4.011 At first sight a proposition--one set out on the printed page, for
example--does not seem to be a picture of the reality with which it is
concerned. But neither do written notes seem at first sight to be a picture
of a piece of music, nor our phonetic notation (the alphabet) to be a
picture of our speech. And yet these sign-languages prove to be pictures,
even in the ordinary sense, of what they represent.


4.012 It is obvious that a proposition of the form 'aRb' strikes us as a
picture. In this case the sign is obviously a likeness of what is
signified.


4.013 And if we penetrate to the essence of this pictorial character, we
see that it is not impaired by apparent irregularities (such as the use
[sharp] of and [flat] in musical notation). For even these irregularities
depict what they are intended to express; only they do it in a different
way.


4.014 A gramophone record, the musical idea, the written notes, and the
sound-waves, all stand to one another in the same internal relation of
depicting that holds between language and the world. They are all
constructed according to a common logical pattern. (Like the two youths in
the fairy-tale, their two horses, and their lilies. They are all in a
certain sense one.)


4.0141 There is a general rule by means of which the musician can obtain