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The International Library of Philosophy
LOGICAL STUDIES
Founded by C. K. Ogden
The International Library of Philosophy
PHILOSOPHY OF LOGIC AND MATHEMATICS

In 8 Volumes
The Nature of Mathematics Black

II The Technique of Controversy Bogos/ovsky
III The Limits of Science Chwistek
IV Foundations of Geometry and Induction Nicod
v The Foundations of Mathematics Braithwaite
VI Logical Studies von Wright
VII A Treatise on Induction and Probability von Wright
VIII An Examination of Logical Positivism Weinberg
LOGICAL STUDIES
GEORG HENRIK VON WRIGHT

First published in 1957 by
Routledge and Kegan Paul Ltd
Reprinted in 2000, 2001 (twice) by

Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon, OX14 4RN
Transferred to Digital Printing 2006
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group
© 1957 Routledge and Kegan Paul Ltd
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced

or utilized in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means,
now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying
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The publishers have made every effort to contact authors/copyright holders

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welcome correspondence from those individuals/companies
we have been unable to trace.
These reprints are taken from original copies of each book. In many cases
the condition of these originals is not perfect. The publisher has gone to
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out that certain characteristics of the original copies will, of necessity, be
apparent in reprints thereof.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

A CIP catalogue record for this book
is available from the British Library
Logical Studies
ISBN 978-0-415-22547-2
ISBN 0-415-22547-7
Philosophy of Logic and Mathematics: 8 Volumes
ISBN 0-415-22575-2
The International Library of Philosophy: 56 Volumes
ISBN 0-415-21803-9
Printed and bound by CPI Antony Rowe, Eastbourne
TABLE OF CONTENTS
PREFACE page vii

