The Correspondence of Charles S. Peirce and the Open Court Publishing Company, 1890–1913

698 Pages·2022·16.53 MB·English

by  Robinson, Stetson J.

The Correspondence of Charles S. Peirce
and the Open Court Publishing Company,
1890–1913
Peirceana
Edited by
Francesco Bellucci and Ahti-Veikko Pietarinen
Volume 5
The Correspondence of
Charles S. Peirce and the
Open Court Publishing
Company, 1890–1913
Edited by
Stetson J. Robinson
ISBN 978-3-11-076868-8
e-ISBN (PDF) 978-3-11-076875-6
ISSN 2698-7155
Library of Congress Control Number: 2022941947
Bibliographic information published by the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek
The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliografie;
detailed bibliographic data are available on the Internet at http://dnb.dnb.de.
© 2022 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston
Typesetting: Jukka Nikulainen
Printing and binding: CPI books GmbH, Leck
www.degruyter.com
Charles S. Peirce (1839–1914), from
SunandShade,August1892(Courtesy
ofPeirceEditionProject)
Paul Carus (1852–1919), OCP editor, Edward Hegeler (1835–1910), OCP
from frontispiece of The Gospel of founder,ca.1900,fromfrontispieceof
Buddha,1894(CourtesyofSIUSpecial The Open Court, July 1910 (Courtesy
CollectionsResearchCenter) of SIU Special Collections Research
Center)

