely to
the influence of that abstract mode of thought. And it is not unusual
to draw such a distinction between a notion of understanding and a
notion of reason. The distinction however does not mean that notions
are of two kinds. It means that our own action often stops short at
the mere negative and abstract form of the notion, when we might also
have proceeded to apprehend the notion in its true nature, as at once
positive and concrete. It is _e.g._ the mere understanding, which
thinks liberty to be the abstract contrary of necessity, whereas the
adequate rational notion of liberty requires the element of necessity
to be merged in it. Similarly the definition of God, given by what is
called Deism, is merely the mode in which the understanding thinks God:
whereas Christianity, to which He is known as the Trinity, contains the
rational notion of God.
(α) _Qualitative Syllogism._
183.] The first syllogism is a syllogism of definite being,--a
Qualitative Syllogism, as stated in the last paragraph. Its form (1) is
I--P--U: _i.e._ a subject as Individual is coupled (concluded) with a
Universal character by means of a (Particular) quality.
Of course the subject (_terminus minor_) has other characteristics
besides individuality, just as the other extreme (the predicate of the
conclusion, or _terminus major_) has other characteristics than mere
universality. But here the interest turns only on the characteristics
through which these terms make a syllogism.
The syllogism of existence is a syllogism of understanding merely, at
least in so far as it leaves the individual, the particular, and the
universal to confront each other quite abstractly. In this syllogism
the notion is at the very height of self-estrangement. We have in it
an immediately individual thing as subject: next some one particular
aspect or property attaching to this subject is selected, and by means
of this property the individual turns out to be a universal. Thus we
may say, This rose is red: Red is a colour: Therefore, this rose
is a coloured object. It is this aspect of the syllogism which the
common logics mainly treat of. There was a time when the syllogism was
regarded as an absolute rule for all cognition, and when a scientific
statement was not held to be valid until it had been shown to follow
from a process of syllogism. At present, on the contrary, the different
forms of the syllogism are met nowhere save in the manuals of Logic;
and an acquaintance with them is considered a piece of mere pedantry,
of no further use either in practical life or in science. It would
indeed be both useless and pedantic to parade the whole machinery of
the formal syllogism on every occasion. And yet the several forms of
syllogism make themselves constantly felt in our cognition. If any one,
when awaking on a winter morning, hears the creaking of the carriages
on the street, and is thus led to conclude that it has frozen hard in
the night, he has gone through a syllogistic operation:--an operation
which is every day repeated under the greatest variety of conditions.
The interest, therefore, ought at least not to be less in becoming
expressly conscious of this daily action of our thinking selves, than
confessedly belongs to the study of the functions of organic life, such
as the processes of digestion, assimilation, respiration, or even the
processes and structures of the nature around us. We do not, however,
for a moment deny that a study of Logic is no more necessary to teach
us how to draw correct conclusions, than a previous study of anatomy
and physiology is required in order to digest or breathe.
Aristotle was the first to observe and describe the different forms,
or, as they are called, figures of syllogism, in their subjective
meaning: and he performed his work so exactly and surely, that no
essential addition has ever been required. But while sensible of the
value of what he has thus done, we must not forget that the forms of
the syllogism of understanding, and of finite thought altogether,
are not what Aristotle has made use of in his properly philosophical
investigations. (See § 189.)
184.] This syllogism is completely contingent (α) in the matter of its
terms. The Middle Term, being an abstract particularity, is nothing
but any quality whatever of the subject: but the subject, being
immediate and thus empirically concrete, has several others, and could
therefore be coupled with exactly as many other universalities as it
possesses single qualities. Similarly a single particularity may have
various characters in itself, so that the same _medius terminus_ would
serve to connect the subject with several different universals.
It is more a caprice of fashion, than a sense of its incorrectness,
which has led to the disuse of ceremonious syllogising. This and the
following section indicate the uselessness of such syllogising for the
ends of truth.
The point of view indicated in the paragraph shows how this style of
syllogism can 'demonstrate' (as the phrase goes) the most diverse
conclusions. All that is requisite is to find a _medius terminus_ from
which the transition can be made to the proposition sought. Another
_medius terminus_ would enable us to demonstrate something else, and
even the contrary of the last. And the more concrete an object is, the
more aspects it has, which may become such middle terms. To determine
which of these aspects is more essential than another, again, requires
a further syllogism of this kind, which fixing on the single quality
can with equal ease discover in it some aspect or consideration by
which it can make good its claims to be considered necessary and
important.
