Page:Ferrier's Works Volume 1 - Institutes of Metaphysic (1875 ed.).djvu/483

RhPROP. I.———— demonstration. Absolute existence may possibly be that which we are cognisant of, or it may possibly be that which we are ignorant of; but if it is not that which we are cognisant of, and not that which we are ignorant of, it must be that which we are neither cognisant of nor ignorant of; and no other alternative is possible. This conclusion seems sufficiently obvious. To those, however, who may desire a more concrete example of the kind of syllogism here employed, the following illustration will be of service: If it is not summer, it may be winter; but if it is not summer, and not winter, it must be neither summer nor winter. Therefore it is either summer or winter, or neither; and no other alternative as to time and season is possible. For suppose it to be spring; but spring is neither summer nor winter, and therefore the conclusion of the syllogism is unshaken. Such, mutatis mutandis, is the present reasoning in regard to Absolute Existence.

3. All the alternatives which Absolute Existence is capable of being, having been exhibited in this proposition, the next step which the system takes is to reduce these alternatives from three to two. This elimination is accomplished in Propositions II. III. IV. Meanwhile the counter-proposition is subjoined.