That I. may be simply converted may be seen in Fig. 3, which represents the least that an I. proposition can mean; and that E. may be simply converted is manifest in Fig. 4.

As for O., we know that it cannot be converted, and this is made plain enough by glancing at Fig. 1; for that represents the O., Some ruminants are not hollow-horned, but also shows this to be compatible with All hollow-horned animals are ruminants (A.).  Now in conversion there is (by definition) no change of quality.  The Converse, then, of Some ruminants are not hollow-horned must be a negative proposition, having ‘hollow-horned’ for its subject, either in E. or O.; but these would be respectively the contrary and contradictory of All hollow-horned animals are ruminants; and, therefore, if this be true, they must both be false.

But (referring still to Fig. 1) the legitimacy of contrapositing O. is equally clear; for if Some ruminants are not hollow-horned, Some animals that are not hollow-horned are ruminants, namely, all the animals between the two ring-fences.  Similar inferences may be illustrated from Figs. 3 and 4.  And the Contraposition of A. may be verified by Figs. 1 and 2, and the Contraposition of E. by Fig. 4.

Lastly, the Inverse of A. is plain from Fig. 1—­Some things that are not hollow-horned are not ruminants, namely, things that lie outside the outer circle and are neither ‘ruminants’ nor ‘hollow-horned.’  And the Inverse of E may be studied in Fig. 4—­Some things that are not-horned beasts are carnivorous.

Notwithstanding the facility and clearness of the demonstrations thus obtained, it may be said that a diagrammatic method, representing denotations, is not properly logical.  Fundamentally, the relation asserted (or denied) to exist between the terms of a proposition, is a relation between the terms as determined by their attributes or connotation; whether we take Mill’s view, that a proposition asserts that the connotation of the subject is a mark of the connotation of the predicate; or Dr. Venn’s view, that things denoted by the subject (as having its connotation) have (or have not) the attribute connoted by the predicate; or, the Conceptualist view, that a judgment is a relation of concepts (that is, of connotations).  With a few exceptions artificially framed (such as ’kings now reigning in Europe’), the denotation of a term is never directly and exhaustively known, but consists merely in ‘all things that have the connotation.’  If the value of logical training depends very much upon our habituating ourselves to construe propositions, and to realise the force of inferences from them, according to the connotation of their terms, we shall do well not to turn too hastily to the circles, but rather to regard them as means of verifying in denotation the conclusions that we have already learnt to recognise as necessary in connotation.