Page:Philosophical Review Volume 2.djvu/95

] But is it possible, so long as we consistently adhere to facts, to overcome that dualism? The world of reality stubbornly refuses to be annulled by any logical process, and the final reconciliation, if we are to find one, must rest upon a postulate of faith that sense and understanding may, perhaps, "have a common root," and that "there must be a ground of the unity of the supersensible which lies at the basis of nature with that which the concept of freedom practically contains." But Kant, it seems to me, has done well in insisting that the theoretical and the practical domains must be kept apart, and in refusing to apply the term knowledge to what is, and must be, a conviction founded upon faith.

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Although simplicity, distinctness, and directness in statement and obviousness in transition are the justification of a "First Book," this compend, which aims to be "a 'First Logic Book' which may be used in teaching beginners" and "a connected, though brief, sketch of the science," does not well exemplify such qualities. When, however, formal defects are put aside, grounds for grave exception to much in the discussion force themselves into view.

The relatively liberal allotment of space to the treatment of terms and propositions is indeed to be welcomed, but confusion and real misconception are introduced at the outset, not by the mere failure to distinguish properly between something and some thing, but by the downright obliteration of the distinction. The standpoint of the book being nominalistic, the agile interchange of some thing and something in the doctrine of names and propositions, which is here laid down, produces a Durcheinander in which the "beginner" must, I take it, be hopelessly confounded.

The somewhat labored and plentiful divisions, subdivisions, and cross-divisions are often neither accurate nor full, nor yet — what might perhaps excuse such shortcoming — suggestively helpful. Special names, for instance, form a class where "the application is limited by some constant condition not implied in the signification." By way of example, winter, we are told, means the coldest season of the year; but, as it does not mean that in temperate zones it occurs at intervals of nine months, it is a special name. Along with winter are classed genus, one o'clock, the conic sections, King of Spain, etc. Where unimplied constant condition is used in a sense that