Little as we usually think on the Syllogism of Understanding in the
daily business of life, it never ceases to play its part there. In
a civil suit, for instance, it is the duty of the advocate to give
due force to the legal titles which make in favour of his client. In
logical language, such a legal title is nothing but a middle term.
Diplomatic transactions afford another illustration of the same, when,
for instance, different powers lay claim to one and the same territory.
In such a case the laws of inheritance, the geographical position of
the country, the descent and the language of its inhabitants, or any
other ground, may be emphasised as a _medius terminus._
185.] (ß) This syllogism, if it is contingent in point of its terms,
is no less contingent in virtue of the form of relation which is
found in it. In the syllogism, according to its notion, truth lies in
connecting two distinct things by a Middle Term in which they are one.
But connexions of the extremes with the Middle Term (the so-called
_premisses,_ the major and the minor premiss) are in the case of this
syllogism much more decidedly _immediate_ connexions. In other words,
they have not a proper Middle Term.
This contradiction in the syllogism exhibits a new case of the infinite
progression. Each of the premisses evidently calls for a fresh
syllogism to demonstrate it: and as the new syllogism has two immediate
premisses, like its predecessor, the demand for proof is doubled at
every step, and repeated without end.
186.] On account of its importance for experience, there has been
here noted a defect in the syllogism, to which in this form absolute
correctness had been ascribed. This defect however must lose itself in
the further specification of the syllogism. For we are now within the
sphere of the notion; and here therefore, as well as in the judgment,
the opposite character is not merely present potentially, but is
explicit. To work out the gradual specification of the syllogism,
therefore, there need only be admitted and accepted what is at each
step realised by the syllogism itself.
Through the immediate syllogism I--P--U, the Individual is mediated
(through a Particular) with the Universal, and in this conclusion put
as a universal. It follows that the individual subject, becoming itself
a universal, serves to unite the two extremes, and to form their ground
of intermediation. This gives the second figure of the syllogism, (2)
U--I--P. It expresses the truth of the first; it shows in other words
that the intermediation has taken place in the individual, and is thus
something contingent.
187.] The universal, which in the first conclusion was specified
through individuality, passes over into the second figure and there
now occupies the place that belonged to the immediate subject. In the
second figure it is concluded with the particular. By this conclusion
therefore the universal is explicitly put as particular--and is now
made to mediate between the two extremes, the places of which are
occupied by the two others (the particular and the individual). This is
the third figure of the syllogism: (3) P--U--I.
What are called the Figures of the syllogism (being three in
number, for the fourth is a superfluous and even absurd addition of
the Moderns to the three known to Aristotle) are in the usual mode of
treatment put side by side, without the slightest thought of showing
their necessity, and still less of pointing out their import and value.
No wonder then that the figures have been in later times treated as an
empty piece of formalism. They have however a very real significance,
derived from the necessity for every function or characteristic
element of the notion to become the whole itself, and to stand as
mediating ground.--But to find out what 'moods' of the propositions
(such as whether they may be universals, or negatives) are needed
to enable us to draw a correct conclusion in the different figures,
is a mechanical inquiry, which its purely mechanical nature and its
intrinsic meaninglessness have very properly consigned to oblivion.
And Aristotle would have been the last person to give any countenance
to those who wish to attach importance to such inquiries or to the
syllogism of understanding in general. It is true that he described
these, as well as numerous other forms of mind and nature, and that
he examined and expounded their specialities. But in his metaphysical
theories, as well as his theories of nature and mind, he was very
far from taking as basis, or criterion, the syllogistic forms of the
'understanding.' Indeed it might be maintained that not one of these
theories would ever have come into existence, or been allowed to exist,
if it had been compelled to submit to the laws of understanding. With
all the descriptiveness and analytic faculty which Aristotle after his
fashion is substantially strong in, his ruling principle is always the
speculative notion; and that syllogistic of 'understanding' to which he
first gave such a definite expression is never allowed to intrude in
the higher domain of philosophy.
