nd become verbal.

Formal Logic has, in fact, mistaken _words_, which are (within the same
language) identical on all occasions, for the _thoughts_ they are
intended to express, which are varied to suit each occasion. Words alone
are tolerant of the abstract treatment Formal Logic demands. This
'science,' therefore, finally reduces to mere verbalism, distracted by
inconsistent relapses into 'psychology.'

But will this conception of Logic either work out consistently in itself
or lead to a tenable theory of scientific thinking? Emphatically not.
What is the use of a logic which (1) cannot effect the capital
distinction of all thought, that between the true and the false? (2) is
debarred by its own principles from considering the _meaning_ of any
real assertion? and (3) is thus tossed helplessly from horn to horn of
the dilemma 'either verbalism or psychology'?

We may select a few examples of this fatal dilemma.

1. In dealing with what it calls 'the meaning' of terms, propositions,
etc., Formal Logic has always to choose between the meaning of the
_words_ and the meaning of the _man_. For it is clear that words which
may be used ambiguously may on occasion leave no doubt as to their
meaning, while conversely all may become 'ambiguous' in a context. If,
therefore, the occasion is abstracted from, all forms must be treated
verbally as ambiguous formulae, which may be used in different senses.
If it is, nevertheless, attempted to deal with their actual meaning on
any given occasion, what its maker meant the words to convey must be
discovered, and the inquiry at once becomes 'psychological'--that is to
say, 'extralogical.'

2. If judgments are not to be verbal ('propositions'), but real
assertions which are actually meant, they must proceed from personal
selections, and must have been chosen from among alternative
formulations because of their superior value for their maker's purpose.
But all this is plainly an affair of psychology. So inevitable is this
that a truly formal Ideal of 'Logic' would exclude all judgment whatever
from the complete system of 'eternal' Truth. For from such a system no
part could be rightly extracted to stand alone. Such a selection could
be effected and justified only by the exigencies of a human thinker.

The impotent verbalism of the formal treatment of judgment appears in
another way when the question is raised _how_ a 'true' judgment is to be
distinguished from a 'false.' For the logic