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CHAPTEE
INSUFFICIENCY OF THE OLD AND OUTLINES OF A NEW
DEMONSTRATION.
15. Cases which are not comprised among the old estdb-
lished meanings of the Principle.
FEOM the summary given in the preceding chapter we
gather, that two distinct applications of the principle
of sufficient reason have been recognized, although very
gradually, very tardily, and not without frequent relapses
into error and confusion : the one being its application to
judgments, which, to be true, must have a reason ; the
other, its application to changes in material objects, which
must always have a cause. In both cases we find the
principle of sufficient reason authorizing us to ask why ? a
quality which is essential to it. But are all the cases in
which it authorizes us to ask why comprised in these two
relations? If I ask: Why are the three sides of this
triangle equal ? the answer is : Because the three angles
are so. Now, is the equality of the angles the cause of the
equality of the sides? No; for here we have to do with
no change, consequently with no effect which must have a
cause. Is it merely a logical reason ? No for the ; equality
of the angle is not only a proof of the equality of the
sides, it is not only the foundation of a : judgment mere
conceptions alone would never suffice to explain why the
sides must be equal, because the angles are so ; for the
conception of the equality of the sides is not contained in
that of the equality of the angles. Here therefore we