All relatives, then, if properly defined, have a correlative.I add this condition because, if that to which they are related is stated as haphazard and not accurately, the two are not found to be interdependent.Let me state what I mean more clearly.Even in the case of acknowledged correlatives, and where names exist for each, there will be no interdependence if one of the two is denoted, not by that name which expresses the correlative notion, but by one of irrelevant significance.The term 'slave,' if defined as related, not to a master, but to a man, or a biped, or anything of that sort, is not reciprocally connected with that in relation to which it is defined, for the statement is not exact.Further, if one thing is said to be correlative with another, and the terminology used is correct, then, though all irrelevant attributes should be removed, and only that one attribute left in virtue of which it was correctly stated to be correlative with that other, the stated correlation will still exist.If the correlative of 'the slave' is said to be 'the master', then, though all irrelevant attributes of the said 'master', such as 'biped', 'receptive of knowledge', 'human', should be removed, and the attribute 'master' alone left, the stated correlation existing between him and the slave will remain the same, for it is of a master that a slave is said to be the slave.On the other hand, if, of two correlatives, one is not correctly termed, then, when all other attributes are removed and that alone is left in virtue of which it was stated to be correlative, the stated correlation will be found to have disappeared.
For suppose the correlative of 'the slave' should be said to be 'the man', or the correlative of 'the wing"the bird'; if the attribute 'master' be withdrawn from' the man', the correlation between 'the man' and 'the slave' will cease to exist, for if the man is not a master, the slave is not a slave.
Similarly, if the attribute 'winged' be withdrawn from 'the bird', 'the wing' will no longer be relative; for if the so-called correlative is not winged, it follows that 'the wing' has no correlative.
Thus it is essential that the correlated terms should be exactly designated; if there is a name existing, the statement will be easy; if not, it is doubtless our duty to construct names.When the terminology is thus correct, it is evident that all correlatives are interdependent.
Correlatives are thought to come into existence simultaneously.This is for the most part true, as in the case of the double and the half.The existence of the half necessitates the existence of that of which it is a half.Similarly the existence of a master necessitates the existence of a slave, and that of a slave implies that of a master; these are merely instances of a general rule.Moreover, they cancel one another; for if there is no double it follows that there is no half, and vice versa; this rule also applies to all such correlatives.Yet it does not appear to be true in all cases that correlatives come into existence simultaneously.The object of knowledge would appear to exist before knowledge itself, for it is usually the case that we acquire knowledge of objects already existing; it would be difficult, if not impossible, to find a branch of knowledge the beginning of the existence of which was contemporaneous with that of its object.
Again, while the object of knowledge, if it ceases to exist, cancels at the same time the knowledge which was its correlative, the converse of this is not true.It is true that if the object of knowledge does not exist there can be no knowledge: for there will no longer be anything to know.Yet it is equally true that, if knowledge of a certain object does not exist, the object may nevertheless quite well exist.Thus, in the case of the squaring of the circle, if indeed that process is an object of knowledge, though it itself exists as an object of knowledge, yet the knowledge of it has not yet come into existence.Again, if all animals ceased to exist, there would be no knowledge, but there might yet be many objects of knowledge.