Ir is not often that the Reviewer has an opportunity to assemble on one subject, three works so valuable as the Treatises of Whately, Mill and Tappan, on Logic. When we say, however, that these writers treat upon one subject, we must acknowledge we use a considerable latitude of expression; for, to the Logic of Aristotle, which Whately reproduced, Mill has added the Baconian Induction, while, besides both of these, Tappan embraces the wide field of Transcendental Intuition. It would be impossible to examine all these various topics within a sufficient ly short compass, if we were bold enough to undertake the adventurous task at all. We propose mere. ly to give our opinion upon the merits of these works, and to make some few and condensed observations upon the Syllogism, Induction and Intuition. And we trust it will not be thought foreign to the object of our Journal, to introduce to the notice of our readers a subject, the practice of which gave to Edwards and Bellamy and Hopkins and Dwight and Emmons, and has giv.

en to the divines of New England generally, the high character which they sustain as sound reasoners.

We assert some things; we prove others. What we prove, we know in consequence of our knowing something else: what we assert, we know directly. To prove a proposition, is to connect it with another proposition which is ultimately asserted. Thus, Assertion is the starting point from which every thing that is proved must proceed. We prove in two ways. We prove, Inductively, when that which we know to be true of certain individual things, we infer is true of certain like things which we have not examined. We prove, Syllogistically, when from a general truth we authenticate an individual truth which is embraced within it. Assertion, Induction and Ratiocination, furnish us with all that we know.

The terms, Reasoning, Induction and Logic, are used in different senses by good writers. From this circumstance have arisen many controversies which are merely verbal. How much Logic comprehends,— whether Induction is included within the province of the Syllogism,-duced to the form of the Syllogism, or whether all Reasoning can be re

are questions which depend entirely upon the sense in which the terms are used. But we shall not discuss these points. Real precision of thought is gained less by an attempt at uniformity, than it is by each writer accurately defining his own use of terms.

We commence with Ratiocina tion; and we mean by it, the process by which we deduce a less general from a more general proposition.

It is important to consider the order in which knowledge is acquired. If philosophers could have their way in the matter, the mind would first furnish itself with all the individual sensations, thoughts, emotions and intuitions, which it might ever have occasion to use; then, it would be set to the task of forming general truths from the stores thus accumulated; till, at length, armed with first principles, the person would be sent forth into life, with rules, all fresh and all self-obtained, to guide his judgment in all the real occurrences which might meet him. But the actual order of knowledge is far different. While the mind is early becoming acquainted with individu al facts as they occur within its sphere; while it early affirms those intuitive truths which are necessarily brought to light by the occasions of actual experience; while it early generalizes in some degree for itself from what it observes, it is more frequently and more extensively receiving general truths without investigation, and on mere authority. Most of the words in language are general terms, which have a meaning for the most part correspondent to the reality. Most of the truths which are universally believed among men, are general propositions which have been handed down from age to age, and from generation to generation. What are proverbs and maxims but general propositions universally received? What the principles of human con

duct, but the same? What, indeed, the beliefs and opinions of most men? The sciences and the vari ous departments of human instruction contain a series of general propositions, which are proposed for the acceptance of those who are taught. What else are the axioms of pure mathematics? or the laws of Natural Philosophy? What else the principles of Political Economy? What else are civil laws and the decisions of the courts? No man forms for himself even a tithe of the generalizations which he believes.

Now in the instruction of the young and in the common affairs of life, all these general propositions are taken as truths. They are not proved-they are assumed. They are used by every body. The orator uses them in convincing men ; the statesman uses them in defending his measures; the man of business uses them in the judgment which he makes upon individual cases which demand his action. These general truths or propositions are common stock. It was in this view of them, that the ancient rhetori cians, in their attempt to teach the orator how to speak convincingly on any subject, arranged these admitted truths into a smaller number of more general truths, which they called Topics; for the ancient Topics are nothing but very general propositions applicable to a great variety of individual things, and which would be generally accepted as true. And with the orator the question is, what are the propositions which the audience will admit, and from which the particular proposition can be deduced?