* * * * *
In their objective sense, the three figures of the syllogism declare
that everything rational is manifested as a triple syllogism; that
is to say, each one of the members takes in turn the place of the
extremes, as well as of the mean which reconciles them. Such, for
example, is the case with the three branches of philosophy; the Logical
Idea, Nature, and Mind. As we first see them, Nature is the middle
term which links the others together. Nature, the totality immediately
before us, unfolds itself into the two extremes of the Logical Idea
and Mind. But Mind is Mind only when it is mediated through nature.
Then, in the second place, Mind, which we know as the principle of
individuality, or as the actualising principle, is the mean; and Nature
and the Logical Idea are the extremes. It is Mind which cognises the
Logical Idea in Nature and which thus raises Nature to its essence.
In the third place again the Logical Idea itself becomes the mean: it
is the absolute substance both of mind and of nature, the universal
and all-pervading principle. These are the members of the Absolute
Syllogism.
188.] In the round by which each constituent function assumes
successively the place of mean and of the two extremes, their specific
difference from each other has been superseded. In this form, where
there is no distinction between its constituent elements, the syllogism
at first has for its connective link equality, or the external identity
of understanding. This is the Quantitative or Mathematical Syllogism:
if two things are equal to a third, they are equal to one another.
* * * * *
Everybody knows that this Quantitative syllogism appears as a
mathematical axiom, which like other axioms is said to be a principle
that does not admit of proof, and which indeed being self-evident does
not require such proof. These mathematical axioms however are really
nothing but logical propositions, which, so far as they enunciate
definite and particular thoughts, are deducible from the universal and
self-characterising thought. To deduce them, is to give their proof.
That is true of the Quantitative syllogism, to which mathematics
gives the rank of an axiom. It is really the proximate result of
the qualitative or immediate syllogism. Finally, the Quantitative
syllogism is the syllogism in utter formlessness. The difference
between the terms which is required by the notion is suspended.
Extraneous circumstances alone can decide what propositions are to be
premisses here: and therefore in applying this syllogism we make a
pre-supposition of what has been elsewhere proved and established.
189.] Two results follow as to the form. In the first place, each
constituent element has taken the place and performed the function of
the mean and therefore of the whole, thus implicitly losing its partial
and abstract character (§ 182 and § 184); secondly, the mediation has
been completed (§ 185), though the completion too is only implicit,
that is, only as a circle of mediations which in turn pre-suppose each
other. In the first figure I--P--U the two premisses I is P and P is
U are yet without a mediation. The former premiss is mediated in the
third, the latter in the second figure. But each of these two figures,
again, for the mediation of its premisses pre-supposes the two others.
In consequence of this, the mediating unity of the notion must be put
no longer as an abstract particularity, but as a developed unity of the
individual and universal--and in the first place a reflected unity of
these elements. That is to say, the individuality gets at the same time
the character of universality. A mean of this kind gives the Syllogism
of Reflection.
(β) _Syllogism of Reflection._
190.] If the mean, in the first place, be not only an abstract
particular character of the subject, but at the same time all the
individual concrete subjects which possess that character, but possess
it only along with others, (1) we have the Syllogism of Allness.
The major premiss, however, which has for its subject the particular
character, the _terminus medius,_ as allness, pre-supposes the very
conclusion which ought rather to have pre-supposed it. It rests
therefore (2) on an Induction, in which the mean is given by the
complete list of individuals as such,--a, b, c, d, &c. On account of
the disparity, however, between universality and an immediate and
empirical individuality, the list can never be complete. Induction
therefore rests upon (3) Analogy. The middle term of Analogy
is an individual, which however is understood as equivalent to its
essential universality, its genus, or essential character.--The first
syllogism for its intermediation turns us over to the second, and the
second turns us over to the third. But the third no less demands an
intrinsically determinate Universality, or an individuality as type of
the genus, after the round of the forms of external connexion between
individuality and universality has been run through in the figures of
the Reflective Syllogism.
By the Syllogism of Allness the defect in the first form of the
Syllogism of Understanding, noted in § 184, is remedied, but only to
give rise to a new defect. This defect is that the major premiss itself
pre-supposes what really ought to be the conclusion, and pre-supposes
it as what is thus an 'immediate' proposition. All men are mortal,
therefore Caius is mortal: All metals conduct electricity, therefore
_e.g._ copper does so. In order to enunciate these major premisses,
which when they say 'all' mean the 'immediate' individuals and are
properly intended to be empirical propositions, it is requisite that
the propositions about the individual man Caius, or the individual
metal copper, should previously have been ascertained to be correct.
