PROPOSITION LXVI.

Logical Distinction is of two kinds.

In every instance in which no real Distinction is discoverable but only a Distinction of concepts, there is either a difference between the objective, as well as the subjective or formal, concepts; or there is no difference between the objective, but only between the formal, concepts. If the former, the Distinction is conceptual; if the latter, it is a specifically logical Distinction. An explanation of these terms will afford a sufficient declaration of the Thesis. The intellect can at its pleasure evoke and duplicate its concepts, and may exhibit them under different logical forms; even when the representation in each concept is precisely the same, and the object one and the same. Thus, when Henry is predicated of himself or when the Judgment is formed that he is identical with himself, there is the same adequate concept of the same entity repeated. The only Distinction between the two concepts is, that the one occupies the place of Subject, the other the place of Predicate in a Judgment. Perhaps the same may be said of the two ideas, Good and Goodness; which can scarcely be said to differ, save as the abstract and concrete representations of the same object. For, though the Transcendental relation to a Subject of inhesion is more explicitly represented in the concrete than in the abstract; still, it is necessarily included in the latter as well as in the former. Thus the only Distinction between the two would be reduced to a difference of the mould or form in which the two concepts were cast; and it is, accordingly, resolved into a piece of intellectual play. Such a Distinction is said to be purely logical.

But again, the intellect can, and repeatedly does, represent to itself the same object under different aspects; in which case the representations and, in consequence, the objective concepts, are conceptually distinguished from each other. For it must not be forgotten that, when the concept is real, the objective concept is that reality in the object, which is covered by the subjective or formal concept in virtue of its representation. Thus, when the mind pronounces Judgment that man is a rational animal, it is plain that the two concepts which occupy the places respectively of Subject and Predicate in this Judgment, though they represent the same object and represent it wholly, nevertheless differ in their representation. For the one exhibits the object as a whole; the other exhibits the essential constituents of that whole. So, when a dog is cognized as a quadruped, the same object is represented, now as a whole, now exclusively under the form of a particular property or attribute. Once more; when we say that the intellect or intuitive faculty differs from the reason or ratiocinative faculty, the Subject and Predicate are really representative of the same object; and the Judgment is only justified by the fact, that the same faculty of the soul is represented, in the two concepts, under two partial forms which correspond with its two distinct manners of operation. Lastly, it is theologically true to affirm that the Divine Mercy is not the Divine Justice; yet these two concepts are representative of the same infinite, indivisible Reality. There is not, there cannot be, any real Distinction of the sort in the Object. Nevertheless, the two representations are not the same; for God, conceived as Mercy, is not the same as God, conceived exclusively as Just. This is called Conceptual Distinction, to distinguish it from the preceding, which, in conformity with the Kantian precision of the term, has been called logical, or purely logical, Distinction.

It follows from the preceding declarations that, in the latter kind of mental Distinction, the object represented affords grounds, in some way or other, for those different representations of itself; which are the foundation of Conceptual Distinction. The diversity of the concepts is not, as it is in purely logical Distinction, a mere difference in the form of thought; it is not, therefore, a simple fabrication of the intellect. It is motived; and the motive is to be found in the reality represented. This may account for the two terms respectively applied by the School to these two species of Distinction; viz. distinctio rationis ratiocinantis and distinctio rationis ratiocinatae, which it would be difficult to represent in an English dress. The nearest approach to it perhaps would be to call the former a Distinction of the mind motiving, the latter a Distinction of the mind motived. In the one case, the Distinction is solely a product of the mind's activity; in the other case, the mind is first acted upon by the nature of its object, and is in some way moved by it to form the differing Concepts. There is, in the reality presented for thought, something which justifies the distinct representations. Hence, this kind of Distinction has received the name of mental Distinction with a real foundation, to distinguish it from the former, which is designated as purely mental Distinction.

In order to avoid possible confusion it may be necessary to add, that, in the case of a Distinction which is rationis ratiocinantis, the difference between the two concepts is to be found solely in the logical form, or mode of thought, not in the representative or material element of each concept. But, in the case of a Distinction rationis ratiocinatae, the representative or material element of each concept is different; and, as the object of itself is supposed to be one and the same, the reality in the object which is formally represented by one concept, is distinguished from the reality which is formally represented by the other concept; i.e. the objective concepts differ. This is the reason why I have called the former, logical; the latter, conceptual.