FORM AND CONTENT IN LOGIC
ON THE IDEA OF LOGICAL TRUTH (1) 22
ON DOUBLE QUANTIFICATION 44
DEONTIC LOGIC 58
INTERPRETATIONS OF MODAL LOGIC 75
A NEW SYSTEM OF MODAL LOGIC 8g
ON CONDITIONALS 127
THE CONCEPT OF ENTAILMENT r66
INDEX I92
v
PREFACE
I beenthispublished
N volume eight essays are included. Five of them had
before. None of the five, however, is re-
printed without alterations or additions.
The first three essays deal with the problem of logical truth.
Their aim is to elucidate what is meant by saying that logical
truth is formal-dependent of form and independent of con-
tent-or that logical truth is tautologous. The results achieved
are hardly novel. In the course of the discussion some methods
(distributive normal forms) are developed, which yield a solu-
tion to some cases of the so-called decision problem of the
predicate calculus.
'Form and Content in Logic', Cambridge 1949 is reprinted
with the permission of the Syndics of the Cambridge University
Press. Two Appendices have been added. 'On the Idea of Logical
Truth (I)' was first published in Societas Scientiarum Fennica,
Commentationes Physico-Mathematicae XIV 4, 1948 and 'On Double
Quantification' in the same series Vol. XVI :J, 1952.
It was the study of distributive normal foriJlS that awakened
my interest in modality. The next three essays are in the field
of modal logic. It is one of the attractions of this comparatively
undeveloped branch of logical theory that it has applications
in a variety of highly divergent directions. One such applica-
tion is to the study of processes in nature which are in a charac-
teristic sense additive or linear. Another application is to the
logical study ofnoriJlS (normative discourse). This latter study
is important to ethic$ and the philosophy of law. But it must
be pursued with much more refinement than in my first paper
(here republished) on deontic logic. Philosophically, I find this
paper very unsatisfactory. For one thing, because it treats of
noriJlS as a kind of proposition which may be true or false. This,
I think, is a mistake. Deontic logic gets part of its philosophic
significance from the fact that noriJ1S and valuations, though
removed from the realm of truth, yet are subject to logical law.
This shows that logic, so to speak, has a wider reach than
truth.
It was always thought that modality is akin to probability.
Vll
PREFACE
Yet it was a surprise to me, when I first noted that a modal
logic could be constructed which contains an analogue to the
multiplication principle of probability theory. This 'new'
modal logic differs from 'classical' modal logic in that it treats
modality as a relative and not as an absolute notion-a dis-
tinction of which the germ may be found in Aristotle's dis-
tinction between modality (necessity) J~ vrro8lu£wf> and drr.\wf>,
The logic of the relative modalities can, in a characteristic
sense, be said to include the logic of the absolute modalities as
a limiting case. Probability theory again may be regarded as a
metric extension of this new modal logic. I believe that it has
interesting applications in the fields of axiology and deontology,
which I hope to be able to study in future publications.
'Deontic Logic' was published in Mind, Vol. 6o, N.S., 1951
and 'Interpretations of Modal Logic' in Mind, Vol. 61, N.S.,
1952. They are reprinted with the permission of the Editor. A
first version of'A New System of Modal Logic' appeared in the
Proceedings of the Xlth International Congress of Philosophy, Vol 5,
Amsterdam-Louvain, 1953· The present version is different and
developed much more in detail.
Related to modal logic are the problems of the conditional
(the if-then) and of entailment (logical consequence). Condi-
tionality exhibits two aspects, rather different in nature. The
first is a feature of intensionality which seems to be peculiar to
all hypothetical asserting, knowing, and believing, and which
explains why the if-then relation cannot be 'formalized' on a
level with truth-functional or with modal notions. The second
aspect discloses the problem of natural necessity which, in its
tum, is closely related to the problem of the inductive
ground.
The concept of entailment too, the discussion of which with
C. I. Lewis was the very point from which modern research
in modal logic started, seems to be out of the reach of a defini-
tion in terms of possibility, necessity, and truth-connectives. In
the last essay in this volume, I try to show that in the logic
of entailment epistemic notions enter. The concept of entail-
ment is closely related to the concept of demonstrability. And
the demonstrable is that which, by means of logic, we may
come to know.
viii
PREFACE
The essay on conditionals was, in more than one version,
read and criticized by Dr. Rogers Albritton and the essay on
the new modal logic by Mr. Peter Geach. I am much indebted
to their assistance and criticism. I am also grateful to Dr.
Casimir Lewy for the stimulus which discussions with him has
provided to the development of my views of entailment.
Cambridge,
May 1956 GEORG HENRIK VON WRIGHT
ix
( 1949)
0 traditionally
NEof the main objects of the logicians' inquiries has
been various provinces of what might be
called logical truth.
The most ancient and best known example is Aristotle's
theory of the syllogism. Let us say a few words about it.
An Aristotelian syllogism is, e.g. 'if all Europeans are white
men and some Europeans are Mohammedans, then some white
men are Mohammedans.'
The syllogism is an if-then-sentence.1 The if-sentence con-
sists in its turn of two sentences, viz. 'all Europeans are white
men' and 'some Europeans are Mohammedans', joined by the
word 'and'. They are called premisses. The then-sentence is
called the conclusion.
The syllogism itself obviously expresses a true proposition.
It expresses a true proposition, even if one or both of the pre-
misses and the conclusion should happen to express false pro-
positions. It might actually be the case that some Europeans
are not white and that no Europeans nor any other white men
are Mohammedans. But it nevertheless remains true that if
all Europeans are white men and some are Mohammedans,
then some white men are Mohammedans.
The words which occur in the syllogism can be divided into
two groups.
The first group consists of words for which other words can
be substituted without affecting the truth of the proposition
expressed by the syllogism. We shall call them variable words.
It is plain that the variables in our example are the words
'Europeans', 'white men', and 'Mohammedans'. We could also
have said: 'If all x arey and some x are~. then somey are;:.'
without saying what x andy and ~mean.
1 See Appendix III at the end of this paper.
L.S.-B I
LOGICAL STUDIES
The second group consists of words for which it is impossible
to substitute other words without affecting the truth of the
proposition expressed by the syllogism. We shall call these
words (logical) constants. The constants in our example are the
words 'if-then', 'all', 'are', 'and', and 'some'.
We shall say that the variables give to the syllogism its
content, and that the constants give to it its form. Since the
syllogism expresses a true proposition independently of the
meaning of the variables, we shall say that the syllogism
expresses truth because of its form and independently of its
content.
From the point of view of truth the syllogism itself behaves
differently from the premisses and the conclusion. Whether it
is true or not that all x are y essentially depends upon what x
and y mean. The premisses and the conclusion, unlike the
syllogism, thus express truth or falsehood according to their
content and not for reasons of form.
Similar remarks about truth and form and content apply to
all valid Aristotelian syllogisms.
We shall say that a sentence, which expresses truth because
of its form and independently of its content, expresses formal or
logical truth.
The Stoics started investigations into another province of
logical truth, which had not been systematically studied by
Aristotle, and which, because of the predominance of the
Aristotelian tradition, was not very much cultivated before the
renaissance oflogic in the second halfofthe nineteenth century.
An example from this province is provided by the following
sentence: 'If there is thunder, if there is lightning, then there is
not lightning, if there is not thunder.'
Like our syllogism, this sentence is an if-then-sentence. It
consists itselfoftwo conditional sentences, viz. 'there is thunder,
if there is lightning' and 'there is not lightning, if there is not
thunder'. The first conditional sentence consists in its turn of two
sentences, viz. 'there is thunder' and 'there is lightning', joined
by the word 'if'. The second conditional sentence again con-
sists of the two sentences 'there is not lightning' and 'there is
not thunder', joined by the word 'if'. But the sentence 'there is
not lightning' consists of the sentence 'there is lightning', into
2
which has been inserted the word 'not', and similarly the
sentence 'there is not thunder' consists of the sentence 'there is
thunder', into which has been inserted the word 'not'.
Like our syllogism, the if-then-sentence now under consi-
deration obviously expresses a true proposition.1 This proposi-
tion is true independently of whether it is true or not that there
is thunder or lightning and also of whether it is true or not that
there is thunder, if there is lightning, and of whether it is true
or not that there is not lightning, if there is not thunder. As a
matter of fact, there can be lightning without thunder. But
it nevertheless remains true that if there is thunder, if there
is lightning, then there is not lightning, if there is not
thunder.
As in our syllogism, we can distinguish between variables
and constants in the example which we are discussing.
The variables are those parts of the sentence for which we
could substitute other fragments of language without affecting
the truth of the proposition expressed by the if-then-sentence.
It is plain that the variables here are the sentences 'there is
thunder' and 'there is lightning'. We could also have said: 'If
x, ify, then noty, if not x', without saying what x andy mean.
The constants are the words 'if-then' and 'not'.
We might again say that the variables give to our sentence its
content, and that the constants give to it its form, and also that
the sentence expresses truth because of its form and indepen-
dently ofits content.
It was not till the middle of the nineteenth century that
logicians became systematically interested in an important
province of logical truth, of which the following sentence is an
example: 'If somebody is teacher of somebody, then somebody
is pupil of somebody.'
This sentence also obviously expresses a true proposition. It
is plain that it has variable parts, i.e. contains words for which
we could substitute other words without affecting the truth of
what we say. It is further plain that the existence of variables
has to do with the fact that we used teachers and pupils to
1 This is not in contradiction with the account of conditionals, given in the
seventh essay of the present volume. What is here called 'if-then-sentences' are
material implication sentences. ( 1 955)
3
LOGICAL STUDIES
illustrate something which would also be true of, say, parents
and children.
On the other hand, the words 'teacher' and 'pupil' could not
be regarded as two variables of our sentence. For if we say 'if
somebody is x of somebody, then somebody isy of somebody',
then we obviously say something the truth or falsehood of
which essentially depends upon the meaning of x andy. What
we say is true, if x andy mean teacher and pupil, or parent and
child, or master and servant respectively. But it is not true,
e.g., if x means teacher andy means servant. Somebody could be
some body's teacher without anybody being somebody's servant.
The problem of discovering what is variable and what is
constant in our third example is thus somewhat more difficult
than in the two first examples. This is due to an insufficiency of
our language.
The relations of a teacher to his pupil, or a parent to his
child, or a master to his servant have a common feature, for
which, however, there is no word in ordinary language. The
logician must invent a word for it. He speaks about relations
and their converse relations. Whenever one person is another
person's teacher, the latter is without exception the former
person's pupil, and for this reason we call the relation of a
pupil to his teacher the converse relation of the relation of a
teacher to his pupil. Instead of 'pupil' a logician might say
'teacher converse', and similarly instead of 'child' he might say
'parent converse' and instead of 'servant' he might say 'master
converse'. And if he then said 'if somebody is x of somebody,
then some body is x converse of somebody', he would say some-
thing, the truth of which is independent of the meaning of x
in the same sense in which the truth of 'if x, if y, then not y, if
not x' is independent of the meaning of x andy.
Thus our third example contains one variable only, viz. the
word 'teacher' (or 'pupil'). Its constants are the words 'if-then',
'somebody', 'is', and 'converse'. The constant 'converse', how-
ever, does not occur explicitly in the sentence, because we say
'pupil' ('teacher') when we mean what the logician calls a
'teacher converse'.
We might again say that the variable gives to our sentence its
content, and that the constants give to it its form, and that the
4
sentence expresses truth because of its form and independently
of its content.
It is of some interest to observe that there are logical constants
for which ordinary language has no name and for which the
logician must invent a technical term. This fact probably offers
a partial explanation why some branches of logic were much
retarded in their development before the rise of so-called
symbolic logic.
What we have said about variables and constants above is
still vague. The following remarks are intended to make the
distinction somewhat more precise:
In our syllogism there occurred three variables. The syllo-
gism, we said, expresses a true proposition independently of the
meaning of the variables. This, however, is subject to an
important restriction. We must not substitute for the variables
words which would make the whole expression void of meaning.
We could not, for example, substitute numerals for the variables.
We must substitute for them words of the same kind as 'Euro-
peans', 'white men', and 'Mohammedans'. This means that we
must substitute for them names of some properties (classes).
Similarly, it is obvious that in our second example we can
only substitute for the variables sentences, i.e. linguistic expres-
sions of propositions. In our third example again we can only
substitute for the variable a name of a relation.
These restrictions on the meaning of the variables offer a
suitable basis for a classification of expressions.
First, there are expressions in which the variables mean pro-
positions. Their study belongs to a discipline known as the
Logic of Propositions. Its foundations were laid by the Stoics.
Its systematic study in modern times dates from Frege. It is a
province of logic which is today pretty thoroughly explored.
Secondly, there are expressions in which the variables mean
properties (classes). Their study belongs to a discipline which
can conveniently be called the Logic of Properties (Classes). It
includes, but is by no means coextensive with, the theory of the
syllogism.
Thirdly, there are expressions in which the variables mean
relations. The Logic of Relations was hardly studied at all
before de Morgan. Important contributions to it were made by
5
LOGICAL STUDIES
Peirce and Schroder and the authors of Principia Mathematica.
It still remains, however, a comparatively unexplored branch of
logic.
There are other provinces oflogic (and logical truth) besides
the three mentioned, but we shall not discuss them here.
The three provinces mentioned are hierarchically related.
This is seen from a consideration of logical constants. All the
constants of the Logic of Propositions occur among the con-
stants of the Logic of Properties, and all the constants of the
Logic of Properties among the constants of the Logic of Rela-
tions. But some constants of the Logic of Properties, e.g. 'all'
and 'some', do not belong to the Logic of Propositions, and
some constants of the Logic of Relations, e.g. 'converse', do
not belong to the Logic of Properties.
It is an old observation that truth is sometimes dependent
upon 'form' and sometimes upon 'content'. This observation
has obviously something to do, e.g., with Leibniz's distinction
between verites de raison and verites de faits, and with Kant's
distinction between analytische Urteile and synthetische Urteile.
The distinction between form and content, however, is far
from clear. What we have said above to elucidate it does not
give us any means of determining whether a given sentence
expresses logical truth or not. On the contrary, in distinguish-
ing between the form and content of expressions we pre-
supposed an insight into the truth of the propositions which
they express and how this truth may be affected by the substi-
tution of parts in the expressions. Nor does what Leibniz or
Kant said in order to elucidate their above-mentioned dis-
tinctions help us very much.
A substantial contribution to the clarification of the idea of
logical truth was made by Wittgenstein in his Tractatus logico-
philosophicus. Wittgenstein there tried to give an account of the
idea of logical truth by using the idea of a tautology which in
its turn is based on the idea of a truth-function.
Let us call truth and falsehood truth-values. We can then
define a truth-function in the following way:
A given proposition is a truth-function of n propositions, if
for every possible combination of truth-values in the n propo-
sitions there is a rule determining the truth-value of the given
6
proposition. (There are many problems attached to this defini-
tion which we shall not discuss here.)
As we know, the Logic of Propositions studies expressions
the variable parts of which are sentences. It was known before
Wittgenstein that these expressions could be regarded as
expressing truth-functions of the propositions expressed by
their variable parts. Wittgenstein's new observation could be
described as follows:
Among the truth-functions of n propositions there is the
proposition which has the truth-value 'true' for every possible
combination of truth-values in the n propositions. We call this
truth-function the tautology of the n propositions. It is plain
that if an expression of propositional logic expresses the tauto-
logy of the propositions expressed by its variables, then what it
expresses is true independently of the content of the variables.
For whatever propositions the variables mean, the expression
itself means a true proposition.
What truth-function of the propositions expressed by its
variables a given expression ofpropositionallogic itself expresses
can always be found out or decided 'mechanically' in so-called
truth-tables. The idea of truth-tables was developed by Wittgen-
stein and independently of him by Post. 1 The characterization
of logical truths as tautologies gets part of its importance from
this fact, that one can for any given expression of propositional
logic decide whether it expresses a tautology or not.
The tautology of n propositions is a proposition which is true
for every possible combination of truth-values in the n proposi-
tions. The combinations are mutually exclusive, i.e. n given
propositions are never true and false in more than one of these
ways. The combinations are also collectively exhaustive, i.e. n
given propositions are always true and false in one of these
ways. The tautology of the n propositions is the proposition
which is true independently of which of these combinations of
truth-values actually is the case with the n propositions. Logical
truth could therefore be said to consist in agreement with every
one of a number of mutually exclusive and collectively exhaus-
tive possibilities.
1 Post, 'Introduction to a General Theory of Elementary Propositions', in Amer.
Joum. cif Math. 43, 1921.
7
LOGICAL STUDIES
It is the character of (mutual exclusiveness and) collective
exhaustiveness of the possibilities which entitles us to speak of
them as representing every possible combination of truth-values
in the n propositions. And this character itself is a consequence
of two principles which are basic in relation to the concept of
a truth-function and the construction of truth-tables and thus
also to the decision whether an expression of propositional
logic expresses logical truth or not. These principles are (i)
that every proposition has a truth-value (is true or false) and
(ii) that no proposition has more than one truth-value (is not
true and false). We might call the first of them the Principle of
Excluded Middle and the second the Principle of Contradic-
tion.
It is an illusion to think that these two principles could them-
selves be proved to be tautologies and hence logical truths in
the same sense as, e.g. 'it is raining or it is not raining' expresses
the tautology of the proposition that it is raining. I shall not
discuss here what sort of truths the two principles in question
are or might be.
The concept of a tautology works very well for the purpose of
clarifYing the idea of logical truth or 'independence of content'
in propositional logic, i.e. in that province of logical truth
where the variable parts of the expressions which we study are
sentences. Can it be applied for a similar purpose in those
provinces of logical truth where the variables mean properties
or relations?
This question could be answered affirmatively, if it could be
shown that the logical constants which occur in expressions
about properties and relations can be somehow 'eliminated'
and 'replaced' by logical constants of propositional logic.
Consider again our syllogism. Suppose there are only two
men in the world. We call them 'Smith' and 'Jones'. Instead of
saying 'all Europeans are white men' we can also say 'if Smith
is a European, then Smith is a white man, and if Jones is a
European, then Jones is a white man'. Instead of saying 'some
Europeans are Mohammedans' we can say 'Smith is a European
and Smith is a Mohammedan or Jones is a European and Jones
is a Mohammedan'. And instead of saying 'some white men are
Mohammedans' we can say 'Smith is a white man and Smith is
8
a Mohammedan or Jones is a white man and Jones is a Moham-
medan'. If we substitute these equivalent sentences for the
premisses and the conclusion in our syllogism, we get a new
if-then-sentence. It contains the logical constants 'if-then', 'and',
'or', 'not' and the six sentences 'Smith is a European', 'Smith
is a Mohammedan', 'Smith is a white man', 'Jones is a Euro-
pean', 'Jones is a Mohammedan', and 'Jones is a white man'.
The constants mentioned are constants of propositional logic.
The new expression which we get, therefore, expresses a truth-
function of the propositions expressed by the six sentences. If we
examine in a truth-table which truth-function of them it
expresses, we shall find that it expresses their tautology.
It is 'intuitively' obvious that if the number of men were,
not two, but one or three or four or five or just any number n
we should always get a tautology if we replaced, as above, the
all-sentences and the some-sentences by new sentences, con-
sisting of the words 'if-then', 'and', 'or', and 'not', and parts
which are themselves sentences. Let us call a world with only
one man, with only two men, with only three men, etc., a
'possible world'. We can then say that the syllogism turns out
to be a tautology in all possible worlds, if we eliminate from it
the words 'all' and 'some' as described above.
Similar remarks about the elimination of constants apply to
our example from relational logic: 'If somebody is teacher of
somebody, then somebody is pupil of somebody.' The new
expression which we get after the elimination contains the
logical constants 'if-then', 'and', and 'or', and parts which are
themselves sentences. If we examine in a truth-table which
truth-function of the propositions expressed by these sentences
the expression itself expresses, we shall find that it expresses
their tautology.
It might now be suggested that the concept of a tautology in
all possible worlds gives the proper meaning to the idea of
logical truth or 'independence of content' in the Logic of
Properties and the Logic of Relations.
The concept of a tautology in all possible worlds has a certain
intuitive plausibility. But it is far from clear. There are at least
two difficulties worth observation.
For any given world of n things we can use a truth-table to
9
LOGICAL STUDIES
decide whether any given expression of the Logic of Properties
or Relations expresses a tautology in this world or not. But we
cannot use truth-tables to show that such an expression expresses
a tautology in all possible worlds, since the number of possible
worlds is unlimited. When we said above that our syllogism
expresses a tautology in all possible worlds, we referred to
'intuition'. Sometimes, however, we can refer to considerations
(other than truth-tables) which amount to a 'proof' that an
expression expresses a tautology in all possible worlds. This
could actually have been done in the case of the syllogism and
also in the case of our example about teachers and pupils. But
the very nature of these proofs is far from clear, and besides one
has not been able to provide a general instrument of proof
which would make it possible in the case of any expression to
decide whether it expresses a tautology in all possible worlds
or not.
I now come to the second difficulty.
Consider the expression 'every man is shorter than some man'.
Whatever be the number of men in the world, this expresses a
falsehood. For among any number n of men, there will always
be a tallest man (or several tallest men). It follows from this
that the expression 'not every man is shorter than some man'
expresses a truth in all possible worlds of men. But is this really
a logical truth? Substitute for the word 'man' the word 'prime
(number)' and for the word 'shorter' the word 'smaller'. Then
we get the expressions 'every prime is smaller than some prime'
and 'not every prime is smaller than some prime' respectively.
The latter expresses a truth in any world of n numbers. Yet it
expresses a false proposition.
These considerations take us to a distinction between finite
and infinite worlds. Something can be true of any finite world
without being true of an infinite world. Among any finite
number of numbers there is a greatest number, but among all
numbers there is not. Many things, on the other hand, are
true of any finite world and also of infinite worlds. The syllo-
gisms, for example, are valid for numbers as well as for men.
By an infinite world we shall here exclusively understand
the world of natural numbers.
What it means for an expression to express a tautology in a
10
possible finite world is clear. It means to express a tautology
in the sense of propositional logic of a finite number of proposi-
tions. Which these propositions are can be found out by apply-
ing to the expression in question a technique for diminating
from it logical constants like 'all' and 'some' and 'converse'.
What it means for an expression to express a tautology in an
infinite world, however, is so far from clear that it is probably
quite senseless. For there is no technique for the elimination of
logical constants which would give us a finite number of
propositions, of which the expression in question expressed the
tautology.
It does not seem unplausible to suggest that to express a
tautology in all possible finite worlds is a necessary criterion
oflogical truth. 1 But, as we have seen, this will hardly do as a
sufficient criterion.
A sufficient criterion might be obtained in the following
way:
Take an expression which fulfils the necessary criterion, i.e.
expresses a tautology in all possible finite worlds. Take the
contradictory of this expression. Let it be the case that we can
substitute for its variable parts names of properties and rela-
tions from the world of numbers and in this way obtain a pro-
position which is true for numbers. We then say that the expres-
sion from which we started does not express logical truth. It
would have expressed logical truth, if it had not been the case
that we can substitute in the contradictory of it names of
arithmetical properties and relations and in this way obtain a
true proposition.
About the necessary criterion we observe that no general
method is known for deciding whether a given expression
satisfies it or not. 2
About the suggested sufficient criterion we only observe here
that it seems to make the idea of logical truth dependent upon
the idea of truth about numbers. As is well known, there is no
general technique for deciding whether an expression about
1 0ur concept of a tautology in all possible (finite) worlds answers to that which
Hilbert calls im Endlichen identisch.
1Since this was written (1949), it has been proved that no such general method
is possible. See The Journal q{Symbolic Logic, 15, 1950, p. 229. The proof is due to a
Russian logician, Trachtenbrot. ( 1955)
II
LOGICAL STUDIES
numbers expresses a true proposition or not. There are, more-
over, convincing reasons for believing that such a technique is
impossible.
I shall now try to say some words about a different way of
dealing with the problem of form and content in the Logic of
Properties and Relations. This way also uses the idea of a
tautology, but not the questionable extension of it which we
have called a tautology in all possible worlds.
I shall first speak about the Logic of Properties.
Consider again our syllogism: 'If all Europeans are white
men and some Europeans are Mohammedans, then some
white men are Mohammedans'. As already observed, the
syllogism is a sentence constructed out of the three sentences
'all Europeans are white men', 'some Europeans are Moham-
medans', and 'some white men are Mohammedans' by means
of the words 'if-then' and 'and'. These words are logical con-
stants of propositional logic. For this reason the syllogism
expresses a truth-function of the propositions expressed by the
three sentences. If, however, we construct a truth-table for the
syllogism, relying only upon the technique for the construction
of such tables in propositional logic, we shall not find that it
expresses the tautology of the propositions expressed by the
three sentences. This is clear, for if the two first sentences
expressed true propositions and the third a false proposition,
then the syllogism itself would express a false proposition.
To say that the syllogism expresses logical truth is thus
tantamount to saying that the propositions expressed by the
premisses and the conclusion cannot be independently true
and false in any combination of truth-values, but that the
combination under which the two premisses express true pro-
positions and the conclusion a false proposition is an impossi-
bility. With the difficulties caused by this impossibility, how-
ever, the technique of truth-tables in propositional logic is
incapable of coping.
We raise the following question: Could the decision-technique
of propositional logic be improved or amplified so as to make
the tautological character of the proposition expressed by the
syllogism emerge from a truth-table? It is not difficult to see
that this question can be answered affirmatively.
12
We begin by defining a certain set of eight conditions in the
following way:
The first condition is satisfied by any man who is European,
white, and Mohammedan, the second by any man who is
European and white but not Mohammedan, the third by any
man who is European and Mohammedan but not white, the
fourth by any man who is European but neither white nor
Mohammedan, the fifth by any man who is not European but
white and Mohammedan, the sixth by any man who is neither
European nor white but Mohammedan, the seventh by any
man who is neither European nor Mohammedan but white,
and the eighth by any man who is neither European nor
white nor Mohammedan.
These conditions are mutually exclusive, i.e. no man can
satisfY two of them. They are also collectively exhaustive, i.e.
any man satisfies one of them. They can be independently
satisfied or not in 256 ( = 2 8 ) different ways, beginning from
the case when they are all satisfied and ending with the case
when none of them is satisfied. (The last case would mean that
there are no men at all; if we wish, we can omit it from con-
sideration as being an 'awkward' case.)
Anything that can be said about Europeans, white men, and
Mohammedans, using the logical constants of the Logic of
Propositions and of Properties can also be expressed by saying
something about the way in which the eight conditions are
satisfied or not. To say that all Europeans are white men is to
say that the third and fourth conditions are not satisfied. To
say the some Europeans are Mohammedans is to say that the
first or third conditions are satisfied. Since to say that all
Europeans are white men is to exclude the third condition
from being satisfied, it follows that to say that all Europeans
are white men and some Europeans are Mohammedans is to
say that the first condition is satisfied but not the third and
fourth. To say that some white men are Mohammedans,
finally, is to say that the first or the fifth conditions are satis-
fied. What the syllogism itself says is, therefore, that if the first
condition is satisfied but not the third and fourth, then the first
or the fifth conditions are also satisfied. This is a logical truth.
It is further a truth-function of the proposition that the first
13
LOGICAL STUDIES
condition is satisfied, the proposition that the third condition
is satisfied, the proposition that the fourth condition is satisfied,
and the proposition that the fifth condition is satisfied. If we
construct a truth-table, we shall find that it is the tautology of
these four propositions.
By this means it has been shown that the syllogism expresses
the tautology of four propositions. These four propositions are
each to the effect that there is a man who satisfies a certain
condition. We shall, therefore, call them the existence-con-
stituents of the proposition expressed by the syllogism.
The above considerations can be generalized. Take any
expression in the Logic of Properties. It contains n variable
parts. These variables are names of properties. By a procedure
-illustrated above for 'Europeans', 'white men', and 'Moham-
medans' -we can set up a number (= 2n) of conditions, which
are mutually exclusive, collectively exhaustive, and inde-
pendently satisfiable. By another procedure 1 we show that the
given expression in the Logic of Properties expresses a truth-
function of some propositions each to the effect that there is a
thing which satisfies a certain one of the conditions. These
propositions we call the existence-constituents of the proposition
expressed by the original expression. If the original expression
expresses the tautology of its existence-constituents it expresses
logical truth.
The truth-value of any proposition to the effect that there is
a thing which satisfies a certain one of the conditions depends
upon the content of the n names of properties which occur in
the expression. The (truth-value of the) tautology of some of
these propositions, however, is independent of the truth-values
of the propositions themselves. Hence if the expression expresses
the tautology of these propositions, it expresses truth inde-
pendently of the content of the property-names.
It seems to me that the concept of a tautology of existence-
constituents gives a fair account of the idea of logical truth or
'independence of content' in the Logic of Properties. It is
connected with a universal decision-procedure and it avoids the
1There is a detailed account of these procedures and of the idea of logical truth
in the Logic of Properties in the next essay. Essentially similar ideas about decida-
bility are found in Quine's paper 'On the Logic of Quantification' (The Journal qf
Symbolic Logic, 10, 1945).
difficulties and obscurities which are attached to the concept of
a tautology in all possible worlds and which arise from the
attempt to eliminate the logical constants peculiar to the Logic
of Properties.
I shall now say some words about the Logic of Relations.
Consider again our example 'if somebody is teacher of
somebody, then somebody is pupil of somebody'. It is a sen-
tence constructed out of the two sentences 'somebody is teacher
of somebody' and 'somebody is pupil of somebody' by means of
the logical constant 'if-then'. The logical constant is one of
propositional logic. For this reason our example expresses a
truth-function of the propositions expressed by the two sen-
tences. If, however, we construct a truth-table, relying upon the
technique for the construction of such tables in propositional
logic, we shall certainly not find that our example expresses
the tautology of the propositions expressed by the two sentences.
We therefore ask whether the amplified decision-technique of
the Logic of Properties can cope with the case.
One could define a set of mutually exclusive and collectively
exhaustive conditions in the following way:
The first condition is satisfied by any man who is somebody's
teacher and also somebody's pupil, the second by any man who
is somebody's teacher but not anybody's pupil, the third by
any man who is somebody's pupil but not anybody's teacher,
and the fourth by any man who is neither anybody's teacher
nor anybody's pupil.
To say that somebody is teacher of somebody is to say that
the first or the second conditions are satisfied. To say that
somebody is pupil of somebody is to say that the second or third
conditions are satisfied. Hence to say that if somebody is
teacher of somebody, then somebody is pupil of somebody is
to say that if the first or second conditions are satisfied, then
also the second or third. This is a truth-function of the pro-
position that the first condition is satisfied, the proposition
that the second condition is satisfied, and the proposition that
the third condition is satisfied. Since each of these propositions
is to the effect that there is a thing (a man) satisfying a certain
condition, we shall call them the existence-constituents of the
proposition that if somebody is teacher of somebody, then some-
rs
LOGICAL STUDIES
body is pupil of somebody. This last proposition is thus, like
the proposition expressed by our syllogism, a truth-function of
its existence-constituents. If, however, we construct a truth-
table, we shall not find that it is their tautology.
It is easy to see why the decision-technique of the Logic of
Properties cannot cope with the concept of logical truth in the
case now under discussion. The failure is due to the fact that
th~ four conditions about teachers and pupils, though they
resemble our eight conditions above about Europeans, white
men, and Mohammedans in being mutually exclusive and
collectively exhaustive, differ from them in not being inde-
pendently satisfiable or left unsatisfied. This again is due to the
fact that our example, as we have already observed, contains a
logical constant-peculiar to the Logic of Relations-which is
not explicit in ordinary language, viz. the constant which we
have called 'converse'. Or to put it in a different way: our
example does not contain two variable relation-names, but
only one. We can regard 'teacher' as the variable name, in
which case we have for 'pupil' to read 'teacher converse'. Or we
can regard 'pupil' as the variable name, in which case we have
for 'teacher' to substitute 'pupil converse'.
There is a feature which is characteristic of any relation and
its converse relation. We will call it their existential symmetry.
This means in our example that if some of the conditions for
the truth of the proposition that somebody is teacher of some-
body is satisfied, then some of the conditions for the truth of the
proposition that somebody is pupil of somebody is also satis-
fied, and vice versa. From this it follows that of the sixteen
different ways in which our four conditions above might be
satisfied or left unsatisfied according to the Principles of
Excluded Middle or Contradiction, four ways are excluded
as impossible thanks to the existential symmetry of the rela-
tions called 'teacher' and 'pupil'.
According to the above, there are thus I 6 - 4 or twelve
combinations of truth-values in the existence-constituents,
representing the I 6 - 4 or twelve different ways in which the
respective conditions can be satisfied or left unsatisfied. These
twelve combinations of truth-values are mutually exclusive,
i.e. the existence-constituents are never true and false in more
16
than one of these twelve ways. The combinations are also
collectively exhaustive, i.e. the existence-constituents are
always true and false in some of these twelve ways. It is this
character of (mutual exclusiveness and) collective exhaustive-
ness which entitles us to speak of the twelve combinations as
all possible combinations. (Of. above, p. 8.)
If we construct a truth-table, we shall find that our example
expresses a proposition which is true of every one of the possible
combinations of truth-values in its existence-constituents. It
thus expresses their tautology.
(The truth-table used in this case differs from an 'ordinary'
truth-table in that certain combinations of truth-values are
missing in it.) 1
The above considerations can also be generalized. Take any
expression in the Logic of Relations. It contains n variable
parts. These variables are names of relations. By a procedure-
not, however, adequately illustrated by our example above for
'teacher' and 'pupil' -we can set up a number of conditions
which are mutually exclusive and collectively exhaustive,
though not (in general) independently satisfiable. By another
procedure we show that the given expression in the Logic of
Relations expresses a truth-function of some propositions each
to the effect that there is a thing which satisfies a certain one of
the conditions. These propositions we call the existence-
constituents of the proposition expressed by the original expres-
sion. By a third procedure, the nature of which is determined by
the logical constants peculiar to relational logic, 1 we exclude
certain combinations of truth-values in the existence-con-
stituents as being impossible. The remaining combinations of
truth-values represent a set of mutually exclusive and collec-
tively exhaustive possibilities. If the original expression expresses
the tautology of its existence-constituents (i.e., a proposition
which is true for every one of the possible combinations of
1 Truth-tables of this mutilated type were, as far as I know, for the first time
mentioned by Wittgenstein in 'Some Remarks on Logical Form' in Proceedings qf
the Aristoulian Soci8fY, Supp. vol. 9, 19119. ( 1955)
I'I'here are two (primitive) logical constants of relational logic. One is the con-
stant which we have called 'converse'. The other is usually known as 'relative
product' or 'chain'. The relation called 'uncle', e.g., is the chain-relation of the
relations called 'brother' and 'father', and the relation called 'grandfather' is the
chain-relation of the relation called 'father' with itself.
L.s.-a 17
LOGICAL STUDIES
truth-values in the existence-constituents), it expresses logical
truth.
The truth-value of any proposition to the effect that there
is a thing which satisfies a certain one of the conditions depends
upon the content of the n names of relations which occur in the
expression. The tautology of some of these propositions, how-
ever, is independent of the truth-values of the propositions
themselves. Hence if the expression expresses the tautology of
these propositions, it expresses truth independently of the con-
tent of the relation-names.
It would be premature to attempt to answer the question
whether the concept of a tautology of existence-constituents
can give a satisfactory account of the idea of logical truth or
'independence of content' in the Logic of Relations, before
settling other problems which occur in this context. One such
problem is whether the concept of a tautology of existence-
constituents as a criterion of logical truth is equivalent to the
necessary and sufficient criterion which we have previously
suggested (p. I I) or to a similar criterion. I shall not discuss
this problem here.
APPENDIX I
The above outline of decision-procedures for the Logic of
Propositions, Properties, and Relations mentions truth-tables.
There is another technique which is equivalent to the construc-
tion of truth-tables. It consists in the transformation of a given
expression into a certain 'normal form'. From this normal form
can immediately be seen, whether the given expression expresses
logical truth or not.
It is a well-known fact that any expression of propositional
logic has what might be called a perfect disjunctive normal
form (ausgezeichnete disjunktive Normalform). This normal form
enumerates those of a number of mutually exclusive and
collectively exhaustive possibilities with which the given ex-
pression expresses agreement. If it enumerates all possibilities,
the expression expresses logical truth.
It is not difficult to show that any expression in the Logic of
Properties has an analogous disjunctive normal form. The
technique by means of which we derive it can be described as a
18
Another random document with
no related content on Scribd:
Speech of Henry W. Davis, of Maryland,
On the Mission of the American Party.