Everybody feels not merely the pedantry, but the unmeaning formalism of
such syllogisms as: All men are mortal, Caius is a man, therefore Caius
is mortal.
The syllogism of Allness hands us over to the syllogism of Induction,
in which the individuals form the coupling mean. 'All metals conduct
electricity,' is an empirical proposition derived from experiments
made with each of the individual metals. We thus get the syllogism of
Induction I in the following shape P--I--U. I . . .
Gold is a metal: silver is a metal: so is copper, lead, &c. This is
the major premiss. Then comes the minor premiss: All these bodies
conduct electricity; and hence results the conclusion, that all metals
conduct electricity. The point which brings about a combination here
is individuality in the shape of allness. But this syllogism once
more hands us over to another syllogism. Its mean is constituted by
the complete list of the individuals. That pre-supposes that over
a certain region observation and experience are completed. But the
things in question here are individuals; and so again we are landed
in the progression _ad infinitum_ (i, i, i, &c.). In other words, in
no Induction can we ever exhaust the individuals. The 'all metals,'
'all plants,' of our statements, mean only all the metals, all the
plants, which we have hitherto become acquainted with. Every Induction
is consequently imperfect. One and the other observation, many it may
be, have been made: but all the cases, all the individuals, have not
been observed. By this defect of Induction we are led on to Analogy.
In the syllogism of Analogy we conclude from the fact that some things
of a certain kind possess a certain quality, that the same quality is
possessed by other things of the same kind. It would be a syllogism of
Analogy, for example, if we said: In all planets hitherto discovered
this has been found to be the law of motion, consequently a newly
discovered planet will probably move according to the same law. In the
experiential sciences Analogy deservedly occupies a high place, and
has led to results of the highest importance. Analogy is the instinct
of reason, creating an anticipation that this or that characteristic,
which experience has discovered, has its root in the inner nature or
kind of an object, and arguing on the faith of that anticipation.
Analogy it should be added may be superficial or it may be thorough.
It would certainly be a very bad analogy to argue that since the man
Caius is a scholar, and Titus also is a man, Titus will probably be a
scholar too: and it would be bad because a man's learning is not an
unconditional consequence of his manhood. Superficial analogies of
this kind however are very frequently met with. It is often argued,
for example: The earth is a celestial body, so is the moon, and it
is therefore in all probability inhabited as well as the earth. The
analogy is not one whit better than that previously mentioned. That
the earth is inhabited does not depend on its being a celestial body,
but in other conditions, such as the presence of an atmosphere, and of
water in connexion with the atmosphere, &c.: and these are precisely
the conditions which the moon, so far as we know, does not possess.
What has in modern times been called the Philosophy of Nature consists
principally in a frivolous play with empty and external analogies,
which, however, claim to be considered profound results. The natural
consequence has been to discredit the philosophical study of nature.
(γ) _Syllogism of Necessity._
191.] The Syllogism of Necessity, if we look to its purely abstract
characteristics or terms, has for its mean the Universal in the same
way as the Syllogism of Reflection has the Individual, the latter
being in the second, and the former in the third figure (§ 187).
The Universal is expressly put as in its very nature intrinsically
determinate. In the first place (1) the Particular, meaning by the
particular the specific genus or species, is the term for mediating
the extremes--as is done in the Categorical syllogism. (2) The
same office is performed by the Individual, taking the individual as
immediate being, so that it is as much mediating as mediated:--as
happens in the Hypothetical syllogism. (3) We have also the
mediating Universal explicitly put as a totality of its particular
members, and as a single particular, or exclusive individuality:--which
happens in the Disjunctive syllogism. It is one and the same
universal which is in these terms of the Disjunctive syllogism; they
are only different forms for expressing it.
192.] The syllogism has been taken conformably to the distinctions
which it contains; and the general result of the course of their
evolution has been to show that these differences work out their own
abolition and destroy the notion's outwardness to its own self. And,
as we see, in the first place, (1) each of the dynamic elements has
proved itself the systematic whole of these elements, in short a whole
syllogism,--they are consequently implicitly identical. In the second
place, (2) the negation of their distinctions and of the mediation of
one through another constitutes independency; so that it is one and
the same universal which is in these forms, and which is in this way
also explicitly put as their identity. In this ideality of its dynamic
elements, the syllogistic process may be described as essentially
involving the negation of the characters through which its course runs,
as being a mediative process through the suspension of mediation,--as
coupling the subject not with another, but with a suspended other, in
one word, with itself.
