Too Long; Didn't Read

In a work lately published[1], I have exhibited the application of a new and peculiar form of Mathematics to the expression of the operations of the mind in reasoning. In the present essay I design to offer such an account of a portion of this treatise as may furnish a correct view of the nature of the system developed. I shall endeavour to state distinctly those positions in which its characteristic distinctions consist, and shall offer a more particular illustration of some features which are less prominently displayed in the (p. 184)[2] original work. The part of the system to which I shall confine my observations is that which treats of categorical propositions, and the positions which, under this limitation, I design to illustrate, are the following: (1) That the business of Logic is with the relations of classes, and with the modes in which the mind contemplates those relations. (2) That antecedently to our recognition of the existence of propositions, there are laws to which the conception of a class is subject,—laws which are dependent upon the constitution of the intellect, and which determine the character and form of the reasoning process. (3) That those laws are capable of mathematical expression, and that they thus constitute the basis of an interpretable calculus. (4) That those laws are, furthermore, such, that all equations which are formed in subjection to them, even though expressed under functional signs, admit of perfect solution, so that every problem in logic can be solved by reference to a general theorem. (5) That the forms under which propositions are actually exhibited, in accordance with the principles of this calculus, are analogous with those of a philosophical language. (6) That although the symbols of the calculus do not depend for their interpretation upon the idea of quantity, they nevertheless, in their particular application to syllogism, conduct us to the quantitative conditions of inference.