Extract from Mr. Davis’s speech in the House of Representatives, on the 6th of
Jan., 1857, on the results of the recent Presidential election:—
“The great lesson is taught by this election that both the parties
which rested their hopes on sectional hostility, stand at this day
condemned by the great majority of the country, as common
disturbers of the public peace of the country.
“The Republican party was a hasty levy, en masse, of the Northern
people to repel or revenge an intrusion by Northern votes alone.
With its occasion it must pass away. The gentlemen of the
Republican side of the House can now do nothing. They can pass no
law excluding slavery from Kansas in the next Congress—for they are
in a minority. Within two years Kansas must be a state of the Union.
She will be admitted with or without slavery, as her people prefer.
Beyond Kansas there is no question that is practically open. I speak
to practical men. Slavery does not exist in any other territory,—it is
excluded by law from several, and not likely to exist anywhere; and
the Republican party has nothing to do and can do nothing. It has no
future. Why cumbers it the ground?
“Between these two stand the firm ranks of the American party,
thinned by desertions, but still unshaken. To them the eye of the
country turns in hope. The gentleman from Georgia saluted the
Northern Democrats with the title of heroes—who swam vigorously
down the current. The men of the American party faced, in each
section, the sectional madness. They would cry neither free nor slave
Kansas; but proposed a safe administration of the laws, before which
every right would find protection. Their voice was drowned amid the
din of factions. The men of the North would have no moderation, and
they have paid the penalty. The American party elected a majority of
this House: had they of the North held fast to the great American
principle of silence on the negro question, and, firmly refusing to join
either agitation, stood by the American candidate, they would not
now be writhing, crushed beneath an utter overthrow. If they would
now destroy the Democrats, they can do it only by returning to the
American party. By it alone can a party be created strong at the
South as well as at the North. To it alone belongs a principle accepted
wherever the American name is heard—the same at the North as at
the South, on the Atlantic or the Pacific shore. It alone is free from
sectional affiliations at either end of the Union which would cripple it
at the other. Its principle is silence, peace, and compromise. It abides
by the existing law. It allows no agitation. It maintains the present
condition of affairs. It asks no change in any territory, and it will
countenance no agitation for the aggrandizement of either section.
Though thousands fell off in the day of trial—allured by ambition, or
terrified by fear—at the North and at the South, carried away by the
torrent of fanaticism in one part of the Union, or driven by the fierce
onset of the Democrats in another, who shook Southern institutions
by the violence of their attack, and half waked the sleeping negro by
painting the Republican as his liberator, still a million of men, on the
great day, in the face of both factions, heroically refused to bow the
knee to either Baal. They knew the necessities of the times, and they
set the example of sacrifice, that others might profit by it. They now
stand the hope of the nation, around whose firm ranks the shattered
elements of the great majority may rally and vindicate the right of
the majority to rule, and of the native of the land to make the law of
the land.
The recent election has developed, in an aggravated form, every
evil against which the American party protested. Again in the war of
domestic parties, Republican and Democrat have rivalled each other
in bidding for the foreign vote to turn the balance of a domestic
election. Foreign allies have decided the government of the country—
men naturalized in thousands on the eve of the election—eagerly
struggled for by competing parties, mad with sectional fury, and
grasping any instrument which would prostrate their opponents.
Again, in the fierce struggle for supremacy, men have forgotten the
ban which the Republic puts on the intrusion of religious influence
on the political arena. These influences have brought vast multitudes
of foreign born citizens to the polls, ignorant of American interests,
without American feelings, influenced by foreign sympathies, to vote
on American affairs; and those votes have, in point of fact,
accomplished the present result.
The high mission of the American is to restore the influence of the
interests of the people in the conduct of affairs; to exclude appeals to
foreign birth or religious feeling as elements of power in politics; to
silence the voice of sectional strife—not by joining either section, but
by recalling the people from a profitless and maddening controversy
which aids no interest, and shakes the foundation not only of the
common industry of the people, but of the Republic itself; to lay a
storm amid whose fury no voice can be heard in behalf of the
industrial interests of the country, no eye can watch and guard the
foreign policy of the government, till our ears may be opened by the
crash of foreign war waged for purposes of political and party
ambition, in the name, but not by the authority nor for the interests,
of the American people.
Return, then, Americans of the North, from the paths of error to
which in an evil hour fierce passions and indignation have seduced
you, to the sound position of the American party—silence on the
slavery agitation. Leave the territories as they are—to the operation
of natural causes. Prevent aggression by excluding from power the
aggressors, and there will be no more wrong to redress. Awake the
national spirit to the danger and degradation of having the balance of
power held by foreigners. Recall the warnings of Washington against
foreign influence—here in our midst—wielding part of our
sovereignty; and with these sound words of wisdom let us recall the
people from paths of strife and error to guard their peace and power;
and when once the mind of the people is turned from the slavery
agitation, that party which waked the agitation will cease to have
power to disturb the peace of the land.
This is the great mission of the American party. The first condition
of success is to prevent the administration from having a majority in
the next Congress; for, with that, the agitation will be resumed for
very different objects. The Ostend manifesto is full of warning; and
they who struggle over Kansas may awake and find themselves in the
midst of an agitation compared to which that of Kansas was a
summer’s sea; whose instruments will be, not words, but the sword.
Joshua R. Giddings Against the Fugitive Slave
Law.
In the House of Representatives, April 25, 1848.