* * * * *
In the common logic, the doctrine of syllogism is supposed to conclude
the first part, or what is called the 'elementary' theory. It is
followed by the second part, the doctrine of Method, which proposes
to show how a body of scientific knowledge is created by applying to
existing objects the forms of thought discussed in the elementary part.
Whence these objects originate, and what the thought of objectivity
generally speaking implies, are questions to which the Logic of
Understanding vouchsafes no further answer. It believes thought to
be a mere subjective and formal activity, and the objective fact,
which confronts thought, to have a separate and permanent being. But
this dualism is a half-truth: and there is a want of intelligence in
the procedure which at once accepts, without inquiring into their
origin, the categories of subjectivity and objectivity. Both of them,
subjectivity as well as objectivity, are certainly thoughts--even
specific thoughts: which must show themselves founded on the universal
and self-determining thought. This has here been done--at least for
subjectivity. We have recognised it, or the notion subjective (which
includes the notion proper, the judgment, and the syllogism) as the
dialectical result of the first two main stages of the Logical Idea,
Being and Essence. To say that the notion is subjective and subjective
only, is so far quite correct: for the notion certainly is subjectivity
itself. Not less subjective than the notion are also the judgment and
syllogism: and these forms, together with the so-called Laws of Thought
(the Laws of Identity, Difference, and Sufficient Ground), make up the
contents of what is called the 'Elements' in the common logic. But we
may go a step further. This subjectivity, with its functions of notion,
judgment, and syllogism, is not like a set of empty compartments which
has to get filled from without by separately-existing objects. It would
be truer to say that it is subjectivity itself which, as dialectical,
breaks through its own barriers and opens out into objectivity by means
of the syllogism.
193.] This 'realisation' of the notion,--a realisation in which the
universal is this one totality withdrawn back into itself (of which
the different members are no less the whole, and) which has given
itself a character of 'immediate' unity by merging the mediation:--this
realisation of the notion is the Object.
I his transition from the Subject, the notion in general, and
especially the syllogism, to the Object, may, at the first glance,
appear strange, particularly if we look only at the Syllogism
of Understanding, and suppose syllogising to be only an act of
consciousness. But that strangeness imposes on us no obligation to seek
to make the transition plausible to the image-loving conception. The
only question which can be considered is, whether our usual conception
of what is called an 'object' approximately corresponds to the object
as here described. By 'object' is commonly understood not an abstract
being, or an existing thing merely, or any sort of actuality, but
something independent, concrete, and self-complete, this completeness
being the totality of the notion. That the object (_Objekt_) is also
an object to us (_Gegenstand_) and is external to something else,
will be more precisely seen, when it puts itself in contrast with
the subjective. At present, as that into which the notion has passed
from its mediation, it is only immediate object and nothing more,
just as the notion is not describable as subjective, previous to the
subsequent contrast with objectivity.
Further, the Object in general is the one total, in itself still
unspecified, the Objective World as a whole, God, the Absolute Object.
The object, however, has also difference attaching to it: it falls
into pieces, indefinite in their multiplicity (making an objective
world); and each of these individualised parts is also an object, an
intrinsically concrete, complete, and independent existence.
Objectivity has been compared with being, existence, and actuality;
and so too the transition to existence and actuality (not to being,
for _it_ is the primary and quite abstract immediate) maybe compared
with the transition to objectivity. The ground from which existence
proceeds, and the reflective correlation which is merged in actuality,
are nothing but the as yet imperfectly realised notion. They are only
abstract aspects of it,--the ground being its merely essence-bred
unity, and the correlation only the connexion of real sides which are
supposed to have only self-reflected being. The notion is the unity of
the two; and the object is not a merely essence-like, but inherently
universal unity, not only containing real distinctions, but containing
them as totalities in itself.
It is evident that in all these transitions there is a further purpose
than merely to show the indissoluble connexion between the notion or
thought and being. It has been more than once remarked that being is
nothing more than simple self-relation, and this meagre category is
certainly implied in the notion, or even in thought. But the meaning
of these transitions is not to accept characteristics or categories,
as only implied;--a fault which mars even the Ontological argument for
God's existence, when it is stated that being is one among realities.
