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In connection with this distinction between perception and conception , we may as well consider the subject of apperception , a term favored by many modern psychologists, although others steadfastly decline to recognize its necessity or meaning and refuse to employ it. Apperception may be defined as: "perception accompanied by comprehension; perception accompanied by recognition." The thing perceived is held to be comprehended or recognized—that is, perceived in a new sense , by reason of certain previously acquired ideas in the mind. Halleck explains it as: "the perception of things in relation to the ideas which we already possess." It follows that all individuals possessed of equally active organs of perception, and equally active attention, will perceive the same thing in the same way and in the same degree. But the apperception of each individual will differ and vary according to his previous experience and training, temperament and taste, habit and custom. For instance, the familiar story of the boy who climbed a tree and watched the passers-by, noting their comments. The first passer-by noticing the tree, says aloud: "That would make a good stick of timber." "Good morning, Mr. Carpenter," said the boy. The next man said: "That tree has fine bark." "Good morning, Mr. Tanner," said the boy. Another said, "I bet there's a squirrel's nest up in that tree." "Good morning, Mr. Hunter," said the boy.

The woman sees in a bird something pretty and "cunning." The hunter sees in it something to kill. The ornithologist sees it as something of a certain genus and species, and perhaps also as something appropriate for his collection. The farmer perceives it to be something destructive of either insects or crops. A thief sees a jail as something to be dreaded; an ordinary citizen, something useful for confining objectionable people; a policeman, something in the line of his business. And so on, the apperception differing upon the previous experience of the individual. In the same way the scientist sees in an animal or rock many qualities of which the ordinary person is ignorant. Our training, experience, prejudices, etc., affect our apperception.

And so, we see that in a measure our concepts are determined not only by our simple perceptions, but also materially by our apperceptions. We conceive things not only as they are apparent to our senses, but also as colored and influenced by our previous impressions and ideas. For this reason we find widely varying concepts of the same things among different individuals. Only an absolute mind could form an absolute concept.

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In logic the words concept and term are practically identical, but in the popular usage of the terms there is a distinct difference. This difference is warranted, if we depart from the theoretical phase of logic, for the word concept really denotes an idea in the mind, while the word term really denotes a word or name of an idea or concept—the symbol of the latter. In a previous chapter we have seen that Denomination, or "the act of naming or designating by a name" is the final step or stage in forming a concept. And it is a fact that the majority of the words in the languages of civilized people denote general ideas or concepts. As Brooks says: "To give each individual or particular idea a name peculiar to itself would be impracticable and indeed impossible; the mind would soon become overwhelmed with its burden of names. Nearly all the ordinary words of our language are general rather than particular. The individuals distinguished by particular names, excepting persons and places, are comparatively few. Most objects are named only by common nouns; nearly all of our verbs express general actions; our adjectives denote common qualities, and our adverbs designate classes of actions and qualities. There are very few words in the language, besides the names of persons and places, that do not express general ideas."

In logic the word term is employed to denote any word or words which constitute a concept . The word concept is employed strictly in the sense of a subject of thought , without reference to the words symbolizing it. The concept , or subject of thought, is the important element or fact and the term denoting it is merely a convenient symbol of expression. It must be remembered that a term does not necessarily consists of but a single word, for often many words are employed to denote the concept, sometimes even an entire clause or phrase being found necessary for the current term . For the purpose of the consideration of the subjects to be treated upon in this book, we may agree that: A term is the outward symbol of a concept ; and that: The concept is the idea expressed by the term .

There are three general parts or phases of Deductive Logic, namely: Terms, Propositions and Syllogisms. Therefore, in considering Terms we are entering into a consideration of the first phase of Deductive Logic. Unless we have a correct understanding of Terms, we cannot expect to understand the succeeding stages of Deductive Reasoning. As Jevons says: "When we join terms together we make a Proposition; when we join Propositions together, we make an argument or piece of reasoning.... We should generally get nothing but nonsense if we were to put together any terms and any propositions and to suppose that we were reasoning. To produce a good argument we must be careful to obey certain rules, which it is the purpose of Logic to make known. But, in order to understand the matter perfectly, we ought first to learn exactly what a term is, and how many kinds of terms there may be ; we have next to learn the nature of a proposition and the different kinds of propositions. Afterwards we shall learn how one proposition may by reasoning be drawn from other propositions in the kind of argument called the syllogism."

Now, having seen that terms are the outward symbols or expression of concepts, and are the names of things which we join together in a proposition, let us proceed to consider the different kinds of terms, following the classifications adopted by the authorities.

A term may contain any number of nouns, substantive or adjective or it may contain but a single noun. Thus in, "Tigers are ferocious," the first term is the single substantive "tigers;" the second term is the single adjective "ferocious." And in the proposition, "The King of England is the Emperor of India," there are two terms, each composed of two nouns, "King of England" being the first term and "Emperor of India" being the second term. The proposition, "The library of the British Museum is the greatest collection of books in the world," contains fifteen words but only two terms ; the first term being "The library of the British Museum," in which are two substantives, one adjective, two definite articles and one preposition; the second term being, "the greatest collection of books in the world," which contains three substantives, one adjective, two articles, and two prepositions. The above illustration is supplied by Jevons, who adds: "A logical term, then, may consist of any number of nouns, substantive or adjective, with the articles, prepositions and conjunctions required to join them together; still it is only one term if it points out, or makes us think of a single object, or collection, or class of objects ." (A substantive, is: "the part of speech which expresses something that exists, either material or immaterial.")

The first classification of terms divides them into two general classes, viz. , (1) Singular Terms; and (2) General Terms.

A Singular Term is a term denoting a single object, person or thing. Although denoting only a single object, person or thing, it may be composed of several words; or it may be composed of but one word as in the case of a proper name, etc. The following are Singular Terms, because they are terms denoting but a single object, person or thing: "Europe; Minnesota; Socrates; Shakespeare; the first man; the highest good; the first cause; the King of England; the British Museum; the Commissioner of Public Works; the main street of the City of New York." It will be noted that in all of the examples given, the Singular Term denotes a particular something, a specific thing, a something of which there is but one, and that one possesses particularity and individuality. As Hyslop says: " Oneness of kind is not the only or distinctive feature of Singular Terms, but individuality , or singularity, as representing a concrete individual whole."