“Why, sir, I never saw a panting fugitive speeding his way to a land
of freedom, that an involuntary invocation did not burst from my
lips, that God would aid him in his flight! Such are the feelings of
every man in our free states, whose heart has not become hardened
in iniquity. I do not confine this virtue to Republicans, nor to Anti-
Slavery men; I speak of all men, of all parties, in all Christian
communities. Northern Democrats feel it; they ordinarily bow to this
higher law of their natures, and they only prove recreant to the law of
the ‘Most High,’ when they regard the interests of the Democratic
party as superior to God’s law and the rights of mankind.
“Gentlemen will bear with me when I assure them and the
President that I have seen as many as nine fugitives dining at one
time in my own house—fathers, mothers, husbands, wives, parents,
and children. When they came to my door, hungry and faint, cold
and but partially clad, I did not turn round to consult the Fugitive
Law, nor to ask the President what I should do. I knew the
constitution of my country, and would not violate it. I obeyed the
divine mandate, to feed the hungry and clothe the naked. I fed them.
I clothed them, gave them money for their journey, and sent them on
their way rejoicing. I obeyed God rather than the President. I obeyed
my conscience, the dictates of my heart, the law of my moral being,
the commands of Heaven, and, I will add, the constitution of my
country; for no man of intelligence ever believed that the framers of
that instrument intended to involve their descendants of the free
states in any act that should violate the teachings of the Most High,
by seizing a fellow-being, and returning him to the hell of slavery. If
that be treason, make the most of it.
“Mr. Bennett, of Mississippi. I want to know if the gentleman
would not have gone one step farther?
“Mr. Giddings. Yes, sir; I would have gone one step farther. I
would have driven the slave-catcher who dared pursue them from my
premises. I would have kicked him from my door-yard, if he had
made his appearance there; or, had he attempted to enter my
dwelling, I would have stricken him down upon the threshold of my
door.
Robert Toombs on Slavery,
At Tremont Temple, Boston, January 24th, 1856.

