Heidegger Contra Cassirer

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Such remarks muld very well be dismissed were i t not for thewide meamre of acceptance they have received.

Discussion Between Ernst Cassirer and Martin Heidegger, A. Translated by Fr.Slade. In: N. Langiulli (ed.), The Existential Tradition: Selected Writings. NewYork: Doubleday, 197 1. (1 929e)

A Disczcssion Between Emst Cassiretand Martin Heidegger"

Ttmzslated by Francis Slade

[P. 17.1 CASSIRER:?lnt does Heidegget understand by Ne6Kantianism? Who is the opponent whom Heidegger has inmind? T h e concept "NedCantianism" must not he defined sub

stantially, but functionally. What is a t issue is not t h e characterof that philosophy as a dogmatic doctrinal system, but a way offormulating the question.

HEIDECCER:f Iam

to begin by naminnnames,

I will men-1 T h e following piece is a translatian of "ArMtsgerneinsehaft

CassimHeideggcrV' printed in Guido Scbneeberger, E r g Z m ~ g e nrrc eim Heideggdikliaglraphie, Bern, 1960, pp. r7-27) and i s a

record of the discussion betwem C a d @ and Heidegger which tmkplace a t Dams, Switzerland, in March 1929 during the semn,dDa~asec Hochscbulkurse. Since this record was made by ~ W O

auditors of the discussian, the statements contained in whatis here

translated under the title "A Discussion Between Ernst Csslrer andMartin Heidegger" do not represent the written statements either o f

Cassirer or of Heidegger. However, thev do not contradict the knownan d a c h m 1 d g e d views of dtha of t h e philosophers. Contrastingaccounts o f this encounter between Cassim and Heidegger a n befound in Hendrick J. Pos, "RecoIleaions of Ernst Caszirer" in ThePhilosophy of E m drer, &tied by Paul A. Sehilpp, New York,1949, pp. 67-69 and in Straus, uKurr Riezler: In hkrnm5am"in What I s Polirieal: PhiIosqhy# Glencoe (Illinois), ~ g b o , p. 245-246. Also of interest i s the account gimn in T. Cassim, Aus winemLehm m i t E m arsirer, New York, 1950, m. 67-167.

T h e maslator wishes to thank Joseph Carpino and T h o m a s Pmkrfor their many comments and suggestions during the course of theprepmeion of this transladon. H e would also like to acknowledge th e

generodty of U7illi Schmidt who read parts of this tanslation andmade suggestions for its improvement.

Discussion Between Ernst Cassirer and Martin Heidegger, A. Translated by Fr.Slade. In: N. Langiulli (ed.), The Existential Tradition: Selected Writings. NewYork: Doubleday, 1971. (1929e)



tion M e n , Windelband, Rickert, Erdrnann, Riehl. Whs t i s

common to every form of Neo-Kantianisrn can only be under-stood in terms of i t s origin. This is the embarrassing dilemma of

philosophy before the question of what still really remains to i t[as a field of inquiry12 within the totality of knowledge. Thereappeared to remain only the knowledge about science, not of"that-which-is" [das Seiende]. It w a s this paint of view t h a t de-f i n d the movement back to Kant. Kant was seen as the theoreti-cian of the mathematico-physical theory of knowledge. Kan t,

however, did not wish to provide a theory of natural science, butto show the problematic of metaphysics, more specifically ofontology. My intention is to wmk this essential content of thepositive basis of the Critique of Pure Reason into ontology. B yreason of my interpretation of the Dialectic as ontology, I believethat th e problem of Being [Sein] in the Transcendental Logic,seemingly only negative in Kant, i s really a positive problem.

C A S ~ ~ R E R :ohen is only undefstcmd correctly if he is under-stood historically, not simply as an epistemologist. I do not con-ceive of my own development as a defection from Gohen. Thepositioning of the mathematical sciences of nature is for me onlya paradigm, not the whole of the problem.-Heidegger and Iare in agreement on one point: for Kant the ~roductive magina-don is of central significance. I have been led to this through

my work on the symbolic. T h e imagination is the relation ofall thinking to intuition, synthesis speciosa. The synthesis i s thefundamental power of thought. W h a t matters far Kant i s

the synthesis which makes use of the species. [P. 8J And thisleads to the heart of he image-concept: o f th e ~ymbolancept .

