a

over all other animals. A lion lies under a hole in a rock; and if any other lion happen to pass by, they fight. Now, whoever gets habit of lying under a hole in a rock, and fighting with every gentleman who passes near him, cannot possibly make any progress. Every man's understanding and acquirements, how great and extensive soever they may appear, are made up from the contributions of his friends and companions. You spend your morning in learning from Hume what happened at particular periods of your own history: you dine where some man tells you what he has observed in the East Indies, and another discourses of brown sugar and Jamaica. It is from these perpetual rills of knowledge that you refresh yourself, and become strong and healthy as you are. If lions would consort together, and growl out the observations they have made, about killing sheep and shepherds, the most likely places for catching a calf grazing, and so forth, they could not fail to improve; because they would be actuated by such a wide range of observation, and operating by the joint force of so many minds."-Sydney Smith's Moral Philosophy.

"By the power of language we are enabled to be useful to others. We can instruct the ignorant, caution the unwary, or console the afflicted. Of what use is the intense application of the student, the conceptions of the poet, or the contemplations of the philosopher, if the result of their labours is known only to themselves? Thoughts valuable as gold in the mine are of no use to others until coined into words. And by imparting information to others, our own faculties are improved. Our intellectual weapons are kept polished by us. Knowledge shut up in the mind of its possessor is like a stagnant pool, useful to none; but when allowed to flow out freely in the channels of language, it becomes a living fountain, the streams of which carry health and beauty and fertility into every district through which they roll."-Lecture on the Philosophy of Language.

4. The following are examples of conversational reasoning:

"I praised the accuracy of an account-book of a lady whom I mentioned. JOHNSON: Keeping accounts, Sir, is of no use when a man is spending his own money, and has nobody to whom he is to account. You won't eat less beef to-day because you have written down what it cost yesterday.' I mentioned another lady who thought as he did, so that her husband could not get her to keep an account of the expense of the family, as she thought it enough that she never exceeded the sum allowed her. JOHNSON: Sir, it is fit she should keep an account, because her husband wishes it; but I do not see its use.' I maintained that

keeping an account has this advantage, that it satisfies a man that his money has not been lost or stolen, which he might sometimes be apt to imagine, were there no written state of his expense: and, besides, a calculation of economy, so as not to exceed one's income, cannot be made without a view of the different articles in figures, that one may see how to retrench in some particulars less necessary than others. This he did not attempt to answer."

"Mr. Walker, the celebrated master of elocution, came in, and then we went up stairs into the study. I asked him if he had taught many clergymen. JOHNSON: I hope not.' WALKER: 'I have taught only one, and he is the best reader I ever heard, not by my teaching, but by his own natural talents.' JOHNSON: 'Were he the best reader in the world, I would not have it told that he was taught.' Here was one of his peculiar prejudices. Could it be any disadvantage to the clergyman to have it known that he was taught an easy and graceful delivery? BOSWELL: 'Will you not allow, Sir, that a man may be taught to read well? JOHNSON: Why, Sir, so far as to read better than he might do without being taught, yes. Formerly it was supposed that there was no difference in reading, but that one read as well as another.' BOSWELL: It is wonderful to see old Sheridan as enthusiastic about oratory as ever.' WALKER: 'His enthusiasm as to what oratory will do, may be too great: but he reads well.' JOHNSON He reads well, but he reads low; and you know it is much easier to read low than to read high; for when you read high you are much more limited, your loudest note can be but one, and so the variety is less in proportion to the loudness. Now some people have occasion to speak to an extensive audience, and must speak loud to be heard." WALKER: The art is to read strong, though low.'

Talking of the origin of language:-JOHNSON: It must have come by inspiration. A thousand, nay a million of children could not invent a language. While the organs are pliable, there is not understanding enough to form a language; by the time that there is understanding enough the organs are become stiff. We know that after a certain age we cannot learn to pronounce a new language. No foreigner who comes to England when advanced in life ever pronounces English tolerably well; at least, such instances are very rare. When I maintain that language must have come by inspiration, I do not mean that inspiration is required for rhetoric, and all the beauties of language; for when once man has language, we can conceive that he may gradually form modifications of it. I mean only that inspiration seems to me to be necessary to give man the faculty of speech; to inform him that he may have speech; which I think he could no more find out without inspiration than cows or hogs would think of

such a faculty.' WALKER: 'Do you think, Sir, that there are any perfect synonymes in any language?' JOHNSON: 'Originally there were not; but by using words negligently, or in poetry, one word comes to be confounded with another.'"-Boswell's Life of Johnson.

