When we are to prove a conclusion, we must take a primary
essential predicate-suppose it C-of the subject B, and then suppose
A similarly predicable of C. If we proceed in this manner, no
proposition or attribute which falls beyond A is admitted in the
proof: the interval is constantly condensed until subject and
predicate become indivisible, i.e. one. We have our unit when the
premiss becomes immediate, since the immediate premiss alone is a
single premiss in the unqualified sense of 'single'. And as in other
spheres the basic element is simple but not identical in all-in a
system of weight it is the mina, in music the quarter-tone, and so
on--so in syllogism the unit is an immediate premiss, and in the
knowledge that demonstration gives it is an intuition. In
syllogisms, then, which prove the inherence of an attribute, nothing
falls outside the major term. In the case of negative syllogisms on
the other hand, (1) in the first figure nothing falls outside the
major term whose inherence is in question; e.g. to prove through a
middle C that A does not inhere in B the premisses required are, all B
is C, no C is A. Then if it has to be proved that no C is A, a
middle must be found between and C; and this procedure will never
vary.
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