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We know that 'being' is only the verb of existence, the copula, the most general symbol of relation, the first and most meagre of abstractions; but to some of the ancient philosophers this little word appeared to attain divine proportions, and to comprehend all truth.
The copula is the sign denoting that there is an affirmation or denial; and thereby enabling the hearer or reader to distinguish a proposition from any other kind of discourse. Dismissing, for the present, the copula, of which more will be said hereafter, every proposition, then, consists of at least two names; brings together two names, in a particular manner.
This is one step: there must, it seems, be two things concerned in every act of belief. But what are these Things? They can be no other than those signified by the two names, which being joined together by a copula constitute the Proposition.
Galvanism forms the transition to living nature, in which through the operation of the "copula" these three dynamical categories are raised to organic categories.
That the employment of it as a copula does not necessarily include the affirmation of existence, appears from such a proposition as this, A centaur is a fiction of the poets; where it cannot possibly be implied that a centaur exists, since the proposition itself expressly asserts that the thing has no real existence.
In such a case as this, the verb expresses predication and nothing else, and is called a copula. But, in the great majority of verbs, the word is the sign of a complex idea, and the predication is expressed only by its form. Thus in "silver shines," the verb "to shine" is the sign for the feeling of brightness, and the mark of predication lies in the form "shine-s."
It is apt to be supposed that the copula is something more than a mere sign of predication; that it also signifies existence. In the proposition, Socrates is just, it may seem to be implied not only that the quality just can be affirmed of Socrates, but moreover that Socrates is, that is to say, exists.
Like the combining power of Life, the copula here resists for awhile the attempts to dissolve it, and then yields, to reappear in new phenomena. It is a wonderful property of the human mind, that when once a momentum has been given to it in a fresh direction, it pursues the new path with obstinate perseverance, in all conceivable bearings, to its utmost extremes.
There the affections are formed in the first instance, not by any reference to works or deeds, but by an unmerited rescue from death, liberation from slavish task-work; by faith, gratitude, love, and affectionate contemplation of the exceeding goodness and loveliness of the Saviour, Redeemer, Benefactor: from the affections flow the deeds, or rather the affections overflow in the deeds, and the rewards are but a continuance and continued increase of the free grace in the state of the soul and in the growth and gradual perfecting of that state, which are themselves gifts of the same free grace, and one with the rewards; for in the kingdom of Christ which is the realm of love and inter-community, the joy and grace of each regenerated spirit becomes double, and thereby augments the joys and the graces of the others, and the joys and graces of all unite in each; Christ, the head, and by his Spirit the bond, or unitive 'copula' of all, being the spiritual sun whose entire image is reflected in every individual of the myriads of dew-drops.
The publisher, of course, was Andrew Millar; and the actual day of issue, as appears from the General Advertiser, was December the 19th, although the title-page, by anticipation, bore the date of 1752. There were two mottoes, one of which was the appropriate "Felices ter & amplius Quos irrupta tenet Copula;" and the dedication, brief and simply expressed, was to Ralph Allen.
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