But the question may be propounded in a different manner,—more precise and more embarrassing. I formulate it thus: the generic image is never, the concept is always a judgment. We know that for logicians (formerly at any rate) the concept is the simple and primitive element; next comes the judgment, uniting two or several concepts; then ratiocination, combining two or several judgments. For the psychologist, on the contrary, affirmation is the fundamental act; the concept is the _result_ of judgments (explicit or implicit), of similarities with exclusion of differences. If in addition to this we recall what was said above: that speech commences with phrases only, that in its simplest form it is the word-phrase; then the debated question may be thus transformed: Is there, between the generic image and judgment in its lower forms, a break in continuity, or a passage by slow transformation? For the partisans of the first theory, the appearance of judgment is a “passage of the Rubicon” (Max Müller). It is as impossible to deny this as to affirm it positively and indisputably. Romanes, who makes a stand against the “passage of the Rubicon,” admits the following stages in the development of signs, taken as indicative of the development of intelligence itself. 1. The indicative sign; gesture or pronominal root; a dog barking for a door to be opened, etc. 2. The denotative sign which is affixed to particular objects, qualities, or actions; for example, the parrot which on seeing a person utters the name of the person, or some word which it has associated with him, and which for the animal has become the distinctive mark of the person. 3. The connotative or attributive sign, which, rightly or wrongly, is attributed to an entire class of objects having a common quality; for instance, the child which applies the word _star_ to everything that shines. 4. The denominative sign; or the intentional employment of the sign as such, with a full appreciation of its value; for example, the word _star_ in its meaning to the astronomer. 5. The predicative sign, or a proposition formed by the apposition of two denominative signs.[72] This hierarchical order, while in some measure open to criticism, indicates at least schematically the progressive passage from the concrete to the higher abstractions, and may therefore be accepted. It is clear that the two first stages scarcely pass beyond the concrete.