Cursus Philosophicus Thomisticus, Prima Pars Artis Logicae

In the disputes … etc. See above, p. 89 b 32.

I SAY FIRST: It belongs to the essential notion of a logical or artificial term that it signify by convention, if it is spoken or written, but not if it is a concept.

This conclusion is common among dialecticians, who follow Aristotle in defining all the logical instruments—the syllogism, speech, noun, verb, and so on—by significant words. St. Thomas follows this view in On Interpretation I, lect. 1,¹ treating the definition of the noun, and at the end of lect. 6² treating the definition of speech. He excludes words that signify naturally, although Plato thought otherwise in the Cratylus,³ because speech and its parts are not natural things but certain artificial effects; hence they must signify artificially, or by convention, just as all artificial things are caused by human will and reason. Words lacking signification, however, represent only naturally and not by convention, and so do not of themselves belong to the construction of speech.

The REASON for the conclusion follows: a non-signifying word, such as “blitiri,” can represent nothing to the mind that needs the direction of art and contributes to reasoning. Therefore, of itself it does not belong to a logical instrument.

The consequence is clear, because every logical instrument must serve some direction and art of reason, since, as was said, the formal notion of Logic is to concern the direction of reason so that the intellect may proceed without error. Whether a non-signifying word can be taken by Logic per accidens to compose speech, we will say in the arguments.

That a term must signify by convention and not naturally is proved first as follows. Here the term is defined in general, so as to include every part of speech, even the copula or verb; this is what we understand by the name “term.” But no word naturally represents the copula of other things (if you deny this, identify one). Therefore, at least as regards the copula, a term requires signification by convention. Further, the copula signifies by convention; therefore, it cannot of itself join extremes that represent naturally. For how could the verb “is” join two sights or two groans? Thus, for there to be logical art, signification by convention is required both in the verb and in the extremes joined by the verb, and consequently in the term, which is common to them all. For if non-signifying writing—for example, a line drawn with a pen—does not compose logically, neither will a non-signifying word.

I SAY SECOND: The ultimate formality of an enunciative term is that it be a part of an enunciation, from which a simple proposition is made—not only as subject and predicate, but according to a more common notion that includes the verb and other parts, such as pronouns, adverbs, prepositions, and the like.

This conclusion is common among the Thomists, Peter of Spain, Soto, Báñez, and others. It is proved first from the authority of Aristotle and St. Thomas in On Interpretation I, ch. “On Enunciation,”⁴ where Aristotle, explaining how noun and verb are excluded from speech, says: “Noun and verb, then, are only an expression, since it is not to say that someone enunciates something by a voice signifying in this way.” Explaining these words there in lect. 8, § He excludes it from unity,⁵ St. Thomas says: “Noun and verb, then, are only an expression: an expression, that is, not an enunciation; and it seems from his manner of speaking that he himself imposed the name ‘expression’ to signify the parts of an enunciation.” Therefore, the Philosopher gave noun and verb a common name, namely, that they are only “expressions”; and, St. Thomas says, he imposed this name “to signify the parts of an enunciation.” Therefore, according to Aristotle and St. Thomas, “expression,” or “term,” signifies the character of a part of an enunciation, common to noun and verb, in which they agree and by which they pertain to the present inquiry. The holy Doctor explicitly says this in On Interpretation I, lect. 1,⁶ where he says that “simple expressions are considered insofar as they are parts of an enunciation, and thus they are treated in this book, etc.” A term or expression is therefore very well defined as a part of an enunciation, or “that from which a simple proposition is made”; for if the logician considers a term as a part, he must define it generally by its being a part. This is rightly its constitutive formality, since, when every other formality is set aside, a term or expression is understood to remain if it is conceived under the character of a part of an enunciation.

If you ask whether this consideration of a part includes all parts of an enunciation or only the principal ones, we answer that “term” or “expression” can be taken in two ways: in a general, broad, common sense, or in a restricted, more determinate sense. In the first way, “term” includes every kind of part insofar as it is a part, including adverbs, pronouns, and other syncategorematic terms. These are more connections among the parts of speech than parts of speech themselves, just as nails and similar things are not parts of a ship but connections among its parts, although they are commonly called parts of the ship, since they help compose it in one way or another. But if “term” is taken in the second way, in a strict sense, it includes only the principal parts of speech, noun and verb, to which the others are reduced: pronouns are included under nouns, and participles under verbs. Observe, however, that although the verb joins the extremes of a proposition like a union or bond, while syncategorematic terms are called connections among parts, they do so in different ways. The verb connects by signifying something after the manner of an action or motion, and can function as the predicate in a proposition, as when I say, “Peter runs” or “Peter is.” Syncategorematic terms connect by signifying in some way and not something; hence, strictly speaking, they cannot function as predicate and subject as noun and verb can, which are called the principal parts of speech. For this reason Aristotle treated only those, as St. Thomas says in the cited place; this whole doctrine is his, since he intended to treat simple speech, which necessarily requires a noun and a verb.

