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A letter from Charles S. Peirce to Samuel Barnett dated Dec 20, 1909 is reprinted. The letter describes Peirce's early philosophical reading and other aspects of his intellectual development in detail, providing a fuller intellectual autobiography than any previously published work. The letter is in the collection of the Emory University Library. Introductory notes discuss Peirce's early reading, scientific work, philosophic views and personal aspects related to the correspondence with Barnett.

The influence of scepticism on the development of modern philosophy included a new form of religious scepticism that first arose in the early 17th century. Sceptical arguments figured in disputes between Catholics and Protestants and between Christians and Jews. Fideism, quietism and deism incorporated sceptical arguments into their religious views. The long ascendancy of Christianity in Europe came to be seen as the result of a conspiracy of priests and rulers, which could only be corrected by political revolution. The last four and a half centuries of Western intellectual history have been dominated by problems of scepticism.

Richard Watson's discussion of shadow history in philosophy seems to put historians and philosophers in competition over the interpretation of the past. However, a historian's work gains its position based on the quality of its scholarship, whereas the influence of a philosopher's version of the past depends on how it is treated by philosophers in the future and is always subject to change. Some of the confusion between philosophy and history of philosophy could be cleared up if philosophers would either strive for greater historical accuracy or deal with ideas without reference to history.

Paul Oskar Kristellar (1904-1999) was an eminent scholar of renaissance philosophy. Kristellar studied under Martin Heidegger, was a member of the faculty of Columbia University until his retirement in 1973, and was a founding member of the Renaissance Society of America, later serving as president.

A letter from Etienne Le Moine to Bishop Pierre-Daniel Huet, dated July 20, 1677, counters the usual benign view of the philosopher Baruch de Spinoza as a lovable, sweet person. The letter, number 1014 in a collection of Huet's papers in the Medici Library in Florence, Italy, reports negatively on Spinoza's character. Le Moine's remarks indicate that he had had some contact with Spinoza during the last year of his life. Le Moine was regarded by Huet as honest and a good judge of character, and thus his comments may point to a previously unknown side of Spinoza.