What such a transition does, is to take the notion, as it ought to be
primarily characterised _per se_ as a notion, with which this remote
abstraction of being, or eve of objectivity, has as yet nothing to do,
and looking at its specific character as a notional character alone, to
see when and whether it passes over into a form which is different from
the character as it belongs to the notion and appears in it.
If the Object, the product of this transition, be brought into relation
with the notion, which, so far as its special form is concerned, has
vanished in it, we may give a correct expression to the result, by
saying that notion or, if it be preferred, subjectivity and object are
_implicitly_ the same. But it is equally correct to say that they are
different. In short, the two modes of expression are equally correct
and incorrect. The true state of the case can be presented in no
expressions of this kind. The 'implicit' is an abstraction, still more
partial and inadequate than the notion itself, of which the inadequacy
is upon the whole suspended, by suspending itself to the object with
its opposite inadequacy. Hence that implicitness also must, by its
negation, give itself the character of explicitness. As in every case,
speculative identity is not the above-mentioned triviality of an
_implicit_ identity of subject and object. This has been said often
enough. Yet it could not be too often repeated, if the intention were
really to put an end to the stale and purely malicious misconception in
regard to this identity:--of which however there can be no reasonable
expectation.
Looking at that unity in a quite general way, and raising no objection
to the one-sided form of its implicitness, we find it as the well-known
pre-supposition of the ontological proof for the existence of God.
There, it appears as supreme perfection. Anselm, in whom the notable
suggestion of this proof first occurs, no doubt originally restricted
himself to the question whether a certain content was in our thinking
only. His words are briefly these: '_Certe id quo majus cogitari
nequit, non potest esse in intellectu solo. Si enim vel in solo
intellectu est, potest cogitari esse_ et in re: _quod majus est.
Si ergo id quo majus cogitari non potest, est in solo intellectu; id
ipsum quo majus cogitari non potest, est quo majus cogitari potest.
Sed certe hoc esse non potest._' (Certainly that, than which nothing
greater can be thought, cannot be in the intellect alone. For even
if it is in the intellect alone, it can also be thought to exist in
fact: and that is greater. If then that, than which nothing greater
can be thought, is in the intellect alone; then the very thing, which
is greater than anything which can be thought, can be exceeded in
thought. But certainly this is impossible.) The same unity received
a more objective expression in Descartes, Spinoza and others: while
the theory of immediate certitude or faith presents it, on the
contrary, in somewhat the same subjective aspect as Anselm. These
Intuitionalists hold that _in our consciousness_ the attribute of being
is indissolubly associated with the conception of God. The theory of
faith brings even the conception of external finite things under the
same inseparable nexus between the consciousness and the being of
them, on the ground that _perception_ presents them conjoined with the
attribute of existence: and in so saying, it is no doubt correct. It
would be utterly absurd, however, to suppose that the association in
consciousness between existence and our conception of finite things
is of the same description as the association between existence and
the conception of God. To do so would be to forget that finite things
are changeable and transient, _i.e._ that existence is associated
with them for a season, but that the association is neither eternal
nor inseparable. Speaking in the phraseology of the categories before
us, we may say that, to call a thing finite, means that its objective
existence is not in harmony with the thought of it, with its universal
calling, its kind and its end. Anselm, consequently, neglecting any
such conjunction as occurs in finite things, has with good reason
pronounced that only to be the Perfect which exists not merely in a
subjective, but also in an objective mode. It does no good to put
on airs against the Ontological proof, as it is called, and against
Anselm thus denning the Perfect. The argument is one latent in every
unsophisticated mind, and it recurs in every philosophy, even against
its wish and without its knowledge--as may be seen in the theory of
immediate belief.
The real fault in the argumentation of Anselm is one which is
chargeable on Descartes and Spinoza, as well as on the theory of
immediate knowledge. It is this. This unity which is enunciated as the
supreme perfection or, it may be, subjectively, as the true knowledge,
is pre-supposed, _i.e._ it is assumed only as potential. This identity,
abstract as it thus appears, between the two categories may be at
once met and opposed by their diversity; and this was the very answer
given to Anselm long ago. In short, the conception and existence of
the finite is set in antagonism to the infinite; for, as previously
remarked, the finite possesses objectivity of such a kind as is at
once incongruous with and different from the end or aim, its essence
and notion. Or, the finite is such a conception and in such a way
subjective, that it does not involve existence. This objection and this
antithesis are got over, only by showing the finite to be untrue and
these categories in their separation to be inadequate and null. Their
identity is thus seen to be one into which they spontaneously pass
over, and in which they are reconciled.
