Literary notes about POLEMIC (AI summary)
In literature, “polemic” is employed as a term for writing that takes a combative stand against opposing ideas, a style that often intertwines passionate critique with intellectual rigor. Writers use it to denote works that not only engage in fierce doctrinal debates—whether critiquing philosophical giants like Kant [1] or countering established religious views [2]—but also to describe the broader literary mode of constructing arguments with incisive clarity, as seen in the portrayal of arguments as "pointed" or "energetic" [3, 4]. Some authors deliberately choose a polemic style to challenge prevailing ideologies or to foreground contentious issues in science, economics, and theology [5, 6, 7]. Moreover, historical works have been noted to favor a polemic approach to better underline their critical purpose, distinguishing such writings from more neutral treatises [8, 9].
- But not to interrupt and complicate my own exposition by a constant polemic against Kant, I have relegated this to a special appendix.
— from The World as Will and Idea (Vol. 1 of 3) by Arthur Schopenhauer - Luther published a scathing polemic against it, and renewed his appeal, made two years before, to an œcumenical council.
— from Church History (Volumes 1-3) by J. H. (Johann Heinrich) Kurtz - Well, it is a pointed form of polemic, the argumentum ad absurdum .
— from Voltaire: A Sketch of His Life and Works by G. W. (George William) Foote - Voltaire's polemic cannot be described as anti-religious, for he himself was a theist.
— from Religion and Science from Galileo to Bergson by J. C. (John Charlton) Hardwick - Much of the polemic writing against it is by men who have as yet failed to take it into their imaginations.
— from The Principles of Psychology, Volume 1 (of 2) by William James - The polemic is directed against the individualistic psychology, which regards mental states as a mere succession of events.
— from A Review of the Systems of Ethics Founded on the Theory of Evolution by Cora May Williams - His previous essays and in general the polemic literature of the subject are fully referred to in his footnotes.
— from Pragmatism: A New Name for Some Old Ways of Thinking by William James - in 12mo.; an elaborate and pleasing work, had not the author preferred the character of a polemic to that of a philosopher.
— from The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire by Edward Gibbon - ; an elaborate and pleasing work, had not the author preferred the character of a polemic to that of a philosopher.
— from The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire by Edward Gibbon
