FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   118   119   120   121   122   123   124   125   126   127   128   129   130   131   132   133   134   135   136   137   138   139   140   141   142  
143   144   145   146   147   148   149   150   151   152   153   154   155   156   157   158   159   160   161   162   163   164   165   166   167   >>   >|  
ight course to take, if it be a practical matter. But analytic thought has made no tracks, and we cannot justify ourselves to others. In ethical, psychological, and aesthetic matters, to give a clear reason for one's judgment is universally recognized as a mark of rare genius. The helplessness of uneducated people to account for their likes and dislikes is often ludicrous. Ask the first Irish girl why she likes this country better or worse than her home, and see how much she can tell you. But if you ask your most educated friend why he prefers Titian to Paul Veronese, you will hardly get more of a reply; and you will probably get absolutely none if you inquire why Beethoven reminds him of Michael Angelo, or how it comes that a bare figure with unduly flexed joints, by the latter, can so suggest the moral tragedy of life.... The well-known story of the old judge advising the new one never to give reasons for his decisions, 'the decisions will probably be right, the reasons will surely be wrong,' illustrates this. The doctor will feel that the patient is doomed, the dentist will have a premonition that the tooth will break, though neither can articulate a reason for his foreboding. The reason lies embedded, but not yet laid bare, in all the previous cases dimly suggested by the actual one, all calling up the same conclusion, which the adept thus finds himself swept on to, he knows not how or why."[42] The small boy who said that he could not keep step because he had a cold in his head was relying on a sound general truth, _Colds in the head make one stupid_, for his major premise, but his condition prevented his disentangling it; and all of us every day use minor premises for which we should be incapable of stating the major. A second practical use of the syllogism is to set forth a chain of reasoning in incontrovertible form. If you have a general principle which is granted, and have established the fact that your case certainly falls under it, you can make an effective summing up by throwing the reasoning into the form of a syllogism. Conversely, you can use a syllogism to bring out some essential part of the reasoning of an opponent which you know will not commend itself to the audience, as did Lincoln in his debate with Douglas at Galesburg. Douglas had defended the Dred Scott decision of the United States Supreme Court, which decided that the right of property in a slave is affirmed by the United States Constitu
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   118   119   120   121   122   123   124   125   126   127   128   129   130   131   132   133   134   135   136   137   138   139   140   141   142  
143   144   145   146   147   148   149   150   151   152   153   154   155   156   157   158   159   160   161   162   163   164   165   166   167   >>   >|  



Top keywords:
reason
 

reasoning

 

syllogism

 
general
 

reasons

 

United

 

States

 

Douglas

 

decisions

 

practical


premise

 
calling
 

condition

 
prevented
 
previous
 

suggested

 

stupid

 

actual

 

disentangling

 

relying


conclusion

 

audience

 

Lincoln

 

debate

 

commend

 
essential
 

opponent

 

Galesburg

 

property

 

decided


affirmed

 

Constitu

 
Supreme
 

defended

 

decision

 

Conversely

 

incontrovertible

 

stating

 

incapable

 

premises


principle
 
effective
 

summing

 

throwing

 

granted

 
established
 

surely

 
ludicrous
 
dislikes
 

helplessness