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PARTISAN REVIEW
ond [pragmatist] tradition takes science as one (not especially privileged nor
interesting) sector of culture, a sector which ... only makes sense when
viewed historically (pp.92-3). Li terature has now displaced religion, science,
and philosophy as the presiding discipline of our culture ... (p.155).
SH:
Mr. Peirce?
CSP:
[I] desire to rescue the good ship Philosophy for the service of
Science from the hands of lawless rovers of the sea of li terature ... (5.449).
RR: A few Dovably old-fashioned prigs] will even claim to write in a
clear, precise, transparent way, priding themselves on manly straightfor–
wardness, on abjuring "literary" devices
(EHO,
p.86).
CSP:
As for that phrase "studying in a literary spirit" it is impossible to
express how nauseating it is to any scientific man ... (1.33).
RR: As soon as a program to put philosophy on the secure path of science
succeeds, it simply converts philosophy into a boring academic specialty
(PMN, pp.384-5).
CSP:
In order to be deep it is requisite to be dull ... The new pragma–
tists ... are
lively .
..
(5.17). The apostle of Humanism [E
C.
S. Schiller,
like you] says that professional philosophi sts "have rendered philosophy
like unto themselves, abstruse, arid, abstract, and abhorrent." But I con–
ceive that some branches of science are not in a heal thy state if they are
not
abstruse, arid, and abstract, in which case, ... it will be as Shakespeare
said ...
Not harsh and crabbed, as dull fools suppose,
But musical as is Apollo's lute ... (5.537).
The reader may find the matter [of my "Minute Logic"] so dry, husky
and innutri tious to the spiri t that he cannot in13gine that there is any
human good in it.... But the fault is his. It shall not be more tedious than
the multiplication table, ... and as the multiplication table is worth the
pains of learning, ... so shall this be ... (2.15).
SH:
Professor Rorty, your view of philosophy as a genre of li terature puz–
zles me; surely pragmatism is a form of empiricism?
RR: Pragmatism has gradually broken the historical links that once con–
nected it to empiricism ... (PPJ), p.4).
CSP:
The kind of philosophy which interests me and must, I think, inter–
est everybody is that philosophy, which uses the most rational methods it
