From the moment we select a datum the remaining data are of no import to us, and they need not be mentioned. The selection of one datum is logically identical with the rejection of the rest, and this is therefore not a conclusion from that.--'Do you take tea or coffee?'--'Tea, please.'--'Then I conclude you do not take coffee.'--A person who would 'conclude' in this fashion would be justly deemed irrational. The choice of the tea is a fact, and the rejection of the coffee is the same fact otherwise expressed, so that the rejection cannot be a rational conclusion.--'My doctor sends me off every winter to Nice, Algiers, or Egypt; but I never go to Algiers or Egypt.'--There is no occasion to say, 'therefore you go to Nice'; that has been already announced as a matter of fact and is not susceptible of inference. For the sake of verbal emphasis we might remark, 'So it is to Nice you go', but this is not logically requisite. Whately's examples of this kind of theorem are exactly of the model just given.--'Either the earth is eternal, or the work of chance, or the work of an intelligent Being; it is not eternal, nor the work of chance, _therefore_ it is the work of an intelligent Being.' This is put forward in all gravity as a specimen of reasoning. It is plain that if we know the premises as matters of fact, we also know the proposed conclusion as a matter of fact. There is no occasion to reason about it. The Aristotelian hypothetical can be reduced to arithmetical subtraction. Suppose we put five balls into a bag and afterwards take out three without seeing the remainder: is the judgment that two balls remain in the bag a logical inference? No--it is matter of fact. Since we last perceived the objects they have undergone diminution, but that does not confer on what is left of them the imaginary character proper to a rational conclusion. What remains is as much fact--recollected but not imaginary fact--as before the subtraction. Whately's next example is--'It is either spring, summer, autumn, or winter; but it is neither spring nor summer; therefore it is either autumn or winter.' This is aggravated fallacy. Not only is it mere subtraction, but the remainder is _perceived_--not recollected, as in the preceding case. The actual season of the year is a known fact, and is not rendered more certain by an inference drawn from the absence of some other season. Arguments have no validity as against matters of fact, and add nothing to their authority. Fact is above, and independent of, argument. The example just cited may be paralleled thus--'The cards in my hand are either spades, hearts, clubs, or diamonds; but they are neither spades nor hearts; therefore they are either clubs or diamonds'.--I _see_ that they are either clubs or diamonds: the perceptual judgment renders the rational--imaginary--judgment superfluous. Reason is intended to supplement experience--not to supersede it. XX--DEBATE