In 1790 there were less than seven hundred thousand slaves in the
United States; in 1850 the number exceeded three and one quarter
millions. The same authority shows their increase, for the ten years
preceding the last census, to have been above twenty-eight per cent.,
or nearly three per cent. per annum, an increase equal, allowing for
the element of foreign immigration, to the white race, and nearly
three times that of the free blacks of the North. But these legal rights
of the slave embrace but a small portion of the privileges actually
enjoyed by him. He has, by universal custom, the control of much of
his own time, which is applied, at his own choice and convenience, to
the mechanic arts, to agriculture, or to some other profitable pursuit,
which not only gives him the power of purchase over many
additional necessaries of life, but over many of its luxuries, and in
numerous cases, enables him to purchase his freedom when he
desires it. Besides, the nature of the relation of master and slave
begets kindnesses, imposes duties (and secures their performance),
which exist in no other relation of capital and labor. Interest and
humanity co-operate in harmony for the well-being of slave labor.
Thus the monster objection to our institution of slavery, that it
deprives labor of its wages, cannot stand the test of a truthful
investigation. A slight examination of the true theory of wages, will
further expose its fallacy. Under a system of free labor, wages are
usually paid in money, the representative of products—under ours, in
products themselves. One of your most distinguished statesmen and
patriots, President John Adams, said that the difference to the state
was “imaginary.” “What matters it (said he) whether a landlord,
employing ten laborers on his farm, gives them annually as much
money as will buy them the necessaries of life, or gives them those
necessaries at short hand?” All experience has shown that if that be
the measure of the wages of labor, it is safer for the laborer to take
his wages in products than in their fluctuating pecuniary value.
Therefore, if we pay in the necessaries and comforts of life more than
any given amount of pecuniary wages will buy, then our laborer is
paid higher than the laborer who receives that amount of wages. The
most authentic agricultural statistics of England show that the wages
of agricultural and unskilled labor in that kingdom, not only fail to
furnish the laborer with the comforts of our slave, but even with the
necessaries of life; and no slaveholder could escape a conviction for
cruelty to his slaves who gave his slave no more of the necessaries of
life for his labor than the wages paid to their agricultural laborers by
the noblemen and gentlemen of England would buy. Under their
system man has become less valuable and less cared for than
domestic animals; and noble dukes will depopulate whole districts of
men to supply their places with sheep, and then with intrepid
audacity lecture and denounce American slaveholders.
The great conflict between labor and capital, under free
competition, has ever been how the earnings of labor shall be divided
between them. In new and sparsely settled countries, where land is
cheap, and food is easily produced, and education and intelligence
approximate equality, labor can successfully struggle in this warfare
with capital. But this is an exceptional and temporary condition of
society. In the Old World this state of things has long since passed
away, and the conflict with the lower grades of labor has long since
ceased. There the compensation of unskilled labor, which first
succumbs to capital, is reduced to a point scarcely adequate to the
continuance of the race. The rate of increase is scarcely one per cent.
per annum, and even at that rate, population, until recently, was
considered a curse; in short, capital has become the master of labor,
with all the benefits, without the natural burdens of the relation.
In this division of the earnings of labor between it and capital, the
southern slave has a marked advantage over the English laborer, and
is often equal to the free laborer of the North. Here again we are
furnished with authentic data from which to reason. The census of
1850 shows that, on the cotton estates of the South, which is the chief
branch of our agricultural industry, one-half of the arable lands are
annually put under food crops. This half is usually wholly consumed
on the farm by the laborers and necessary animals; out of the other
half must be paid all the necessary expenses of production, often
including additional supplies of food beyond the produce of the land,
which usually equals one-third of the residue, leaving but one-third
for net rent. The average rent of land in the older non-slaveholding
states is equal to one-third of the gross product, and it not
unfrequently amounts to one-half of it (in England it is sometimes
even greater), the tenant, from his portion, paying all expenses of
production and the expenses of himself and family. From this
statement it is apparent that the farm laborers of the South receive
always as much, and frequently a greater portion of the produce of
the land, than the laborer in the New or Old England. Besides, here
the portion due the slave is a charge upon the whole product of
capital and the capital itself; it is neither dependent upon seasons
nor subject to accidents, and survives his own capacity for labor, and
even the ruin of his master.
But it is objected that religious instruction is denied the slave—
while it is true that religious instruction and privileges are not
enjoined by law in all of the states, the number of slaves who are in
connection with the different churches abundantly proves the
universality of their enjoyment of those privileges. And a much larger
number of the race in slavery enjoy the consolations of religion than
the efforts of the combined Christian world have been able to convert
to Christianity out of all the millions of their countrymen who
remained in their native land.
The immoralities of the slaves, and of those connected with
slavery, are constant themes of abolition denunciation. They are
lamentably great; but it remains to be shown that they are greater
than with the laboring poor of England, or any other country. And it
is shown that our slaves are without the additional stimulant of want
to drive them to crime—we have at least removed from them the
temptation and excuse of hunger. Poor human nature is here at least
spared the wretched fate of the utter prostration of its moral nature
at the feet of its physical wants. Lord Ashley’s report to the British
Parliament shows that in the capital of that empire, perhaps within
the hearing of Stafford House and Exeter Hall, hunger alone daily
drives its thousands of men and women into the abyss of crime.
It is also objected that our slaves are debarred the benefits of
education. This objection is also well taken, and is not without force.
And for this evil the slaves are greatly indebted to the abolitionists.
Formerly in none of the slaveholding states was it forbidden to teach
slaves to read and write; but the character of the literature sought to
be furnished them by the abolitionists caused these states to take
counsel rather of their passions than their reason, and to lay the axe
at the root of the evil; better counsels will in time prevail, and this
will be remedied. It is true that the slave, from his protected position,
has less need of education than the free laborer, who has to struggle
for himself in the warfare of society; yet it is both useful to him, his
master, and society.
The want of legal protection to the marriage relation is also a
fruitful source of agitation among the opponents of slavery. The
complaint is not without foundation. This is an evil not yet removed
by law; but marriage is not inconsistent with the institution of
slavery as it exists among us, and the objection, therefore, lies rather
to an incident than to the essence of the system. But in the truth and
fact marriage does exist to a very great extent among slaves, and is
encouraged and protected by their owners; and it will be found, upon
careful investigation, that fewer children are born out of wedlock
among slaves than in the capitals of two of the most civilized
countries of Europe—Austria and France; in the former, one-half of
the children are thus born; in the latter, more than one-fourth. But
even in this we have deprived the slave of no pre-existing right. We
found the race without any knowledge of or regard for the institution
of marriage, and we are reproached with not having as yet secured to
it that, with all other blessings of civilization. To protect that and
other domestic ties by laws forbidding, under proper regulations, the
separation of families, would be wise, proper, and humane; and
some of the slaveholding states have already adopted partial
legislation for the removal of these evils. But the objection is far
more formidable in theory than in practice. The accidents and
necessities of life, the desire to better one’s condition, produce
infinitely a greater amount of separation in families of the white than
ever happens to the colored race. This is true even in the United
States, where the general condition of the people is prosperous. But
it is still more marked in Europe. The injustice and despotism of
England towards Ireland has produced more separation of Irish
families, and sundered more domestic ties within the last ten years,
than African slavery has effected since its introduction into the
United States. The twenty millions of freemen in the United States
are witnesses of the dispersive injustice of the Old World. The
general happiness, cheerfulness, and contentment of slaves attest
both the mildness and humanity of the system and their natural
adaptation to their condition. They require no standing armies to
enforce their obedience; while the evidence of discontent, and the
appliances of force to repress it, are everywhere visible among the
toiling millions of the earth; even in the northern states of this
Union, strikes and mobs, unions and combinations against
employers, attest at once the misery and discontent of labor among
them. England keeps one hundred thousand soldiers in time of
peace, a large navy, and an innumerable police, to secure obedience
to her social institutions; and physical force is the sole guarantee of
her social order, the only cement of her gigantic empire.
I have briefly traced the condition of the African race through all
ages and all countries, and described it fairly and truly under
American slavery, and I submit that the proposition is fully proven,
that his position in slavery among us is superior to any which he has
ever attained in any age or country. The picture is not without shade
as well as light; evils and imperfections cling to man and all of his
works, and this is not exempt from them.
Judah P. Benjamin, of Louisiana,
On Slave Property, in U. S. Senate, March 11, 1858.