THE ARGUMENTS ARE ANSWERED.

First, it is argued against the first conclusion: “Blitiri” is a term, but it is not a significant word; therefore, the term is wrongly defined this way.

The antecedent is proved: It has the ultimate and essential difference of a term, namely, being part of a simple proposition; for it is part of “Blitiri is not scindapsus” and “Blitiri is trisyllabic.” It also supposits in the proposition by material supposition. Therefore, it is a term.

WE ANSWER: The antecedent is denied. In the proof, the antecedent is distinguished: that it is a part or composes a proposition materially is granted; formally and significantly is denied.

A term and the other logical instruments can be taken in two ways: objectively, for the things signified themselves, and this is materially; or formally, for the signs we use because we cannot bring the things themselves into the schools, and this is significantly. When, then, a proposition or speech is made from non-signifying words, that word stands materially for itself, as in material supposition, for example, when I say, “Man is a noun,” or “man is a word.” These words stand for themselves because they represent themselves to the senses; hence they do not need signification, but self-representation (for then we have brought the thing into the schools), which supplies the place of signification. For signification is not of itself but of another: a sign represents something other than itself, not itself. Strictly speaking, therefore, signification is required for the artificial composition of Logic; accidentally, however, it can use representation when it forms speech not about the things signified but about the words themselves, as in the argument. In that case the words compose materially, not formally.

OBJECTION: Speech composed from “blitiri” is formally speech; therefore, “blitiri” formally composes it.

The consequence is clear, since a whole that is formally a whole requires parts that are formally parts. The antecedent is proved: That is formally speech which produces the sense of speech in the hearer’s mind. Such is “Blitiri is not scindapsus.” Therefore. Moreover, Aristotle formed his demonstrations from the letters A, B, C alone, which signify nothing as an expression or term. Nor did he require all the parts of speech to be significant; he said that speech is “that some of whose parts signifies separately.” Therefore, non-signifying words formally compose speech and syllogism, and speech does not require all its parts to be significant.

WE ANSWER the first proof as follows. First, in keeping with what was said, the formality of speech, since it is a whole, consists in composition. Thus, for it to be formal speech, it is enough that composition be formally present, even if it is supplied not by the signification of the extremes but by their representation. It is supplied by the verb “is,” by which the very composition of speech is signified formally. Thus speech is formal by the formality of composition, which is taken from the verb, not by the formality of the extremes, since these compose only materially and representatively. But if all the parts were non-signifying words, it would not be speech either formally or at all.

We answer second that non-signifying words do not by themselves compose speech formally and artificially; they do so by reason of a significant word understood there, as when I say, “Blitiri is not scindapsus,” with the understood meaning, “The word ‘blitiri’ is not the word ‘scindapsus.’” Here “word” is the term that composes formally, while “blitiri” stands only objectively and materially. This is simply the true and certain solution.

The answer to the remaining proofs is clear from this. Regarding the first, about the letters A, B, C, we say that they either function materially there, or that “the word A” and “the word B” are understood, or that A and B naturally signify those first elements and letters, as is clear from the preposition “a” or “ab.” Regarding the definition of speech, St. Thomas answers in On Interpretation I, lect. 6,⁷ that the Philosopher did not intend non-signifying words to compose speech formally together with the verb, but that at least some part of speech must signify something, that is, as a categorematic term, even if the rest signify only in some way as syncategorematic terms.

Second, it is argued against the second conclusion: The formality of a part differs from that of an extreme. But a term is an extreme of a proposition, as Aristotle says in Prior Analytics I, ch. 1, defining a term as “that into which a proposition is resolved.”⁸ Therefore, the ultimate formality of a term is wrongly said to consist in its character as a part.

The major premise is proved: The notion of a part is more universal than that of an extreme. A part is preserved in that which composes a whole; an extreme, however, is that which contains and closes off the whole, so that the whole does not extend beyond it and it functions as a principal part. Therefore, the major premise is true.

