Page:Mind (Old Series) Volume 9.djvu/139

 F. H. BRADLEY'S PRINCIPLES OF LOGIC. I'll that enters into Mr. Bradley's view of what constitutes a judg- ment. So far, however, as I can determine, his opinions would be somewhat as follows. Judgment is clearly a mental function, that is to say, it can only be understood as part of the complex in which thought and reality stand as opposed to, yet depending on, one another. But as a mental function, judgment is not to be taken as having the characteristics of a mental fact. However valuable may be the results of a psychological investigation of judgment as*a fact in the mental life, however much light may be indirectly thrown on its logical nature by tracing the history and conditions of its appearance, the judgment as an element of knowledge, as the very mode of apprehending the real, is not simply a psychical fact, nor can the logical theory of judgment admit any determination of either idea or reality as these are treated for psychology. The constituents of the judgment, idea and reality, are equally necessary and require special definition. The idea is not the mental fact, taken as such ; it is part of the general content of the real as apprehended, separated off, fixed and used as a sign or symbol. Relatively to the real, which is substantival, the idea is adjectival. It is known as not itself the real, but it has significance, meaning; and this meaning is de- finitely referred to the real. In any judgment the idea or ideal content is connected with, attached to, the real, and the new relation resulting is perceived not to be made by the act of judging but to be independent thereof. Tin's highly general description of judgment can hardly be quite intelligible until it has received fifling-in from contrast with opposed views and from consideration of the new features which complex experience introduces into it. But the view deserves warm recognition as an attempt to see through the thick veils of current doctrine and to seize the very essence of the act of judging. I do not know how far Mr. Bradley's illustrations and explanations of the term ///*// will throw light upon the meaning in which it is to be employed, for there is danger, despite his precautions, that the matter will be viewed psychologically, and this danger is perhaps aggravated by the attempt to give a genetic account of the way in which we may suppose judgment to have come about in a developing intel- ligence. There is a correlative danger, attaching to the term /'a/////, on which a word will be said later. What one would desire to insist more strongly upon, is the essential conjunction of the two factors, reality and idea, in judgment, and the impossi- bility of taking these apart from one another. Popular thinking and psychological considerations tend constantly towards a con- trast which is fatal to any theory of thought, and the employ- ment of the term H'-a at all emphasises the contrast in a most hurtful manner. Provisional acceptance of the general description of judgment enables Mr. Bradley to deal summarily with certain definitions