Examine your Constitution; are slaves the only species of property
there recognized as requiring peculiar protection? Sir, the inventive
genius of our brethren of the north is a source of vast wealth to them
and vast benefit to the nation. I saw a short time ago in one of the
New York journals, that the estimated value of a few of the patents
now before us in this Capitol for renewal was $40,000,000. I cannot
believe that the entire capital invested in inventions of this character
in the United States can fall short of one hundred and fifty or two
hundred million dollars. On what protection does this vast property
rest? Just upon that same constitutional protection which gives a
remedy to the slave owner when his property is also found outside of
the limits of the state in which he lives.
Without this protection what would be the condition of the
northern inventor? Why, sir, the Vermont inventor protected by his
own law would come to Massachusetts, and there say to the pirate
who had stolen his property, “render me up my property, or pay me
value for its use.” The Senator from Vermont would receive for
answer, if he were the counsel of this Vermont inventor, “Sir, if you
want protection for your property go to your own state; property is
governed by the laws of the state within whose jurisdiction it is
found; you have no property in your invention outside of the limits of
your state; you cannot go an inch beyond it.” Would not this be so?
Does not every man see at once that the right of the inventor to his
discovery, that the right of the poet to his inspiration, depends upon
those principles of eternal justice which God has implanted in the
heart of man, and that wherever he cannot exercise them, it is
because man, faithless to the trust that he has received from God,
denies them the protection to which they are entitled?
Sir, follow out the illustration which the Senator from Vermont
himself has given; take his very case of the Delaware owner of a
horse riding him across the line into Pennsylvania. The Senator says:
“Now, you see that slaves are not property like other property; if
slaves were property like other property, why have you this special
clause in your constitution to protect a slave? You have no clause to
protect the horse, because horses are recognized as property
everywhere.” Mr. President, the same fallacy lurks at the bottom of
this argument, as of all the rest. Let Pennsylvania exercise her
undoubted jurisdiction over persons and things within her own
boundary; let her do as she has a perfect right to do—declare that
hereafter, within the state of Pennsylvania, there shall be no property
in horses, and that no man shall maintain a suit in her courts for the
recovery of property in a horse; and where will your horse owner be
then? Just where the English poet is now; just where the slaveholder
and the inventor would be if the Constitution, foreseeing a difference
of opinion in relation to rights in these subject-matters, had not
provided the remedy in relation to such property as might easily be
plundered. Slaves, if you please, are not property like other property
in this: that you can easily rob us of them; but as to the right in them,
that man has to overthrow the whole history of the world, he has to
overthrow every treatise on jurisprudence, he has to ignore the
common sentiment of mankind, he has to repudiate the authority of
all that is considered sacred with man, ere he can reach the
conclusion that the person who owns a slave, in a country where
slavery has been established for ages, has no other property in that
slave than the mere title which is given by the statute law of the land
where it is found.
William Lloyd Garrison Upon the Slavery
Question.
“Tyrants! confident of its overthrow, proclaim not to your vassals,