WE ANSWER by explaining the minor premise: Aristotle there spoke of the syllogistic term, not the enunciative term with which we are concerned here. The former consists in being an extreme; the latter consists in being a part and includes all parts of speech, even the less principal ones. The reason is that an enunciative term is ordered only to constructing truth in an enunciation, whereas a syllogism, or syllogistic term, is ordered to inference. Truth is composed not only from the extremes but also from the joining verb, adverbs, or negations, on which the truth of a proposition often depends. Since, then, we are treating the term as ordered to composing an enunciation, we take it generally, to include every part of an enunciation. But syllogistic inference is not considered as true, but as inferring; it therefore requires only three terms: two that are extremes in the conclusion to be inferred, and a third that serves as a middle, proving and inferring and joining by inference. This can belong only to subject and predicate. Hence only the extremes of a proposition are syllogistic terms. The Philosopher spoke of these in the cited passage, whereas we do not; we use the term in a broader sense.

Finally, it is argued: Being a part of a proposition belongs to things other than a term; therefore, a term is not well defined by the notion of a part.

The consequence is clear, because a definition cannot belong to things other than what is defined. The antecedent is proved: This belongs to a proposition and to speech, since a proposition composes a syllogism and another hypothetical proposition, which essentially consists of categorical propositions.

If you say that a term composes a simple proposition, whereas a categorical proposition composing a hypothetical one composes a composite proposition, namely, a hypothetical one, the objection is: A categorical proposition also composes another simple proposition. The proof: “Man is an animal and true” is a certain simple categorical proposition and is composed from “Man is an animal.” Therefore, a categorical proposition too is a part composing a simple proposition.

If you say that a proposition composes another not as a part in itself, primarily, and essentially, as a term does, but accidentally and secondarily, the objection is: A syllogism and a hypothetical proposition are composed of propositions in themselves; therefore, propositions are parts composing and constituting them in themselves.

WE ANSWER all these points with this distinction: A proposition can compose another proposition, simple or composite; distinguish: in itself—denied; accidentally—granted. Therefore, that being a part, which is the notion of a term, belongs to a proposition—the consequence is denied, because a term composes a simple proposition in itself, not accidentally.

This is explained as follows: Some things are parts in themselves and are ordered in themselves to the composition of a whole; others have in themselves the character of a whole, and if they are ever ordered to compose another whole, this is not in itself but accidentally. For example, a person’s bones and flesh are parts of that person in themselves and are ordered in themselves to composing the person. But a human being, because in himself he has the character of a whole, is not ordered in himself but accidentally to composing another whole, such as an army. The same is true of a house: it is a whole in itself, and if it composes a city, it does so accidentally. In the same way, in logical artifacts, terms are parts in themselves and are ordered in themselves to composing a simple proposition, because they do not have another essence already constituted (for this is how we understand “from which a simple proposition is made,” the difference of a term). But because a proposition is a whole in itself, if it sometimes composes another proposition, it is not ordered to this in itself but accidentally, since this does not constitute it in its essence.

To the final reply, we answer that according to Aristotle, in the chapter on enunciation,⁹ a hypothetical proposition and a syllogism have unity of conjunction or order, not unity simply, as a categorical proposition does. Composites or wholes composed only by conjunction and order can be composed of parts that are not parts in themselves and primarily, but accidentally and materially, as an army is composed of many people and a city of many houses.

YOU WILL ASK: As was said above from St. Thomas, a term can be considered in three ways: as belonging to the categories, as a part of a proposition, and as a part of a syllogism. Why, then, is it not defined according to a common notion covering all these formalities and considerations?

We answer that a term, insofar as it belongs to the categories, is taken for the things signified themselves, as they are ordered in a category according to higher and lower degrees. Insofar as it belongs to a proposition or syllogism, it is taken for a sign or significant voice. Thus it cannot be defined by one definition, since a sign and a thing are not one and the same. Or, even if it could be defined this way, that is not relevant here, where we treat only the term insofar as it precisely belongs to logical form and prioristic resolution.

YOU WILL ASK FINALLY: Why is a term defined more specifically and only as a part of a proposition rather than of a syllogism, since it also composes a syllogism most formally? For without the verb, at least, no conclusion would be inferred and no syllogism would exist.

We answer that the verb composes and is required for a syllogism presuppositively, by reason of the enunciation, not by reason of inference. For it is not required to join the extremes by way of inference and proof, but by way of enunciation. Since an enunciation is presupposed to a syllogism, the verb is presupposed as well, but not formally.