Page:Mind (New Series) Volume 6.djvu/558

 542 w. BLAIR NEATBY: THE EXISTENTIAL IMPORT OF PROPOSITIONS. IN this paper some observations will be offered on the existential import of propositions according to the actual usages of speech (or, as I should prefer to say, according to the laws of speech), without reference to the interests of formal logic. We might reach the answer to this vexed question by a short cut, if we could assume that the verb to be retains an existential import when it is used as the copula ; since almost all (if not all) propositions can be expressed in the form, S is P. And it is far from certain that this way is closed to us, notwithstanding that Mill maintains the contrary with a placid confidence that is rather disconcerting to an unconvinced reader. It seems worth while to recall Mill's discussion of this point, were it only for the sake of the curious example it affords of the confusion in which the whole question of existential import is so often involved. He appears l to regard the use of one and the same verb both to assert existence and to serve for the copula as purely arbitrary ; and he can only excuse Plato and Aristotle for the confusion into which they fell on this subject on the plea of their ignorance of a plurality of languages. Yet in the same paragraph he tells us (very truly) that the "ambiguity" exists "in the modern as well as in the ancient languages " ; from which it would seem probable that an extensive knowledge of languages, far from delivering the Greek philosophers from their error, would have greatly confirmed them in it. Mill even attempts to close the question by giving as an example, A centaur is a fiction of the poets. In so doing, he falls into a curious inconsistency with his own doctrine 2 that every proposi- tion, not merely verbal, implies the real existence of its subject ; since his example is by no means merely verbal, fictitiousness being no part of the connotation of the name centaur. The obvious explanation is that the proposition is elliptically expressed, and as it stands is not true. The poetic fiction never created a centaur, but simply created the idea of one ; and this is amply realised by intelligent people who use such phrases, and they are ready to insist that in strictness of speech they must say, The idea of a centaur is a fiction of the poets. But as soon as the judgment is thus adequately expressed, the existence of the subject is very plainly implied indeed. This would not be worth spending time over if it were merely the case that Mill lighted on a bad example ; but it is quite an- other thing, if, as I believe, he could not have found a good one. At any rate, it is well to insist that he has done nothing (or rather, less than nothing) to silence the evidence of the copula. It is not, however, on that evidence that I should rely in forming an opinion on the general question. For, though it is quite clear to me that it is by no mere accident that we make the verb that 1 Logic, bk. i., c. 4, 1. 2 Bk L, c. 6, 2.