laws are
of relations among the various items of knowledge. Aristotle's
category of Relation is a fourth kind of relation not to be
confused with the others. "Father--son," "uncle--nephew,"
"slave--master," are _relata_ in Aristotle's sense: "father,"
"uncle" are homogeneous counter-relatives, varieties of
kinship; so "slave," "freeman" are counter-relatives in social
status.]

[Footnote 2: Dr. Caird's _Hegel_, p. 134.]

[Footnote 3: See article on Counter-Sense, _Contemporary
Review_, April, 1884.]

PART IV.

THE INTERDEPENDENCE OF PROPOSITIONS.--MEDIATE INFERENCE.
--SYLLOGISM.

CHAPTER I.

THE SYLLOGISM.

We have already defined mediate inference as the derivation of a
conclusion from more than one proposition. The type or form of a
mediate inference fully expressed consists of three propositions so
related that one of them is involved or implied in the other two.

Distraction is exhausting.
Modern life is full of distraction
[.'.] Modern life is exhausting.

We say nothing of the truth of these propositions. I purposely choose
questionable ones. But do they hang together? If you admit the first
two, are you bound in consistency to admit the third? Is the truth of
the conclusion a necessary consequence of the truth of the premisses?
If so, it is a valid mediate inference from them.

When one of the two premisses is more general than the conclusion, the
argument is said to be Deductive. You lead down from the more general
to the less general. The general proposition is called the Major
Premiss, or Grounding Proposition, or Sumption: the other premiss the
Minor, or Applying Proposition, or Subsumption.

Undue haste makes waste.
This is a case of undue hasting.
[.'.] It is a case of undue wasting.

We may, and constantly do, apply principles and draw conclusions
in this way without making any formal analysis of the propositions.
Indeed we reason mediately and deductively whenever we make any
application of previous knowledge, although the process is not
expressed in propositions at all and is performed so rapidly that we
are not conscious of the steps.

For example, I enter a room, see a book, open it and begin to read. I
want to make a note of something: I look round, see a paper case,
open it, take a sheet of paper and a pen, dip the pen in the ink
and proceed to write. In the course of all this, I a