Predicables.

Predicables. This is a term in the scholastic logic connected with the scheme of classification. There were five designations employed in classifying objects on a systematic plan: genus, species, difference (differentia), property (proprium), and accident (accidens). The first two—Genus and Species—name the higher and lower classes of the things classified; a Genus comprehends several Species. The other three designations—Difference, Property, Accident—express the attributes that the classification turns upon. The Difference is what distinguishes one species from the other species of the same genus; as, for example, the peculiarities wherein the cat differs from the tiger, lion, and other species of the genus felis. The Property expresses a distinction that is not ultimate, but a consequence of some other peculiarity. Thus, 'the use of tools' is a property of man, and not a difference, for it flows from other assignable attributes of his bodily and mental organisation, or from the specific differences that characterise him. The Accident is something not bound up with the nature of the species, but chancing to be present in it. Thus, the high value of gold is an Accident; gold would be gold though it were plenty and cheap. See CATEGORIES, GENERALISATION.