B.--THE OBJECT.
194.] The Object is immediate being, because insensible to difference,
which in it has suspended itself. It is, further, a totality in itself,
whilst at the same time (as this identity is only the _implicit_
identity of its dynamic elements) it is equally indifferent to its
immediate unity. It thus breaks up into distinct parts, each of which
is itself the totality. Hence the object is the absolute contradiction
between a complete independence of the multiplicity, and the equally
complete non-independence of the different pieces.
The definition, which states that the Absolute is the Object, is most
definitely implied in the Leibnizian Monad. The Monads are each an
object, but an object implicitly 'representative,' indeed the total
representation of the world. In the simple unity of the Monad, all
difference is merely ideal, not independent or real. Nothing from
without comes into the monad: It is the whole notion in itself, only
distinguished by its own greater or less development. None the less,
this simple totality parts into the absolute multeity of differences,
each becoming an independent monad. In the monad of monads, and the
Pre-established Harmony of their inward developments, these substances
are in like manner again reduced to 'ideality' and unsubstantiality.
The philosophy of Leibnitz, therefore, represents contradiction in its
complete development.
* * * * *
As Fichte in modern times has especially and with justice insisted,
the theory which regards the Absolute or God as the Object and there
stops, expresses the point of view taken by superstition and slavish
fear. No doubt God is the Object, and, indeed, the Object out and
out, confronted with which our particular or subjective opinions and
desires have no truth and no validity. As absolute object however, God
does not therefore take up the position of a dark and hostile power
over against subjectivity. He rather involves it as a vital element in
Himself. Such also is the meaning of the Christian doctrine, according
to which God has willed that all men should be saved and all attain
blessedness. The salvation and the blessedness of men are attained when
they come to feel themselves at one with God, so that God, on the other
hand, ceases to be for them mere object, and, in that way, an object
of fear and terror, as was especially the case with the religious
consciousness of the Romans. But God in the Christian religion is
also known as Love, because in His Son, who is one with Him, He has
revealed Himself to men as a man amongst men, and thereby redeemed
them. All which is only another way of saying that the antithesis of
subjective and objective is implicitly overcome, and that it is our
affair to participate in this redemption by laying aside our immediate
subjectivity (putting off the old Adam), and learning to know God as
our true and essential self.
Just as religion and religious worship consist in overcoming the
antithesis of subjectivity and objectivity, so science too and
philosophy have no other task than to overcome this antithesis by the
medium of thought. The aim of knowledge is to divest the objective
world that stands opposed to us of its strangeness, and, as the phrase
is, to find ourselves at home in it: which means no more than to trace
the objective world back to the notion,--to our innermost self. We
may learn from the present discussion the mistake of regarding the
antithesis of subjectivity and objectivity as an abstract and permanent
one. The two are wholly dialectical. The notion is at first only
subjective: but without the assistance of any foreign material or stuff
it proceeds, in obedience to its own action, to objectify itself. So,
too, the object is not rigid and processless. Its process is to show
itself as what is at the same time subjective, and thus form the step
onwards to the idea. Any one who, from want of familiarity with the
categories of subjectivity and objectivity, seeks to retain them in
their abstraction, will find that the isolated categories slip through
his fingers before he is aware, and that he says the exact contrary of
what he wanted to say.
(2) Objectivity contains the three forms of Mechanism, Chemism,
and Teleology. The object of mechanical type is the immediate and
undifferentiated object. No doubt it contains difference, but the
different pieces stand, as it were, without affinity to each other,
and their connexion is only extraneous. In chemism, on the contrary,
the object exhibits an essential tendency to differentiation, in such
a way that the objects are what they are only by their relation to
each other: this tendency to difference constitutes their quality.
The third type of objectivity, the teleological relation, is the
unity of mechanism and chemism. Design, like the mechanical object,
is a self-contained totality, enriched however by the principle of
differentiation which came to the fore in chemism, and thus referring
itself to the object that stands over against it. Finally, it is the
realisation of design which forms the transition to the Idea.
