He sees you arrive.  You occupy for him the place of the verb in relation to the object which interests him.  He passes from this object to you.  Although you are not the object which engrosses him, there is a progression in the interest, because he knows that through you he will learn what this piece of furniture is.  “Tell me what this is!” he cries.

You strike the piano; it gives forth an accord.  O heavens, how beautiful!  He is greatly moved, he utters many expressions of delight, and now he would not burn the instrument.

Here is a progression.  At first the piece of furniture interests him; then its owner still more; at last the attributes of the piano give it its entire value.

But why six degrees upon the last term?  The value of a fact comes from its limitation; the knowledge of an idea also proceeds from its limitation.  A fact in its general and vague expression, awakens but little interest.  But as it descends from the genus to the species, from the species to the individual, it grows more interesting.  It comes more within our capacity.  We do not embrace the vast circle of a generic fact.

Let us take another proposition:  “A flower is pleasing.”

1            2        3456
--------- Flower           is      pleasing ------
|  |   |                                       |   |
|  |   |        3                       7      |   |
|  |   +-- of the forest               very ---+   |
|  |                                               |
|  |            4                                  |
|  +--------- this                +----------------+
|                                 |
|               5            8 ---+
+----------- little     +-- but
|
+——­+
1  |         2         6             9
it-+         is       faded         Oh!

The word flower alone says nothing to the imagination.  Is it a rose or a lily of the valley?  The expression is too vague.  When the idea of genus is modified by that of species, we are better satisfied.

Let us say:  “The flower of the forest.”  This word forest conveys an idea to the mind.  We can make our bouquet.  We think of the lily of the valley, of the violet, the anemone, the periwinkle.  This restriction gives value to the subject. Forest is more important than the verb which does not complete the idea, and less important than pleasing.  Therefore we place 3 upon forest, and shall rank pleasing from 3 to 4, since it closes the assertion.

If we individualize by the word this, we augment the value by giving actuality to the word flower. This has more value than the forest, because it designates the subject.  Hence this has four degrees.

As pleasing forms the very essence of our proposition, we are obliged to give it five degrees.

The idea is still somewhat vague.  If I specify it still further by saying this little flower, little has a higher value than all the other words.