We have said that the general propositions embraced in language and handed down from generation to generation, are almost innumerable, and that they are a common stock of admitted truths to be used by every body. But how used? There is a strong tendency in the mind, possessed of general

truths, to refer individual propositions to some general one; and the mind rests with much more satisfaction in propositions relating to individual things, when they are viewed as instances of a general law or principle. This is what we mean when we speak of referring things to principles; that is, individual things to general propositions. The great er part of what is called reasoning among men,-excluding original investigations,-consists in this process the reference of the individual to the general class, law or principle; or, as it is more usually expressed, and what is the same thing, the deduction of the particular from the general proposition. Now we have these two facts before us: First, that every man is in possession of a large number of general propositions, which he and every other person holds to be true. Secondly, that all men do naturally refer propositions respecting individuals to these general propositions, and do feel a greater confidence in them when it can be done. It only remains to inquire, whether the particular can always be referred to the general with absolute certainty; or, in other words, whether the deduction of a particular proposition from a more general and admitted proposition, can always be made with entire accuracy and without the possibility of error? The answer is it can be done, and the syllogism is the formula by which it is done.

We

have here arrived at the precise object of logic, as that term is used by Aristotle and Whately. Logic both gives the rules of art or the formula by which all error is avoided in the process of deducing the particular from the general, and demonstrates the necessary accuracy of the rules. It is, therefore, both science and art. We thus see, that logic has a precise and limited field. It begins where investigation leaves off. It contemplates general principles as already established, and shows how

Aristotle makes a broad distinction between science and the materials of science. He seems to regard the philosopher as a teacher laying before his pupils a cyclopedia of knowledge, scientifically arranged and starting from certain primary truths, which, though unproved, the pupil is to receive as known. With him, science is doctrine and discipline; something to be taught and something to be learned. But to teach is to communicate to another that which he does not know, and in order to communicate what is not known we must begin with what is known. So with learning. But that which is known is not strictly a part of that which is taught. Science may be regarded as a series of propositions connected together and mutually dependent, of which the primary are to be taken as known immediately, and the others are shown to be true from their connection with the former. Now, in one sense, the primary truths may be regarded as within the province of science; that is, in the sense of being used within it, and being the medium by which the ultimate conclusions of science are arrived at; but in the sense of having been produced by science, they are not a part of it. Aristotle regards the ascer tainment of these primary truths or first principles, as being prior to science, and merely brought within science for its starting points. Aris

totle teaches the same doctrine with respect to opinion or contingent truths. Science and opinion agree, according to him, in that they are both proved from that which is not proved but is known immediately. They are both deduced with equal certainty, but the truths themselves are certain in the one case, and contingent in the other. The distinct mark of science and opinion is, that ..they are proved by means of something else which is known and granted, but not proved. Every proven proposition, therefore, implies others from which it is deduced and which are themselves unproved. The form in which these propositions are arranged, so that the concluded proposition shall follow with certainty from the foreknown propositions, is the syllogism. The syllogism is of course coëxtensive with science and opinion, and Aristotle divided it, according to its matter, into the demonstrative or scientific syllogism, and the dialectic or probable syllogism. As every proven proposition must be either certain or probable, the syllogism is in the view of Aristotle-coëxtensive with proof, or rather with the deduction of particular from universal propositions.

In support of this representation we take the liberty of quoting a few brief passages.

In the opening paragraph of the Posterior Analytics, he says, "All doctrine and all discipline or learning of the discursive kind is from foreexisting knowledge." "It is necessary that demonstrative science be from premises true and first and immediate and more known and prior, and the cause of the conclusion. They must be true, otherwise the conclusion would not be true. They must be causes, for we only know absolutely when we know the cause -and if causes, then prior and foreknown, not only as being apprehended but as being true." He then says, that by first truths he means "the same as the beginning--(,)

and that the beginning of demonstration is a proposition, immediate, and that an immediate proposition is one, than which there is no other prior." In regard to matters of opinion, he says, in the Topics, (1.1) "the primary truths are those which appear to be true to all or the greater part, or to wise men, the whole or a part."

