The last chapter of Part One’s historical quartet traces the development of Pyrrhonism across medieval, Renaissance, and early modern philosophy. Extending the work of Charles B. Schmitt, Richard H. Popkin, Luciano Floridi, et al., the chapter assesses the sceptical thought of Montaigne and devotes subsequent sections to the Pyrrhonian dimensions of work by François de La Mothe le Vayer, Pierre Gassendi, Pierre Bayle, and Pierre-Daniel Huet. Because Hume is typically understood to be anti-Pyrrhonian, Chapter Four develops a three-plank justification for attributing deeply Pyrrhonian dimensions to his work. Plank one is bibliographic and argues that Hume enjoyed access to Pyrrhonian texts and likely used them. Plank two argues for a hermeneutic of suspicion when reading Hume, largely grounded in the hostility he and others faced on account of their supposed scepticism. Plank three is conceptual and argues that Hume’s work exhibits philosophical qualities remarkably similar to those of historical Pyrrhonism. Synthesizing the results of Part One of Hume’s Scepticism, Chapter Four closes with a twelve-point General Framework defining scepticism generally.
