Universal rhetoric is a central concept in Charles Sanders Peirce's philosophy. According to Peirce, the main purpose of universal rhetoric is to consider questions of Inquiry in the context of community,[1] and "the very origin of the conception of reality shows that this conception ultimately involves a COMMUNITY, without definite limits, and capable of a definite increase of knowledge."[2]
Peirce alternatively called it speculative rhetoric,[3] general rhetoric, formal rhetoric, objective logic, or methodeutic.[4] It constitutes the third and last branch of his general theory of signs.[3] [4]