(a) _Mechanism._
196.] The object (1) in its immediacy is the notion only potentially;
the notion as subjective is primarily outside it; and all its
specific character is imposed from without. As a unity of differents,
therefore, it is a composite, an aggregate; and its capacity of
acting on anything else continues to be an external relation. This is
Formal Mechanism.--Notwithstanding, and in this connexion and
non-independence, the objects remain independent and offer resistance,
external to each other.
Pressure and impact are examples of mechanical relations. Our knowledge
is said to be mechanical or by rote, when the words have no meaning
for us, but continue external to sense, conception, thought; and
when, being similarly external to each other, they form a meaningless
sequence. Conduct, piety, &c. are in the same way mechanical, when a
man's behaviour is settled for him by ceremonial laws, by a spiritual
adviser, &c.; in short, when his own mind and will are not in his
actions, which in this way are extraneous to himself.
* * * * *
Mechanism, the first form of objectivity, is also the category which
primarily offers itself to reflection, as it examines the objective
world. It is also the category beyond which reflection seldom goes.
It is, however, a shallow and superficial mode of observation, one
that cannot carry us through in connexion with Nature and still less
in connexion with the world of Mind. In Nature it is only the veriest
abstract relations of matter in its inert masses which obey the law of
mechanism. On the contrary the phenomena and operations of the province
to which the term 'physical' in its narrower sense is applied, such as
the phenomena of light, heat, magnetism, and electricity, cannot be
explained by any mere mechanical processes, such as pressure, impact,
displacement of parts, and the like. Still less satisfactory is it
to transfer these categories and apply them in the field of organic
nature; at least if it be our aim to understand the specific features
of that field, such as the growth and nourishment of plants, or, it
may be, even animal sensation. It is at any rate a very deep-seated,
and perhaps the main, defect of modern researches into nature, that,
even where other and higher categories than those of mere mechanism
are in operation, they still stick obstinately to the mechanical laws;
although they thus conflict with the testimony of unbiassed perception,
and foreclose the gate to an-adequate knowledge of nature. But even
in considering the formations in the world of Mind, the mechanical
theory has been repeatedly invested with an authority which it has no
right to. Take as an instance the remark that man consists of soul and
body. In this language, the two things stand each self-subsistent, and
associated only from without. Similarly we find the soul regarded as a
mere group of forces and faculties, subsisting independently side by
side.
Thus decidedly must we reject the mechanical mode of inquiry when it
comes forward and arrogates to itself the place of rational cognition
in general, and seeks to get mechanism accepted as an absolute
category. But we must not on that account forget expressly to vindicate
for mechanism the right and import of a general logical category. It
would be, therefore, a mistake to restrict it to the special physical
department from which it derives its name. There is no harm done, for
example, in directing attention to mechanical actions, such as that
of gravity, the lever, &c, even in departments, notably in physics
and in physiology, beyond the range of mechanics proper. It must
however be remembered, that within these spheres the laws of mechanism
cease to be final or decisive, and sink, as it were, to a subservient
position. To which may be added, that, in Nature, when the higher
or organic functions are in any way checked or disturbed in their
normal efficiency, the otherwise subordinate category of mechanism
is immediately seen to take the upper hand. Thus a sufferer from
indigestion feels pressure on the stomach, after partaking of certain
food in slight quantity; whereas those whose digestive organs are sound
remain free from the sensation, although they have eaten as much. The
same phenomenon occurs in the general feeling of heaviness in the
limbs, experienced in bodily indisposition. Even in the world of Mind,
mechanism has its place; though there, too, it is a subordinate one. We
are right in speaking of mechanical memory, and all sorts of mechanical
operations, such as reading, writing, playing on musical instruments,
&c. In memory, indeed, the mechanical quality of the action is
essential: a circumstance, the neglect of which has not unfrequently
caused great harm in the training of the young, from the misapplied
zeal of modern educationalists for the freedom of intelligence. It
would betray bad psychology, however, to have recourse to mechanism for
an explanation of the nature of memory, and to apply mechanical laws
straight off to the soul. The mechanical feature in memory lies merely
in the fact that certain signs, tones, &c. are apprehended in their
purely external association, and then reproduced in this association,
without attention being expressly directed to their meaning and inward
association. To become acquainted with these conditions of mechanical
memory requires no further study of mechanics, nor would that study
tend at all to advance the special inquiry of psychology.