that the American Union is an experiment of freedom, which, if it
fails, will forever demonstrate the necessity of whips for the backs,
and chains for limbs of people. Know that its subversion is essential
to the triumph of justice, the deliverance of the oppressed, the
vindication of the brotherhood of the race. It was conceived in sin,
and brought forth in iniquity; and its career has been marked by
unparalleled hypocrisy, by high-handed tyranny, by a bold defiance
of the omniscience and omnipotence of God. Freedom indignantly
disowns it, and calls for its extinction; for within its borders are three
millions of slaves, whose blood constitutes its cement, whose flesh
forms a large and flourishing branch of its commerce, and who are
ranked with four-footed beasts and creeping things. To secure the
adoption of the constitution of the United States, first, that the
African slave trade—till that time a feeble, isolated, colonial traffic—
should, for at least twenty years, be prosecuted as a national interest,
under the American flag, and protected by the national arm;
secondly, that slavery holding oligarchy, created by allowing three-
fifths of the slaveholding population to be represented by their
taskmasters, should be allowed a permanent seat in congress;
thirdly, that the slave system should be secured against internal
revolt and external invasion, by the united physical force of the
country; fourthly, that not a foot of national territory should be
granted, on which the panting fugitive from slavery might stand, and
be safe from his pursuers, thus making every citizen a slave-hunter
and slave catcher. To say that this ‘covenant with death’ shall not be
annulled—that this ‘agreement with hell’ shall continue to stand—
that this refuge of lies shall not be swept away—is to hurl defiance at
the eternal throne, and to give the lie to Him that sits thereon. It is
an attempt, alike monstrous and impracticable, to blend the light of
heaven with the darkness of the bottomless pit, to unite the living
with the dead, to associate the Son of God with the Prince of Evil.
Accursed be the American Union, as a stupendous, republican
imposture!”
“I am accused of using hard language. I admit the charge. I have

been unable to find a soft word to describe villainy, or to identify the
perpetrator of it. The man who makes a chattel of his brother—what
is he? The man who keeps back the hire of his laborers by fraud—
what is he? They who prohibit the circulation of the Bible—what are
they? They who compel three millions of men and women to herd
together like brute beasts—what are they? They who sell mothers by
the pound, and children in lots to suit purchasers—what are they? I
care not what terms are applied to them, provided they do apply. If
they are not thieves, if they are not tyrants, if they are not men
stealers, I should like to know what is their true character, and by
what names they may be called. It is as mild an epithet to say that a
thief is a thief, as to say that a spade is a spade. Words are but the
signs of ideas. ‘A rose by any other name would smell as sweet.’
Language may be misapplied, and so be absurd or unjust; as for
example, to say that an abolitionist is a fanatic, or that a slaveholder
is an honest man. But to call things by their right names is to use
neither hard nor improper language. Epithets may be rightly applied,
it is true, and yet be uttered in a hard spirit, or with a malicious
design. What then? Shall we discard all terms which are descriptive
of crime, because they are not always used with fairness and
propriety? He who, when he sees oppression, cries out against it—
who, when he beholds his equal brother trodden under foot by the
iron hoof of despotism, rushes to his rescue—who, when he sees the
weak overborne by the strong, takes his side with the former, at the
imminent peril of his own safety—such a man needs no certificate to
the excellence of his temper, or the sincerity of his heart, or the
disinterestedness of his conduct. Or is the apologist of slavery, he
who can see the victim of thieves lying bleeding and helpless on the
cold earth, and yet turn aside, like the callous-hearted priest or
Levite, who needs absolution. Let us call tyrants, tyrants; not to do
so is to misuse language, to deal treacherously with freedom, to
consent to the enslavement of mankind. It is neither amiable nor
virtuous, but a foolish and pernicious thing, not to call things by their
right names. ‘Woe unto them,’ says one of the world’s great prophets,
‘that call evil good, and good evil;’ that put darkness for light, and
light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter.”
Theodore Parker Against the Fugitive Slave
Law.
His Protest Against the Return of Simms by the U. S. Commissioner

