22 JULY 1989, Page 23

Sir: A propos of Ayer's intellectual jeux d'esprit (if that

is all they were) a friend of his protests at 'the educated public's hostil- ity to analytical philosophy'.

I am reminded of the visit of the great Renaissance scholar, Scaliger, to the mediaeval Sorbonne. The guide said to him, 'This is where the great philosophers and theologians have disputed for three hundred years.'

Scaliger said, 'And, pray, what have they settled?'

A. L. Rowse

St Austell, Cornwall