CHAPTER V.. Of Erring, Falsity, and Captions.

OF ERRING, FALSITY, AND CAPTIONS.

1. Erring and falsity how they differ. Error of the mind by itself without the use of words, how it happens.—2. A sevenfold incoherency of names, every one of which makes always a false proposition.—3. Examples of the first manner of incoherency.—4. Of the second.—5. Of the third.—6. Of the fourth.—7. Of the fifth.—8. Of the sixth.—9. Of the seventh.—10. Falsity of propositions detected by resolving the terms with definitions continued till they come to simple names, or names that are the most general of their kind.—11. Of the fault of a syllogism consisting in the implication of the terms with the copula.—12. Of the fault which consists in equivocation.—13. Sophistical captions are oftener faulty in the matter than in the form of syllogisms.

1. Men are subject to err not only in affirming and denying, but also in perception, and in silent cogitation. In affirming and denying, when they call any thing by a name, which is not the name thereof; as if from seeing the sun first by reflection in water, and afterwards again directly in the firmament, we should to both those appearances give the name of sun, and say there are two suns; which none but men can do, for no other living creatures have the use of names. This kind of error only deserves the name of falsity, as arising, not from sense, nor from the things themselves, but from pronouncing rashly; for names have their constitution, not from the species of things, but from the will and consent of men. And hence it comes to pass, that men pronounce falsely, by their own negligence, in departing from such appellations of things as are agreed upon, and are not deceived neither by the things, nor by the sense; for they do not perceive that the thing they see is called sun, but they give it that name from their own will and agreement. Tacit errors, or the errors of sense and cogitation, are made, by passing from one imagination to the imagination of another different thing; or by feigning that to be past, or future, which never was, nor ever shall be; as when, by seeing the image of the sun in water, we imagine the sun itself to be there; or by seeing swords, that there has been or shall be fighting, because it uses to be so for the most part; or when from promises we feign the mind of the promiser to be such and such; or lastly, when from any sign we vainly imagine something to be signified, which is not. And errors of this sort are common to all things that have sense; and yet the deception proceeds neither from our senses, nor from the things we perceive; but from ourselves while we feign such things as are but mere images to be something more than images. But neither things, nor imaginations of things, can be said to be false, seeing they are truly what they are; nor do they, as signs, promise any thing which they do not perform; for they indeed do not promise at all, but we from them; nor do the clouds, but we, from seeing the clouds, say it shall rain. The best way, therefore, to free ourselves from such errors as arise from natural signs, is first of all, before we begin to reason concerning such conjectural things, to suppose ourselves ignorant, and then to make use of our ratiocination; for these errors proceed from the want of ratiocination; whereas, errors which consist in affirmation and negation, (that is, the falsity of propositions) proceed only from reasoning amiss. Of these, therefore, as repugnant to philosophy, I will speak principally.

2. Errors which happen in reasoning, that is, in syllogizing, consist either in the falsity of the premises, or of the inference. In the first of these cases, a syllogism is said to be faulty in the matter of it; and in the second case, in the form. I will first consider the matter, namely, how many ways a proposition may be false; and next the form, and how it comes to pass, that when the premises are true, the inference is, notwithstanding, false.

Seeing, therefore, that proposition only is true, (chap, III, art. 7) in which are copulated two names of one and the same thing; and that always false, in which names of different things are copulated, look how many ways names of different things may be copulated, and so many ways a false proposition may be made.

Now, all things to which we give names, may be reduced to these four kinds, namely, bodies, accidents, phantasms, and names themselves; and therefore, in every true proposition, it is necessary that the names copulated, be both of them names of bodies, or both names of accidents, or both names of phantasms, or both names of names. For names otherwise copulated are incoherent, and constitute a false proposition. It may happen, also, that the name of a body, of an accident, or of a phantasm, may be copulated with the name of a speech. So that copulated names may be incoherent seven manner of ways.

1. If the name of a Body } { the name of an Accident. 2. If the name of a Body } { the name of a Phantasm. 3. If the name of a Body } be { the name of a Name. 4. If the name of an Accident } copulated { the name of a Phantasm. 5. If the name of an Accident } with { the name of a Name. 6. If the name of a Phantasm } { the name of a Name. 7. If the name of a Body, } { the name of a Speech. Accident, or Phantasm } {

Of all which I will give some examples.

3. After the first of these ways propositions are false, when abstract names are copulated with concrete names; as (in Latin and Greek) esse est ens, essentia est ens, τὸ τί ἦν ειναὶ (i.); quidditas est ens, and many the like, which are found in Aristotle's Metaphysics. Also, the understanding worketh, the understanding understandeth, the sight seeth; a body is magnitude, a body is quantity, a body is extension; to be a man is a man, whiteness is a white thing, &c.; which is as if one should say, the runner is the running, or the walk walketh. Moreover, essence is separated, substance is abstracted: and others like these, or derived from these, (with which common philosophy abounds.) For seeing no subject of an accident (that is, no body) is an accident: no name of an accident ought to be given to a body, nor of a body to an accident.

4. False, in the second manner, are such propositions as these; a ghost is a body, or a spirit, that is, a thin body; sensible species fly up and down in the air, or are moved hither and thither, which is proper to bodies; also, a shadow is moved, or is a body; light is moved, or is a body; colour is the object of sight, sound of hearing; space or place is extended; and innumerable others of this kind. For seeing ghosts, sensible species, a shadow, light, colour, sound, space, &c. appear to us no less sleeping than waking, they cannot be things without us, but only phantasms of the mind that imagines them; and therefore the names of these, copulated with the names of bodies, cannot constitute a true proposition.