Contents
ListofFigures|VIII
ThisEdition|IX
Chronology|XXII
1 PeirceandtheOpenCourt|1
2 Letters|20
2.1 PeirceandCarus|20
2.2 PeirceandHegeler|255
2.3 PeirceandMcCormack|311
2.4 PeirceandOtherOCPStaff|337
2.4.1 PartI:Miscellaneous|337
2.4.2 PartII:FredSigrist|362
2.5 PeirceandRussell|371
3 Appendix:EnclosuresandOtherRelatedMaterial|588
3.1 PeirceandCarus|588
3.2 PeirceandHegeler|597
3.3 PeirceandMcCormack|604
3.4 PeirceandRussell|612
BiographicalRegister|618
Bibliography|640
Index|655
List of Figures
Figure1 CarustoPeirce2July1890,onOCPStationeryA.InvitationtocontributetoThe
Monist.|22
Figure2 CarustoPeirce27April1892,onOCPStationeryB.InvitationtohelpwithMach
translation.|40
Figure3 PeircetoCarusearlyNov1896,firsttwopages.ExplanationofPeirce’slogical
characters,withillustrations.SeealsoFigure8,PeircetoMcCormack2Sept
1896.|118
Figure4 CarustoPeirce29March1897,onOCPStationeryC,firstpage.
MisunderstandingwithPeirce’s“OnLogicalGraphs”MS.|131
Figure5 CarustoPeirce30April1910,onOCPStationeryD.EagerrequestforPeirce’s
much-delayed“Illustrations”revisions.|227
Figure6 HegelertoPeirce16March1893,firstpage.The“misdirectedletter”
acknowledgedbyPeirce9April1893andwhichresultedinamiscommunication
betweenthetworegardingthefateofPeirce’s“QuestforaMethod.”|279
Figure7 Peirce’srenderingofillegiblepostmark.|295
Figure8 PeircetoMcCormack2Sept1896,3pages.ExplanationofPeirce’slogical
characters,withillustrations.|334
Figure9 July1890,firstpage.InvitationtocontributetoTheMonist.|381
Figure10 PeircetoRussellca.4Oct1896.Deathnote.|500
Figure11 PeircetoRussell10July1908,pageofomittedset1.Existentialgraphsof
co-identity.|532
Figure12 The“scribbledon”finalsheetofPeircetoRussell5June1909,referencedin
postscript.|584
Figure13 OutlineofPeirce’sproposed“AQuestforaMethod”book(or“Searchfora
Method”),2pages,lateJan–earlyFeb1893.|601
Figure14 AdvertisementbyHenryHolt&Co.forPeirce’sproposed12-volume“The
PrinciplesofPhilosophy,”2-sidedquartobrochure,ca.fall1894.|613
https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110768756-201
This Edition
ScopeandObjective
This edition contains the letters exchanged between Charles S. Peirce and the
OpenCourtPublishingCompany(OCP)from1890to1913,roughlythelasttwenty-
threeyearsofPeirce’slife.OCPpublishedmoreofPeirce’sphilosophicalwritings
thanany other publisher duringhislifetime, andplayed a criticalrole inwhat
littlerecognitionandfinancialincomehereceivedduringthosedifficultyetphilo-
sophicallyrichyears.Thiscorrespondenceisthebasisformuchofwhatisknown
surroundingPeirce’spublicationsinTheMonist andTheOpenCourt,andisref-
erenced ofteninPeirceeditionsdealingwithhislater work.Peirce’sOCPcorre-
spondents includedPaulCarus,editor;EdwardC.Hegeler, founder andowner;
ThomasJ.McCormack,assistanteditorandtranslator;FrancisC.Russell,Chicago
attorney and OCP editorial contractor; and variousother OCP editors and staff
members.Alsoincludedinthisedition(Appendix)areenclosuresandotherma-
terialrelatedtotheletters,withsomeexclusionsnotedinthetext.Notincluded
arelettersexchangedwithintheOCPorganizationthatmakereferencetoPeirce.
Significantportionsofthoselettersarequotedorreferencedineditorialnotes,but
theirentiretyisnotnecessaryforafullaccountofthePeirce–OCPrelationship,
andfornowfallsoutofthescopeofthisedition.
Thedaterangeforthiscorrespondence(1890to1913)isdeterminedbythefirst
andlastextantletters.Whilethebeginningofthecorrespondenceisfairlycertain
in1890,theexactendofthecorrespondenceisdebatable.Thecorrespondence
paused from 1911 to 1913 due to Peirce’s preoccupations and declining health,
andwasrevivedwithabriefexchangebetweenCarusandPeirceinAugustand
September1913.Nootherlettersarefoundandnotextualevidencesuggeststhat
anylettersaremissing,butitispossiblethattheexchangecontinuedinto1914un-
tilPeirce’sdeath.Thiseditiondeterminestheendoftheformalcorrespondence
tobein1913basedontheendoftheextantmaterial,butassumesthatthePeirce–
OCPrelationshipremainedintacttosomedegreeuntilPeirce’sdeath.
Theobjectiveofthiseditionistoprovideforthefirsttimeacompleteandaccu-
ratetextofthisoft-citedcorrespondence,withcontextualannotationandtextual
apparatus.Bysodoing,thiseditionshedscriticallightnotonlyonPeirceandOCP,
butalsoonthecontext,relationships,andconceptsthatinfluencedthedevelop-
mentofProgressiveEraAmericanintellectualhistoryandphilosophy.
https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110768756-202
X | ThisEdition
EditorialMethod
Textandarrangement
Thetextforthiseditioncomesfrommanuscripts,typescripts,andletterpresstype-
scriptcopieshousedinthePeircepapersintheHoughtonLibraryatHarvardUni-
versityandinOCPrecordsintheMorrisLibrarySpecialCollectionsatSouthern
IllinoisUniversity–Carbondale.Mostofthematerialusediswhatwasactuallyex-
changed in correspondence, and the remainder consists of carbon(letterpress)
copiesofmissingtypescripts,second-handOCPcopiesofmissingmanuscriptsor
telegrams,andunsentdraftsofletters. Thelettersarearrangedchronologically
basedondatesprovidedorestimated (typicallythedatealetter waswrittenor
sent,notnecessarilyreceived),exceptforunsentdraftsofletters,whichimmedi-
atelyfollowthefinallettersentevenifpredated(e.g.,anunsentdraftof19July
wouldfollowthesentversionof26August).Multipleunsentdraftsare,however,
orderedaschronologicallyaspossible.Lettersaredividedbycorrespondentin-
steadofconsolidatedasasinglethread,tohighlighttherelationshipsPeircehad
witheachofhisOCPcontacts.Aheadnoteprecedingeachdivisionsummarizes
Peirce’s correspondence with the person and identifies significant themes and
eventsintheirrelationship.Thosewithwhomheheldnoregularcorrespondence,
orunknowncorrespondentswithageneric(typed)“OpenCourtPublishingCom-
pany”byline,aregroupedunder“PeirceandOtherOCPStaff.”Infewcases,letters
signedgenericallybutinaknownhandareincludedinaspecificcorrespondence
where applicable, suchasMcCormackto Peirce9 December 1896 (signed “The
Monist”inhishand).LetterstypedorwrittenbyanOCPamanuensisasdictated
byCarusorHegelerareincludedintheCarusorHegelercorrespondence—such
letterstypicallycontaindictator/transcriberinitialsfollowingthesignature,such
as“PC/N”forPaulCarusdictationtranscribedbyJ.G.Nattinger.Missingletters
(deducedfromthecontextofextantmaterial),gapsincorrespondence,andother
criticalcontextareaddressedininter-lettereditorialnotesenclosedinhorizontal
rules.
Bibliographicalnotes,headings,andclosings
Bibliographicalnotesprecedeeachletterandidentifythesenderandreceiver,the
typeandsourceofthedocument(s),stationeryorpostalinformation,whetherthe
letter wasunsent,externalnotesfoundonthedocument,andanyotherbiblio-
graphicalcontext.Wheremultipledocumentsexistforthesameletter,suchasa
typescriptandanaccompanyingletterpresscopy,thefirstlistedisgivenpriority