[3] Ibid. p. 16, a. 3, seq. ὣν μέντοι ταῦτα σημεῖα πρώτως, ταὐτὰ πᾶσι παθήματα τῆς ψυχῆς, καὶ ὧν ταῦτα ὁμοιώματα, πράγματα ἤδη ταὐτά.
For this doctrine, that the mental affections of mankind, and the things or facts which they represent, are the same everywhere, though the marks whereby they are signified differ, Aristotle refers us to his treatise De Animâ, to which he says that it properly belongs.[4] He thus recognizes the legitimate dependence of Logic on Psychology or Mental Philosophy.
[4] Aristot. De Interpret. p. 16, a. 8: περὶ μὲν οὖν ταύτων εἴρηται ἐν τοῖς περὶ ψυχῆς· ἄλλης γὰρ πραγματείας. It was upon this reference, mainly, that Andronikus the Rhodian rested his opinion, that the treatise De Interpretatione was not the work of Aristotle. Andronikus contended that there was nothing in the De Animâ to justify the reference. But Ammonius in his Scholia (p. 97, Brand.) makes a sufficient reply to the objection of Andronikus. The third book De Animâ (pp. 430, 431) lays down the doctrine here alluded to. Compare Torstrick’s Commentary, p. 210.
That which is signified by words (either single or in combination) is some variety of these mental affections or of the facts which they represent. But the signification of a single Term is distinguished, in an important point, from the signification of that conjunction of terms which we call a Proposition. A noun, or a verb, belonging to the aggregate called a language, is associated with one and the same phantasm[5] or notion, without any conscious act of conjunction or disjunction, in the minds of speakers and hearers: when pronounced, it arrests for a certain time the flow of associated ideas, and determines the mind to dwell upon that particular group which is called its meaning.[6] But neither the noun nor the verb, singly taken, does more than this; neither one of them affirms, or denies, or communicates any information true or false. For this last purpose, we must conjoin the two together in a certain way, and make a Proposition. The signification of the Proposition is thus specifically distinct from that of either of its two component elements. It communicates what purports to be matter of fact, which may be either true or false; in other words, it implies in the speaker, and raises in the hearer, the state of belief or disbelief, which does not attach either to the noun or to the verb separately. Herein the Proposition is discriminated from other significant arrangements of words (precative, interrogative, which convey no truth or falsehood), as well as from its own component parts. Each of these parts, noun and verb, has a significance of its own; but these are the ultimate elements of speech, for the parts of the noun or of the verb have no significance at all. The Verb is distinguished from the Noun by connoting time, and also by always serving as predicate to some noun as subject.[7]
[5] Ibid. p. 16, a. 13: τὰ μὲν οὖν ὀνόματα αὐτὰ καὶ τὰ ῥήματα ἔοικε τῷ ἄνευ διαιρέσεως καὶ συνθέσεως νοήματι, οἷον τὸ ἄνθρωπος καὶ τὸ λευκόν, ὅταν μὴ προστέθῃ τι· οὔτε γὰρ ψεῦδος οὔτε ἀληθές πω.
[6] Ibid. p. 16, b. 19: αὐτὰ μὲν καθ’ ἑαυτὰ λεγόμενα τὰ ῥήματα ὀνόματά ἐστι καὶ σημαίνει τι (ἵστησι γὰρ ὁ λέγων τὴν διάνοιαν, καὶ ὁ ἀκούσας ἠρέμησεν) ἀλλ’ εἰ ἐστὶν ἢ μή, οὔπω σημαίνει, &c.
Compare Analyt. Poster. II. xix. pp. 99, 100, where the same doctrine occurs: the movement of association is stopped, and the mind is determined to dwell upon a certain idea; one among an aggregate of runaways being arrested in flight, another halts also, and so the rest in succession, until at length the Universal, or the sum total, is detained, or “stands still� as an object of attention. Also Aristot. Problem. p. 956, b. 39.
[7] Aristot. De Interpr. p. 16, b. 2, seq.
Aristotle intimates his opinion, distinctly and even repeatedly, upon the main question debated by Plato in the Kratylus. He lays it down that all significant speech is significant by convention only, and not by nature or as a natural instrument.[8] He tells us also that, in this treatise, he does not mean to treat of all significant speech, but only of that variety which is known as enunciative. This last, as declaring truth or falsehood, is the only part belonging to Logic as he conceives it; other modes of speech, the precative, imperative, interrogative, &c., belong more naturally to Rhetoric or Poetic.[9] Enunciative speech may be either simple or complex; it may be one enunciation, declaring one predicate (either in one word or in several words) of one subject; or it may comprise several such.[10] The conjunction of the predicate with the subject constitutes the variety of proposition called Affirmation; the disjunction of the same two is Negation or Denial.[11] But such conjunction or disjunction, operated by the cogitative act, between two mental states, takes place under the condition that, wherever conjunction may be enunciated, there also disjunction may be enunciated, and vice versâ. Whatever may be affirmed, it is possible also to deny; whatever may be denied, it is possible also to affirm.[12]
[8] Ibid. p. 16, a. 26; p. 17, a. 2.