[...]... alien mode of thought but is also tied to his own presuppositions Furthermore, for the historian of philosophy the problem becomes even more acute, because philosophy is both fixed in a certain time and seeks universal validity The history of philosophy is both philosophy and history and will always express the interpretation of a particular age of a particular past, and the historian of philosophy. .. distinction often depends on the editor’s discretion Warnings of this sort are the immediate consequence of general principles of textual criticism and source criticism To these must be added the interpretative difficulties Antiquity was itself able to furnish histories of problems—often of high standard—and collections of material—sometimes on a most unambitious level—but hardly a history of philosophy. .. certain view of the physical world and of man’s moral obligations Already in Plato there is awareness of the tradition Since his time, philosophy has been tied up with its own history This history has often served as a self-evident background; yet just as often philosophers have deliberately sought to return to the ancients, and in every case something new has been the outcome Until the end of the eighteenth... judged in light of what could and would endure The general cultural and social background will, to some extent, be considered—especially in the earliest period and at the transition from Antiquity to 8 INTRODUCTION Christianity—but this book is primarily a presentation of the history of philosophy It does not pretend to be a history of science or a general history of ideas PART I PRESOCRATIC PHILOSOPHY. .. from religious language, the language of poetry, and everyday speech 20 2 IONIAN NATURAL PHILOSOPHY The birthplace of philosophy, Miletus, was from the beginning of historical times a Greek settlement on the south-western coast of Asia Minor (Ionia) In about 600 BC it was one of the most flourishing trading cities of the Greek world, the mother city of a number of colonies and with trade relations... practical application In fact, theoretical knowledge, just as the life of a free man, has its purpose in itself These Aristotelian considerations about the philosophy of history and sociology of knowledge are telling, even though they are not, strictly speaking, dependent on his definition of the nature of philosophy To Aristotle, as to Plato, philosophy comes about because men wonder and without prejudice... (the Origin of the Gods) Of the genesis of the world he writes: Verily first of all did Chaos come into being, and then broad-bosomed Gaia [earth], a firm seat of all things for ever, and misty Tartaros in a recess of broad-wayed earth, and Eros, who is fairest among immortal gods, looser of limbs, and subdues in their breasts the mind and thoughtful counsel of all gods and all men Out of Chaos, Erebos... modern historian of philosophy must combine an Aristotle’s preoccupation with problems with a Diogenes’ simple eagerness to collect facts, and he must in addition bring to his task that sympathy and historical distance, which at happy moments have been the hallmarks of humanistic scholarship Until about 1800 AD history of philosophy was by and large confined to doxography Hegel’s history of philosophy. .. The philosophy of such a period does not become understandable by mere paraphrase To gain access to the conceptual world of the past with the conceptual apparatus of our own time requires considerable balance—and that not least with respect to the philosophy of the earliest period THE EVIDENCE It may be appropriate to begin with some comments on the philological background for the interpretation of ancient. .. texts, both with respect to the very nature of technicalphilological work and to the kinds of surviving sources The latter is connected with the question of Antiquity’s understanding of itself The literature of Antiquity is but a torso to us Major parts have been lost, and the first printed editions of ancient texts in the Renaissance were based on transcripts of transcripts made throughout the long period .