at Boston.
“Come with me, my friends, a moment more, pass over this
golgotha of human history, treading reverent as you go, for our feet
are on our mother’s graves, and our shoes defile our father’s
hallowed bones. Let us not talk of them; go farther on, look and pass
by. Come with me into the inferno of the nations, with such poor
guidance as my lamp can lend. Let us disquiet and bring up the awful
shadows of empires buried long ago, and learn a lesson from the
tomb.” “Come, old Assyria, with the Ninevitish dove upon thy
emerald crown! what laid thee low? ‘I fell by my own injustice.
Thereby Nineveh and Babylon came with me also to the ground.’”
“Oh, queenly Persia, flame of the nations, wherefore art thou so
fallen, who troddest the people under thee, bridgest the Hellespont
with ships, and pouredst thy temple-wasting millions on the world?
Because I trod the people under me, and bridged the Hellespont with
ships, and poured my temple-wasting millions on the western world,
I fell by my own misdeeds.” “Thou muse-like Grecian queen, fairest
of all thy classic sisterhood of states, enchanting yet the world with
thy sweet witchery, speaking in art and most seductive song, why
liest thou there, with beauteous yet dishonored brow, reposing on
thy broken harp? ‘I scorned the law of God; banished and poisoned
wisest, justest men; I loved the loveliness of thought, and treasured
that in more than Parian speech. But the beauty of justice, the
loveliness of love, I trod them down to earth! Lo, therefore have I
become as those barbarian states—as one of them!’” “Oh, manly and
majestic Rome, thy seven-fold mural crown all broken at thy feet,
why art thou here? It was not injustice brought thee low; for thy
great book of law is prefaced with these words—justice is the
unchanged, everlasting will to give each man his right! ‘It was not the
saint’s ideal; it was the hypocrite’s pretense.’ I made iniquity my law.
I trod the nations under me. Their wealth gilded my palaces—where
thou mayest see the fox and hear the owl—it fed my courtiers and my
courtesans. Wicked men were my cabinet counselors, the flatterer
breathed his poison in my ear. Millions of bondsmen wet the soil
with tears and blood. Do you not hear it crying yet to God? Lo, here
have I my recompense, tormented with such downfall as you see! Go
back and tell the new-born child who sitteth on the Alleghanies,
laying his either hand upon a tributary sea, a crown of thirty stars
upon his youthful brow—tell him that there are rights which states
must keep, or they shall suffer wrongs! Tell him there is a God who
keeps the black man and the white, and hurls to earth the loftiest
realm that breaks his just, eternal law! Warn the young empire, that
he come not down dim and dishonored to my shameful tomb! Tell
him that justice is the unchanging, everlasting will to give each man
his right. I knew it, broke it, and am lost. Bid him know it, keep it,
and be safe.”
The same speaker protests against the return of Simms.

“Where shall I find a parallel with men who will do such a deed—
do it in Boston? I will open the tombs and bring up most hideous
tyrants from the dead. Come, brood of monsters, let me bring up
from the deep damnation of the graves wherein your hated memories
continue for all time their never-ending rot. Come, birds of evil
omen! come, ravens, vultures, carrion crows, and see the spectacle!
come, see the meeting of congenial souls! I will disturb, disquiet, and
bring up the greatest monsters of the human race! Tremble not,
women! They cannot harm you now! Fear the living, not the dead!”
Come hither, Herod, the wicked. Thou that didst seek after that
young child’s life, and destroyed the innocents! Let me look on thy
face! No, go! Thou wert a heathen! Go, lie with the innocents thou
hast massacred. Thou art too good for this company! “Come, Nero;
thou awful Roman emperor, come up! No, thou wast drunk with
power! schooled in Roman depravity. Thou hadst, besides, the
example of thy fancied gods. Go, wait another day. I will seek a worse
man.
“Come hither, St. Dominic! come, Torquemada; fathers of the
Inquisition! merciless monsters, seek your equal here. No; pass by.
You are no companion for such men as these. You were the servants
of the atheistic popes, of cruel kings. Go to, and get you gone.
Another time I may have work for you—now, lie there, and persevere
to rot. You are not yet quite wicked and corrupt enough for this
comparison. Go, get you gone, lest the sun goes back at sight of ye!
“Come up, thou heap of wickedness, George Jeffries! thy hands
deep purple with the blood of thy fellow-men. Ah! I know thee, awful
and accursed shade! Two hundred years after thy death men hate
thee still, not without cause. Look me upon thee! I know thy history.
Pause, and be still, while I tell to these men. * * * Come, shade of
judicial butcher. Two hundred years, thy name has been pillowed in
face of the world, and thy memory gibbeted before mankind. Let us
see how thou wilt compare with those who kidnap men in Boston.
Go, seek companionship with them. Go, claim thy kindred if such
they be. Go, tell them that the memory of the wicked shall rot; that
there is a God; an eternity; ay, and a judgment, too, where the slave
may appeal against him that made him a slave, to Him that made
him a man.
“What! Dost thou shudder? Thou turn back! These not thy
kindred! Why dost thou turn pale, as when the crowd clutched at thy
life in London street? Forgive me, that I should send thee on such an
errand, or bid thee seek companionship with such—with Boston
hunters of the slave! Thou wert not base enough! It was a great bribe
that tempted thee! Again, I say, pardon me for sending thee to keep
company with such men! Thou only struckest at men accused of
crime; not at men accused only of their birth! Thou wouldst not send
a man into bondage for two pounds! I will not rank thee with men
who, in Boston, for ten dollars, would enslave a negro now! Rest still,
Herod! Be quiet, Nero! Sleep, St. Dominic, and sleep, O Torquemada,
in your fiery jail! Sleep, Jeffries, underneath ‘the altar of the church’
which seeks, with Christian charity to hide your hated bones!”
William H. Seward’s Speech on the Higher
Law.
In the U. S. Senate, March 11, 1850.

“But it is insisted that the admission of California shall be attended
by a COMPROMISE of questions which have arisen out of SLAVERY! I
am opposed to any such compromise in any and all the forms in
which it has been proposed. Because, while admitting the purity
and the patriotism of all from whom it is my misfortune to differ, I
think all legislative compromises radically wrong, and essentially
vicious. They involve the surrender of the exercise of judgment and
the conscience on distinct and separate questions, at distinct and
separate times, with the indispensable advantages it affords for
ascertaining the truth. They involve a relinquishment of the right to
reconsider in future the decision of the present, on questions
prematurely anticipated. And they are a usurpation as to future
questions of the providence of future legislators.
“Sir, it seems to me as if slavery had laid its paralyzing hand upon
myself, and the blood were coursing less freely than its wont through
my veins, when I endeavor to suppose that such a compromise has
been effected, and my utterance forever is arrested upon all the great
questions, social, moral, and political, arising out of a subject so
important, and yet so incomprehensible. What am I to receive in this
compromise? Freedom in California. It is well; it is a noble
acquisition; it is worth a sacrifice. But what am I to give as an
equivalent? A recognition of a claim to perpetuate slavery in the
District of Columbia; forbearance towards more stringent laws
concerning the arrest of persons suspected of being slaves found in
the free States; forbearance from the PROVISO of freedom in the
charter of new territories. None of the plans of compromise offered
demand less than two, and most of them insist on all these
conditions. The equivalent then is, some portion of liberty, some
portion of human rights in one region for liberty in another.”
“It is true indeed that the national domain is ours. It is true it was
acquired by the valor and the wealth of the whole nation. But we
hold, nevertheless, no arbitrary power over it. We hold no arbitrary
power over anything, whether acquired by law or seized by
usurpation. The constitution regulates our stewardship; the
constitution devotes the domain to union, to justice, to welfare and
to liberty. But there is a higher law than the constitution, which
regulates our authority over the domain, and devotes it to the same
noble purpose. The territory is a part, no inconsiderable part of the
common heritage of mankind, bestowed upon them by the Creator of
the universe. We are his stewards, and must so discharge our trust,
as to secure in the highest attainable degree their happiness. This is a
State, and we are deliberating for it, just as our fathers deliberated in
establishing the institutions we enjoy. Whatever superiority there is
in our condition and hopes over those of any other ‘kingdom’ or
‘estate,’ is due to the fortunate circumstance that our ancestors did
not leave things to ‘take their chances’ but that they ‘added
amplitude and greatness’ to our commonwealth ‘by introducing such
ordinances, constitutions, and customs as were wise.’ We in our turn
have succeeded to the same responsibilities, and we cannot approach
the duty before us wisely or justly, except we raise ourselves to the
great consideration of how we can most certainly ‘sow greatness to
our posterity and successors.’
“And now the simple, bold, and awful question which presents
itself to us is this: shall we, who are founding institutions, social and
political, for countless millions; shall we, who know by experience
the wise and just, and are free to choose them, and to reject the
erroneous and unjust; shall we establish human bondage, or permit
it by our sufferance to be established? Sir, our forefathers would not
have hesitated an hour. They found slavery existing here, and they
left it only because they could not remove it. There is not only no free
State which would now establish it, but there is no slave State which,
if it had had the free alternative, as we now have, would have
founded slavery. Indeed, our revolutionary predecessors had
precisely the same question before them in establishing an organic
law, under which the States of Ohio, Michigan, Illinois, Wisconsin,

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PHILOSOPHY OF LOGIC AND MATHEMATICS

The Nature of Mathematics Black

GEORG HENRIK VON WRIGHT

Reprinted in 2000, 2001 (twice) by

Transferred to Digital Printing 2006

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© 1957 Routledge and Kegan Paul Ltd

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PREFACE page vii

ON THE IDEA OF LOGICAL TRUTH (1) 22

THE CONCEPT OF ENTAILMENT r66

On the Mission of the American Party.

In the House of Representatives, April 25, 1848.

At Tremont Temple, Boston, January 24th, 1856.

On Slave Property, in U. S. Senate, March 11, 1858.

“Tyrants! confident of its overthrow, proclaim not to your vassals,

“I am accused of using hard language. I admit the charge. I have

His Protest Against the Return of Simms by the U. S. Commissioner

The same speaker protests against the return of Simms.

In the U. S. Senate, March 11, 1850.

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