Greek tragedy era philosophy

Author: (German) Nietzsche, translated by Li Chaojie
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2006-12-01
Features: For people distant from us, we need only understand their purposes to judge them as a whole. For people close to us, we judge them based on the means they use to achieve their goals: we often condemn their purposes but like them for the methods or ways they employ to fulfill their wishes. Only for their founders are philosophical systems entirely correct. For all subsequent philosophers, these systems are often a great error, and to those of lower intellect, they are a mixture of truth and falsehood. But ultimately, these systems are a mistake and can therefore be discarded. Thus, many criticize all philosophers because the philosophers' purposes differ from their own; philosophers are distant from them. Conversely, whoever likes great men will also like these systems. Even if they are completely wrong, they still have undeniable aspects, a personal touch and hue. People can use this touch and hue to obtain the portrait of a philosopher, just as one can infer the soil conditions of a place from its plants. In summary, this way of life, this perspective on human affairs has existed and is therefore possible: "systems" are the plants of this soil, or at least part of the system is so. The author will briefly narrate the history of those philosophers: the author will merely extract from each system that which constitutes a part of the "personality" that history must preserve and belongs to the undeniable and irrefutable. This is a beginning, aimed at regaining and reshaping those temperaments through comparison, so that the polyphonic music of Greek temperament can once again resound. Its task lies in clarifying what we must always "cherish" and "revere," which is also what no subsequent knowledge can take away from us: this is the greatness of man.