5. False propositions of the third kind, are such as these; genus est ens, universale est ens, ens de ente prædicatur. For genus, and universale, and predicare, are names of names, and not of things. Also, number is infinite, is a false proposition; for no number can be infinite, but only the word number is then called an indefinite name when there is no determined number answering to it in the mind.

6. To the fourth kind belong such false propositions as these, an object is of such magnitude or figure as appears to the beholders; colour, light, sound, are in the object; and the like. For the same object appears sometimes greater, sometimes lesser, sometimes square, sometimes round, according to the diversity of the distance and medium; but the true magnitude and figure of the thing seen is always one and the same; so that the magnitude and figure which appears, is not the true magnitude and figure of the object, nor anything but phantasm; and therefore, in such propositions as these, the names of accidents are copulated with the names of phantasms.

7. Propositions are false in the fifth manner, when it is said that the definition is the essence of a thing; whiteness, or some other accident, is the genus, or universal. For definition is not the essence of any thing, but a speech signifying what we conceive of the essence thereof; and so also not whiteness itself, but the word whiteness, is a genus, or an universal name.

8. In the sixth manner they err, that say the idea of anything is universal; as if there could be in the mind an image of a man, which were not the image of some one man, but a man simply, which is impossible; for every idea is one, and of one thing; but they are deceived in this, that they put the name of the thing for the idea thereof.

9. They err in the seventh manner, that make this distinction between things that have being, that some of them exist by themselves, others by accident; namely, because Socrates is a man is a necessary proposition, and Socrates is a musician a contingent proposition, therefore they say some things exist necessarily or by themselves, others contingently or by accident; whereby, seeing necessary, contingent, by itself, by accident, are not names of things, but of propositions, they that say any thing that has being, exists by accident, copulate the name of a proposition with the name of a thing. In the same manner also, they err, which place some ideas in the understanding, others in the fancy; as if from the understanding of this proposition, man is a living creature, we had one idea or image of a man derived from sense to the memory, and another to the understanding; wherein that which deceives them is this, that they think one idea should be answerable to a name, another to a proposition, which is false; for proposition signifies only the order of those things one after another, which we observe in the same idea of man; so that this proposition, man is a living creature raises but one idea in us, though in that idea we consider that first, for which he is called man, and next that, for which he is called living creature. The falsities of propositions in all these several manners, is to be discovered by the definitions of the copulated names.

10. But when names of bodies are copulated with names of bodies, names of accidents with names of accidents, names of names with names of names, and names of phantasms, with names of phantasms, if we, nevertheless, remain still doubtful whether such propositions are true, we ought then in the first place to find out the definition of both those names, and again the definitions of such names as are in the former definition, and so proceed by a continual resolution till we come to a simple name, that is, to the most general or most universal name of that kind; and if after all this, the truth or falsity thereof be not evident, we must search it out by philosophy, and ratiocination, beginning from definitions. For every proposition, universally true, is either a definition, or part of a definition, or the evidence of it depends upon definitions.

11. That fault of a syllogism which lies hid in the form thereof, will always be found either in the implication of the copula with one of the terms, or in the equivocation of some word; and in either of these ways there will be four terms, which (as I have shewn) cannot stand in a true syllogism. Now the implication of the copula with either term, is easily detected by reducing the propositions to plain and clear predication; as (for example) if any man should argue thus,

The hand toucheth the pen, The pen toucheth the paper, Therefore, The hand toucheth the paper;

the fallacy will easily appear by reducing it, thus:

The hand, is, touching the pen, The pen, is, touching the paper, Therefore, The hand, is, touching the paper;

where there are manifestly these four terms, the hand, touching the pen, the pen, and touching the the paper. But the danger of being deceived by sophisms of this kind, does not seem to be so great, as that I need insist longer upon them.

12. And though there may be fallacy in equivocal terms, yet in those that be manifestly such, there is none at all; nor in metaphors, for they profess the transferring of names from one thing to another. Nevertheless, sometimes equivocals (and those not very obscure) may deceive; as in this argumentation:--It belongs to metaphysics to treat of principles; but the first principle of all, is, that the same thing cannot both exist and not exist at the same time; and therefore it belongs to metaphysics to treat whether the same thing may both exist and not exist at the same time; where the fallacy lies in the equivocation of the word principle; for whereas Aristotle in the beginning of his Metaphysics, says, that the treating of principles belongs to primary science, he understands by principles, causes of things, and certain existences which he calls primary; but where he says a primary proposition is a principle, by principle, there, he means the beginning and cause of knowledge, that is, the understanding of words, which, if any man want, he is incapable of learning.

13. But the captions of sophists and sceptics, by which they were wont, of old, to deride and oppose truth, were faulty for the most part, not in the form, but in the matter of syllogism; and they deceived not others oftener than they were themselves deceived. For the force of that famous argument of Zeno against motion, consisted in this proposition, whatsoever may be divided into parts, infinite in number, the same is infinite; which he, without doubt, thought to be true, yet nevertheless is false. For to be divided into infinite parts, is nothing else but to be divided into as many parts as any man will. But it is not necessary that a line should have parts infinite in number, or be infinite, because I can divide and subdivide it as often as I please; for how many parts soever I make, yet their number is finite; but because he that says parts, simply, without adding how many, does not limit any number, but leaves it to the determination of the hearer, therefore we say commonly, a line may be divided infinitely; which cannot be true in any other sense.

And thus much may suffice concerning syllogism, which is, as it were, the first pace towards philosophy; in which I have said as much as is necessary to teach any man from whence all true argumentation has its force. And to enlarge this treatise with all that may be heaped together, would be as superfluous, as if one should (as I said before) give a young child precepts for the teaching of him to go; for the art of reasoning is not so well learned by precepts as by practice, and by the reading of those books in which the conclusions are all made by severe demonstration. And so I pass on to the way of philosophy, that is, to the method of study.

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