Aristotle, by drawing this broad distinction between doctrine or deduced truths and direct knowledge, gave a clear and definite boundary to the field of his labors. He knew precisely the kind of material with which he was to work, and the work itself which was to be done. This definiteness of view enabled him to proceed in his labors in an order which seems of all others to be the most convenient and the best adapted to the end he proposed.

It enabled him, at the outset, to form a clear apprehension of the nature of the materials, and to take a comprehensive view of the whole. The materials are universal notions. He therefore, in the first place, treats of terms, or the single words by which universal notions are expressed, in which treatise he makes the famous summary of the ten categories. Having thus a clear conception of the elements of propositions, he is prepared to treat next of propositions themselves. These are the subjects of the two Treatises, entitled Kutnyɣogiai, and IIɛyì Egunvelas.

But the contemplation of the work to be done-the arrangement of the truths through the proposition in the order of mutual dependence, so that the unknown shall certainly follow from the known-would lead him, as the second step, to the consideration of the formula, by which truths could be thus arranged, and by which in every case, that which is concluded shall be certainly deduced from the primary unproved truth. This formula is the syllogism, and he treats of it-so far forth as it is a mere

form-in the treatise called the Prior Analytics.

But, again, the contemplation of the materials to be deduced to the syllogisms, would disclose the important distinction, that some of the primary truths are necessary and some are probable, which would lead him, as the third step, to treat of the manner, in which both kinds of truth should be deduced to the syllogism. This he does in the Treatises, called the Posterior Analytics, or on the Demonstrative Syllogism; and the Top ics, or on the Dialectic Syllogism.

The treatises, which we have thus enumerated, form the Organon of Aristotle. They furnish the instrument with which, and embrace the materials on which, the intellect is to work. It is obvious that the Old Organon and the Novum Organum occupy distinct provinces. But Aristotle and Bacon, so far from being in conflict, are in peaceful possession of almost the entire domain of knowledge. Aristotle recognized the office of induction, and no where underrates its merits, though he did not write a formal treatise on it, and indeed did not consider it capable of a strict science. Bacon, though he speaks with contempt of the trifles of logic in vogue in his day, formally acknowledges the mode of judging by the syllogism. "It is manifest," he says, "that this way of judging by the syllogism is nothing else than a reduction of propositions to principles by means of middle terms." (Manifestum est igitur, artem hanc judicandi per syllogismum nihil aliud quam reductionem propositionum ad principia per medios terminos. De Aug. Sci., Lib. V. Cap. iv.) Bacon derived his knowledge of Aristotle from Latin translations and the scholastic logic; and, as a matter of course, subsequent scholars have discovered many mistakes-but, yet, with his usual sagacity, he perceived and has frequently expressed in his work, the real and precise office of the

syllogism. Aristotle, though he clearly saw that the premises of the syllogism were derived from the induction of singular or individual things, did not give to this subject the full power of his mind, and it must be confessed no where is he so little satisfactory. These great masters of thought have divided between them the intellectual world, and each is supreme within his own dominion. Aristotle reared a superstructure of the finest proportions upon the foundations then existing, but yet leaving it possible to add new superstructures without injury to the proportions as new foundations should be laid. Bacon labored at the foundations themselves-reconstructing and building anew. Their fortune has been various. Bacon, from the first, has received the homage of the human mind ;-his fame has never suffered even a partial eclipse. What may befall it during the nineteen hundred years which must elapse before Bacon shall be where Aristotle now is, it would be presumptuous to say; but we may say thus far, that every new portion of space which has been brought within the vision of man, every new revelation which has been made of the mighty changes this earth has undergone in the illimitable past, every new analysis, every new combination, every new fact, all the astonishing discoveries of science, have only served to make our thoughts of his great name co-extensive with the known bounds of the universe. Aristotle, on the contrary, has suffered equally from the zeal of his followers, and the ignorance of his adversaries, at one time buried beneath the accumulation of friendly commentaries, and at another obscured and distorted by the ignorance of Scotch philosophers. say ignorance without hesitation, for Doct. Reid ingenuously confesses that he had studied only a portion of the writings which he so severely condemned, and had not fully understood

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