5. After the above examples of conversational reasoning, I will conclude this Section with an example of a conversation without reasoning. It is taken from Miss Austen's description of "The Voluble Lady:"—

"My dear sir, you are too obliging. Is there nobody you would not rather?—I am not helpless. Sir, you are most kind. Upon my word, Jane on one arm, and me on the other! Stop, stop, let us stand a little back, Mrs. Elton is going; dear Mrs. Elton, how elegant she looks-beautiful lace!-Now we all follow in her train. Quite the queen of the evening!—Well, here we are at the passage. Two steps, Jane, take care of the two steps. Oh no, there is but one. Well, I was persuaded there were two. How very odd! I was convinced there were two, and there is but one. I never saw anything equal to the comfort and style-candles everywhere. I was telling you of your grandmamma, Jane, there was a little disappointment. The baked apples and biscuits, excellent in their way, you know; but there was a delicate fricassee of sweetbread and some asparagus brought in at first, and good Mr. Woodhouse, not thinking the asparagus quite boiled enough, sent it all out again. Now there is nothing grandmamma loves better than sweetbread and asparagus—so she was rather disappointed; but we agreed we would not speak of it to anybody, for fear of its getting round to dear Miss Woodhouse, who would be so very much concerned. Well, this is brilliant! I am all amazement !-could not have supposed anything!-such elegance and profusion! I have seen nothing like it since.-Well, where shall we sit? Where shall we sit? Anywhere, so that Jane is not in a draught. Where I sit is of no consequence. Oh! do you recommend this side? Well, I am sure, Mr. Churchill-only it seems too good-but just as you please. What you direct in this house cannot be wrong. Dear Jane, how shall we ever recollect half the dishes for grandmamma? Soup too! Bless me! I should not be helped so soon, but it smells most excellent, and I cannot help beginning." -Half-hours with the best Authors.

SECTION IV.

REASONING BY SINGLE SYLLOGISM.

THE following description of the nature of the syllogism is taken from Dr. Watts:

"If the mere perception and comparison of two ideas would always show us whether they agree or disagree; then all rational propositions would be matters of intelligence, or first principles, and there would be no use of reasoning, or drawing any consequences. It is the narrowness of the human mind which introduces the necessity of reasoning. When we are unable to judge of the truth or falsehood of a proposition in an immediate manner, by the mere contemplation of its subject and predicate, we are then constrained to use a medium, and to compare each of them with some third idea, that by seeing how far they agree or disagree with it, we may be able to judge how far they agree or disagree among themselves as if there are two lines, A and B, and I know not whether they are equal or no, I take a third line c, or an inch, and apply it to each of them; if it agree with them both, then I infer that A and B are equal: but if it agree with one and not with the other, then I conclude A and B are unequal: if it agree with neither of them, there can be no comparison.

"So if the question be, whether God must be worshipped, we seek a third idea, suppose the idea of a Creator, and say, "Our Creator must be worshipped:

God is our Creator;

Therefore, God must be worshipped.

"The comparison of this third idea, with the two distinct parts of the questions, usually requires two propositions, which are called the premises: the third proposition which is drawn from them is the conclusion.

"Thus it appears what is the strict and just notion of a syllogism it is a sentence or argument made up of three propositions, so disposed as that the last is necessarily inferred from those which go before, as in the instances which have been just mentioned.

"The three terms are named the major, the minor, and the middle. The predicate of the conclusion is called the major term, because it is generally of a larger extension than the minor term, or the subject. The major and minor terms are called the extremes. The middle term is the third idea, invented and disposed in two propositions, in such a manner as to show the connexion between the major and minor term in the conclusion; for which reason the middle term itself is sometimes called the argument.

"That proposition which contains the predicate of the conclusion, connected with the middle term, is usually called the major proposition, whereas the minor proposition connects the middle term with the subject of the conclusion, and is sometimes called the assumption.

"This exact distinction of the several parts of a syllogism, and of the major and minor terms connected with the middle term in the major and minor propositions, does chiefly belong to simple or categorical syllogisms, though all syllogisms whatsoever have something analogical to it." "Single syllogisms are made up of three propositions : compound syllogisms contain more than three propositions, and may be formed into two or more syllogisms.

Single syllogisms, for distinction's sake, may be divided into simple, complex, and conjunctive."

I. SIMPLE SYLLOGISM.

"Those are properly called simple or categorical syllogisms, which are made up of three plain, single, or categorical propositions, wherein the middle term is evidently and regularly joined with one part of the question in the major proposition, and with the other in the minor, whence there flows a plain single conclusion; as, Every human virtue is to be sought with diligence; prudence is a human virtue; therefore, prudence is to be sought with diligence.""

II. COMPLEX SYLLOGISM.

Those are properly called complex syllogisms, in which the middle term is not connected with the whole subject, or the whole predicate in two distinct propositions, but is