PREFACE.

THIS Manual of Logic is humble in its size, and form of publication; but in its principles it pretends to originality, and in its purpose to interfere with doctrines that have been advocated by some of the profoundest teachers of our kind. I wish, therefore, in this preface, to excuse such presumption as this very statement carries with it, and to soften, as well as I can, the prejudice which I may raise by making it.

First, then, for my pretensions to originality. I think I have the good fortune to start, in this work, with a few self-evident, or nearly self-evident principles, which have been overlooked by all who have gone before me in this department of learning. What they are, and how they affect the kind of instruction here proposed, will appear on an examination of the work; but I may as well indicate them at present, in order that the critical examiner may be prepared to trace their effect in the detail which follows. In the first place, I think it all but selfevident, if not quite so, that every single word competently used, is the sign of knowledge, and that, in calling it the sign of an idea, we either mean the same thing, or we have no distinct, definite meaning

in so using the term idea. Secondly, it appears to me another self-evident truth, that every act of the natural understanding which increases or which develops our knowledge, involves three things,-the thing newly-known or newly-recognized; the thing or things in some relation to it, by being aware of which relation, it is newly, or better known; and the knowledge itself; which knowledge it is the privilege of our species to entertain separately, (apart, abstractly,) so as to be applicable to other things hypothetically, in order, by inquiry, to push our knowledge further. If to others, as to myself, this statement should not convey a self-evident truth, I believe the obstruction to be no other than will be removed by the examples, furnished in various places throughout this work. Thirdly, it appears also self-evident to me, and, with less difficulty than attends the previous statement, will I think, appear evident to others, that words which join to make sense, lose their separate (their more abstract) meaning, in a meaning which they unite to signify; so that the longest expression which can be formed by words that, in this manner, make sense, are but as one single word, with reference to the sense which is thus attained and signified.

Such are the principles,―few, simple, and selfevident, or very nearly so,-which have nevertheless been overlooked, or at least, not considered up to their full weight, by those who have formed systems of logic, especially by Aristotle and his followers; by those who, in any past days, have

speculated on the laws of human thought, and on the origin, the nature, and possible compass of human knowledge. I take these principles with me in the execution of the little work which follows; with what success must be judged by its contents.

But while I speak thus confidently of the ground I take, I feel, and am ready to acknowledge, with deep humility, the imperfections that must be discovered in what I have done to build upon it. It is one thing to plan, and another to execute; and everyone, even from the size of my volume will be ready at once to say, Parturiunt montes, nascitur, &c.

There is another preconceived objection, which, I cannot help feeling, will stand in my way. I am nobody. I belong to no learned body. I have previously produced nothing that the world has much regarded. May I be permitted, without the charge of unnecessarily speaking of myself, to make such a statement, as, with impartial persons, will, I trust, have some weight against this objection.

A man can but do what the short space of life allows; and if his time has not been occupied in pursuits adverse to, and calling him away from some one pursuit in which he takes an interest, he may achieve, in that one pursuit, as much as another; -he may achieve much more than others of far greater natural powers, if he comes after them, and takes up what they have begun, but left unfinished. Such, I believe to be my predicament. Nor do I come forward for the first time, with the fruits of my inquiries. Twenty years ago, I published in

theory what I now offer in a practical work; having had abundant opportunity, in the intervening years, of testing, with pupils of various age, and of every degree of competency, the effect of such instruction as the following pages contain.

And now, if it be asked what sect or denomination of past teachers in logic and speculative science I adhere to,-I answer, to none. I have endeavoured to keep clear of all extremes in opinion:—I am not a Sensationalist with the French philosophers; I am not an Idealist with the German: I give no countenance to Materialism; and I hold not, with Berkeley, that there is nothing outward to the mind. I am not of the Scottish school; for I see no scientific ground for a Philosophy of the Mind in contradistinction to a Philosophy of Matter, or as a part of the Philosophy of Man, yet fitted to be treated distinctly from Man. I wonder therefore that Mr. MORELL, in his able History of Modern Philosophy, should have placed me among the Scoto-English Metaphysicians. The following pages will, I think, take me out of that category, and leave me purely English.

On points transcending Philosophy, I do not declare my creed; for those are points that lie beyond the limits of such a work as this; and I think the cause of religion is never served by forcing religious considerations into science of human origin. The structure built from the earth, ought indeed to prove its own truth by meeting and coinciding with truth that comes from the skies; and it must

coincide either now or eventually; for He who gives the light from above, also gives the power to raise the edifice from below. It is happy for me that what I happen to have reached, or imagine I have reached, of truth in these pages, does not, in any part, stand in contradiction to the doctrines of the Bible.

Something remains by way of advertisement to my Readers. I have placed in the Index at the end, some points that I was glad to exclude from the body of the work:-for instance, under the word Locke, I have indicated in what manner both Locke and Horne Tooke, after beginning well, went completely astray. I conceive myself nevertheless to be a follower of those two men; and only hope I have escaped the errors of my masters. If I have not been able thus to avoid other controversial points in making up what I intend for a practical work, yet I have so placed the more abstruse matter, that the learner may quite avoid it in pursuing his first Course of instruction. For his guidance, and that of the teacher who may not have time and opportunity to extract a better plan, I have given an Outline for a First Course of Logic in the Appendix. Under Philosophy, Philosophers, in the Index, I have furnished a brief memorial of the changes in speculative opinion among the Greeks, and a still slighter intimation of the movement of such opinion into times comparatively modern. Should the reader desire an account to the same purpose, something