Sigwart himself, as his language frequently betrays (cf. e.g. pp. 152 and 150) recognizes at bottom, as he is bound to recognize, in spite of his attack upon the negative copula, that negation and denial are just as much a special function of the judgment as affirmation and recognition. If this be granted, then the range of their application is by no means so limited as he erroneously asserts. It is false that in every case where a denial takes place the predicate denied is the notion “valid.” Even of a judgment we may deny now its validity, now its certainty, now its à priori character. And just in the same way the subject of the judgment can change most frequently. Of a judgment we may deny certainty, and validity; of a request, modesty; and so in every case, universally expressed, we may deny B of A. Sigwart himself, of course, does this just like any one else. Indeed he sometimes speaks unintentionally far more correctly than his theory would admit, and witnesses, as it were, instinctively to the truth; as, e.g. p. 151, where he declares not—as he elsewhere teaches—that the subject of a negative proposition is always a judgment, and its predicate the term “valid,” but “that of every subject ... a countless number of predicates may be denied.” This is certainly true and just on this account the old doctrine holds that affirmation and denial are equally primordial species.
[24] (p. 15). The discovery that every act of love is a “pleasing,” every act of hate a “displeasing,” was very near to Descartes when he wrote his valuable little work on The Affections. In the second book, Des Passions, ii. art. 139, he says: “Lorsque les choses qu’elles (l’amour et la haine) nous portent à aimer sont véritablement bonnes, et celles qu’elles nous portent à haïr, sont véritablement mauvaises, l’amour est incomparablement meilleure que la haine; elle ne saurait être trop grande et elle ne manque jamais de produire la joie”; and this agrees with what he says a little later: “La haine, au contraire ne saurait être si petite qu’elle ne nuise, et elle n’est jamais sans tristesse.”
In ordinary life, however, the expressions “joy” and “sadness,” “pleasure” and “pain” are only used when the pleasure and displeasure have attained a certain degree of liveliness. A sharp boundary in this unscientific division there is not; we may, however, be allowed to make use of it as it stands. It is enough that the expressions, “pleasure” and “displeasure” are not narrowed down by any such limit.
[25] (p. 16). The expressions “true” and “false” are employed in a manifold sense; in one sense we employ them in speaking of true and false judgments; again (somewhat modifying the meaning), of objects, as when we say, “a true friend,” “false money.” I need scarcely observe that where I use the expressions “true” and “false” in this lecture, I associate therewith not the first and proper meaning, but rather a metaphorical one having reference to objects. True, is, therefore, what is; false, what is not. Just as Aristotle spoke of “ὂν ὡς ἀληθές” so we might also say, “ἀληθές ὡς ὂν.”
Of truth in its proper sense it has often been said that it is the agreement of the judgment with the object (adequatio rei et intellectus, as the scholastics said). This expression, true in a certain sense, is yet in the highest degree open to misunderstanding, and has led to serious errors. The agreement is regarded as a kind of identity between something contained in the judgment, or in the idea lying at the root of the judgment and something situated without the mind. But this cannot be the meaning here; “to agree” means here rather as much as “to be appropriate,” “to be in harmony with,” “suit,” “correspond.” It is as though in the sphere of feeling one should say, the rightness of love and hate consists in the agreement of the feelings with the object. Properly understood this also would be unquestionably right; whoever loves and hates rightly, has his feelings adequately related to the object, i.e. the relation is appropriate, suitable, corresponds suitably, whereas it would be manifestly absurd were one to believe that in a rightly directed love or hate there was found to be an identity between these feelings or the ideas lying at their root on the one hand, and something lying outside the feelings on the other, an identity which is absent where the attitude of the feelings is unrightly directed. Among other circumstances this misunderstanding has also conduced towards bringing the doctrine of judgment into that sad confusion from which to-day psychology and logic seek with such painful efforts to set themselves free.
The conceptions of existence and non-existence are the correlates of the conceptions of the truth of the (simple) affirmative and negative judgments. Just as to judgment belongs what is judged, to the affirmative judgment what is judged of affirmatively, to the negative judgment, what is judged of negatively, so to the rightness of the affirmative judgment belongs the existence of what is judged of affirmatively, to the rightness of the negative judgment the non-existence of what is judged of negatively; and whether I say an affirmative judgment is true, or, its object is existent; whether I say a negative judgment is true, or its object is non-existent; in both cases I am saying one and the same thing. In the same way, it is essentially one and the same logical principle whether I say, in each case either the (simple) affirmative or negative judgment is true, or, each is either existent or non-existent.
Thus, for example, the assertion of the truth of the judgment, “a man is learned,” is the correlate of the assertion of the existence of the object, “a learned man”; and the assertion of the truth of the judgment, “no stone is alive,” is the correlate of the assertion of the non-existence of its object, “a living stone.” The correlative assertions are here, as everywhere, inseparable. The case is exactly the same as in the assertions A > B and that B < A; that A is the cause of B, and that B is produced by A.
[26] (p. 16). The notion of the good, in and for itself, is accordingly a unity in the strict sense, and not, as Aristotle teaches (in consequence of a confusion which we shall have to speak of later) a unity in a merely analogous sense. German philosophers also have failed to grasp the unity of the conception. This is the case with Kant, and, quite recently, with Windelband. There is a defect in our ordinary way of speaking which may prove very misleading to Germans inasmuch as for the opposite of the term “good” there is no common expression current, but this is designated now as “schlimm,” now as “übel,” now as “böse,” now as “arg,” now as “abscheulich,” now as “schlecht,” etc. It might very well, as in similar cases, come to be thought that not only the common name is wanting, but also the common notion. And if the notion is wanting on the one side of the antithesis, it would also be wanting on the other, and so the expression “good” would seem an equivocal term.
Of all the expressions quoted, it seems to me (and philologists also, whose advice I have asked, are of the same opinion), that the expression “schlecht,” like the Latin “malum,” is most applicable as the opposite of the good in its full universality, and in this way I shall allow myself to use this expression in what follows.
The fact that I adhere to the view of a certain common character regarding the intentional relation of love and hate does not debar my recognizing along with this view, special forms for particular cases. If, therefore, “bad” is a truly universal simple class conception, there may yet be distinguished special classes within its domain of which one may be suitably termed “böse,” another “übel,” etc.