Pragmatism as a principle of method, like the Mendelian laws of heredity, lay for decades in oblivion. It was brought to light and to the world's notice in 1898 by William James, who by his wonderful literary style immediately gave it the widest currency. The doctrine was originally proposed in 1878 by C. S. Peirce in a paper for the Popular Science Monthly entitled "How To Make Our Ideas Clear." This article was the second of six on the general topic. "Illustrations of the Logic of Science." The other articles of the series were respectively called "The Fixation of Belief," "The Doctrine of Chances," "The Probability of Induction," "The Order of Nature," and "Induction, Deduction, and Hypothesis." In the famous discussion of How To Make Our Ideas Clear, Peirce pointed out that by a _clear_ idea is meant, according to the logicians, one which will be recognized wherever it is met with, so that no other will be mistaken for it. But since to do this without exception is impossible to human beings, and since to have such acquaintance with the idea as to have lost all hesitancy in recognizing it _in ordinary cases_ amounts only to a subjective feeling of mastery which may be entirely mistaken, they supplement the idea of 'clearness' with that of 'distinctness'. A distinct idea is defined as one that contains nothing which is not clear. By the _contents_ of an idea logicians understand whatever is contained in its definition, so that an idea is _distinctly_ apprehended, according to them, when we can give a precise definition of it, in abstract terms. Here the professional logicians leave the subject, but it is easy to show that the doctrine that familiar use and abstract distinctness make the perfection of apprehension, "has its only true place in philosophies which have long been extinct", and it is now time to formulate a method of attaining "a more perfect clearness of thought such as we see and admire in the thinkers of our own time". The action of thought is excited by the irritation of a doubt, and ceases when belief is attained; so that the production of belief is the sole function of thought. As thought appeases the irritation of a doubt, which is the motive for thinking, it relaxes and comes to rest for a moment when belief is reached. But belief is a rule for action, and its application requires further thought and further doubt, so that at the same time that it is a stopping place it is also a new starting place for thought. The final upshot of thinking is the exercise of volition. "The essence of belief is the establishment of a habit, and different beliefs are distinguished by the different modes of action to which they give rise. If beliefs do not differ in this respect, if they appease the same doubt by producing the same rule of action, then no more differences in the manner of consciousness of them can make them different beliefs, any more than playing a tune in different keys is playing a different tune."