Secondly, take the case when we are given a criterion of application for a new word, say ‘toovy’; in particular, let the sentence ‘this thing is toovy’ be true if and only if the thing is quadrangular. (It is irrelevant in this context whether the criterion is explicitly stated or whether we derive it by observing the affirmative and the negative uses of the word.) Then we will say: the word ‘toovy’ is synonymous with the word ‘quadrangular’. And we will not allow its users to tell us that nevertheless they ‘intended’ something else by it than ‘quadrangular’; that though every quadrangular thing is also toovy and conversely, this is only because quadrangularity is the visible manifestation of toovyness, but that the latter itself is a hidden, not itself observable property. We would reply that after the criterion of application has been fixed, the synonymy of ‘toovy’ and ‘quadrangular’ is likewise fixed, and that we are no further at liberty to ‘intend’ this or that by the word.
Let us briefly summarize the result of our analysis. Let ‘a’ be any word and ‘S(a)’ the elementary sentence in which it occurs. Then the sufficient and necessary condition for ‘a’ being meaningful may be given by each of the following formulations, which ultimately say the same thing:
1 The empirical criteria for ‘a’ are known.
2 It has been stipulated from what protocol sentences ‘S(a)’ is deducible.
3 The truth-conditions for ‘S(a)’ are fixed.
4 The method of verification of ‘S(a)’ is known.
Many words of metaphysics, now, can be shown not to fulfil the above requirement, and therefore to be devoid of meaning … [An] example is the word ‘God’. Here we must, apart from the variations of its usage within each domain, distinguish the linguistic usage in three different contexts or historical epochs, which, however, overlap temporally. In its mythological use the word has a clear meaning. It, or parallel words in other languages, is sometimes used to denote physical beings which are enthroned on Mount Olympus, in Heaven or in Hades, and which are endowed with power, wisdom, goodness and happiness to a greater or lesser extent. Sometimes the word also refers to spiritual beings which, indeed, do not have manlike bodies, yet manifest themselves nevertheless somehow in the things or processes of the visible world and are therefore empirically verifiable. In its metaphysical use on the other hand, the word ‘God’ refers to something beyond experience. The word is deliberately divested of its reference to a physical being or to a spiritual being that is immanent in the physical. And as it is not given a new meaning, it becomes meaningless. To be sure, it often looks as though the word ‘God’ had a meaning even in metaphysics. But the definitions which are set up prove on closer inspection to be pseudo-definitions. They lead either to logically illegitimate combinations of words, or to other metaphysical words (e.g. ‘primordial basis’, ‘the absolute’, ‘the unconditioned’, ‘the autonomous’, ‘the self-dependent’ and so forth), but in no case to the truth conditions of its elementary sentences …
Just like … ‘God’, most of the other specifically metaphysical terms are devoid of meaning, e.g. ‘the Idea’, ‘the Absolute’, ‘the Unconditioned’, ‘the Infinite’, ‘the being of being’, ‘non-being’, ‘thing in itself’, ‘absolute spirit’, ‘objective spirit’, ‘essence’, ‘being in itself ’, ‘being-for-itself’, ‘emanation’, ‘manifestation’… etc. These expressions are in the same boat as our previously fabricated example ‘teavy’. The metaphysician tells us that empirical truth-conditions cannot be specified; if he asserts that nevertheless he ‘means’ something, we show that this is merely an allusion to associated images and feelings which, however, do not bestow a meaning on the word. The alleged statements of metaphysics which contain such words have no sense, assert nothing, are mere pseudo-statements …
Having found that many metaphysical statements are meaningless, we confront the question whether there is not perhaps a core of meaningful statements in metaphysics which would remain after elimination of all the meaningless ones.
Indeed, the results we have obtained so far might give rise to the view that there are many dangers of falling into nonsense in metaphysics, and that one must accordingly endeavour to avoid these traps with great care if one wants to do metaphysics. But actually the situation is that meaningful metaphysical statements are impossible. This follows from the task which metaphysics sets itself: to discover and formulate a kind of knowledge which is not accessible to empirical science.
We have seen earlier that the meaning of a statement lies in the method of its verification. A statement asserts only so much as is verifiable with respect to it. Therefore a sentence can be used only to assert an empirical proposition, if indeed it is used to assert anything at all. If something were to lie, in principle, beyond possible experience, it could be neither said nor thought nor asked.
(Meaningful) statements are divided into the following kinds. First there are statements which are true solely by virtue of their form (‘tautologies’ according to Wittgenstein; they correspond approximately to Kant’s ‘analytic judgements’). They say nothing about reality. The formulae of logic and mathematics are of this kind. They are not themselves factual statements, but serve for the transformation of such statements. Secondly there are the negations of such statements (‘contradictions’). They are self-contradictory, hence false by virtue of their form. With respect to all other statements the decision about truth or falsehood lies in the protocol sentences. They are therefore (true or false) empirical statements and belong to the domain of empirical science. Any statement one desires to construct which does not fall within these categories becomes automatically meaningless. Since metaphysics does not want to assert analytic propositions, nor to fall within the domain of empirical science, it is compelled to employ words for which no criteria of application are specified and which are therefore devoid of sense, or else to combine meaningful words in such a way that neither an analytic (or contradictory) statement nor an empirical statement is produced. In either case pseudostatements are the inevitable product …
Our claim that the statements of metaphysics are entirely meaningless, that they do not assert anything, will leave even those who agree intellectually with our results with a painful feeling of strangeness: how could it be explained that so many men in all ages and nations, among them eminent minds, spent so much energy, nay veritable fervour, on metaphysics if the latter consisted of nothing but mere words, nonsensically juxtaposed? And how could one account for the fact that metaphysical books have exerted such a strong influence on readers up to the present day, if they contained not even errors, but nothing at all? These doubts are justified since metaphysics does indeed have a content; only it is not theoretical content. The (pseudo)statements of metaphysics do not serve for the description of states of affairs, neither existing ones (in that case they would be true statements) nor non-existing ones (in that case they would be at least false statements). They serve for the expression of the general attitude of a person towards life.
… The metaphysician believes that he travels in territory in which truth and falsehood are at stake. In reality, however, he has not asserted anything, but only expressed something, like an artist. That the metaphysician is thus deluding himself cannot be inferred from the fact that he selects language as the medium of expression and declarative sentences as the form of expression; for lyrical poets do the same without succumbing to self-delusion. But the metaphysician supports his statements by arguments, he claims assent to their content, he polemicizes against metaphysicians of divergent persuasion by attempting to refute their assertions in his treatise. Lyrical poets, on the other hand, do not try to refute in their poem the statements in a poem by some other lyrical poet; for they know they are in the domain of art and not in the domain