-Kant's major problem is h w s freedom pmsiile. Kant saysthat we conceive only that freedom is inconceivable. And yett 1 a m i s the Kanrian ethics. T h e categorical imperative ought tobe such that the moral law holds not only fur men, but for allrational beings in general. The moral as such leads beyond the

2 Material e n c l d within b r a c k ~ ~ ] has bem insated by thetranskitor. Material enclosed within pammthe~es ( ) appears in paren-theses in the German tart. Page numbers in brackets an the page

numbers of the German t a t .a Reading "Bildbegriffos" far "BBdmgbe~i ffe" s emended by

Guido Schneeberga in a letter to the editor of th;s anthology.



194 MART'IN HEmEIGGER

wmld of appeatances. 'Wha t is a t snke here is the break-throughto the mundus intelligibilis. In the ethical m!m a point isreached which is n o longer relative to the finitude of the cagniz-

ing being.-And this ties in with what Heidegger has done.T h e

extraordinary importance of the schematisrn cannot be overesti-mated. Yet in tbe ethical realm Kant suppresses the schematism.Far he say o u r concepts are "senses of . ." [Einsicbten] (notcognitions), Usen- of . . ." which can na longer be schema-tized. There i s at most a typology, not a schematism, of PracticalReason. For Kent the schematism i s a tminus a quo, not a

t m i m ~ d q m . Kanis point of departure i s the problemposed by Heidegger. However* this citcle widened for Kant.Heidegger has made the p i n t that ou r cognitive power is finite.It is relative and confined. But haw does such a finite beingattain howledge, reason, truth?-Heidgget formulates the probIem o f truth and says there cannot be any truths in themselves,or eternal truths, but truths are always relative to Dasein. ForKant, on the other hand, this was exactly the prablm. Cmntedthis finitude, how can there be r n c e s a r y and universal truths?

Now are synthetic judgmen~ picri ossible? 'That i s the prob-lem which Kant exemplifies with mathematics. Finite copitionhvolves itself with truth, but this relationship again works intoa " m d y " [i.e., is qualified] (?) H e i d e w has said that Kanthas given no demonstration of tbe possibility of mathematics.But this problem is posed in the Pmtegomena. Once more, then,this pure theoretical question, how does a finite being come to

a determination of objects which as such are not limited byfinitude, must fint of a l l be clarified.-My question now is this:

Does Heidegger wish to renounce this complete objectivity, thisfonn of absoluteness, which Kant has s d ar in the realmsof the ethical and the theoretical and in the CMqw of Judgmmt?

H m ~ ~ c o r r ~ :o begin with the q u d o n of the mathematicalsciences of nature* [P. 19.1 In Kant nature does not mean anobject d he mathematical science of nature, but rather the to-

tality OF"thatwhich-iS in f i e s e n s e OF the presenwt-hand [dasG m e des Seienden im Sinm des Vorhmrdenen]. Kant means

"that-which-is" as mch without limimtim to s determinate areaof "that-which-is." W h a t I want to show is that the Analytic is



not an ontology of nature ss object of natural science, but ageneral ontology, that i 5 a mitically hsed metaphysics generalis.Kant himseIf saps that the problematic of she P~olegomena s

not the centraI theme. This is , rather, the question concerningthe possibility of a m z i a p h y k generalis, more exactly, of its= a h a t i o n . - C s l s h wants to &OW further tha t fmitade is tmn-xended in the ethical writings. There is something in the cat*gon'ca1 imperative which exceeds the finite being. Yet preciselythe concept of the imperative displays in itself the inner relationto a finite being. Even this transcendence s t i l l remains within

finitude. For Kant human reason is completely dependent u pitself and cannot escape from i ~ l fnto an eternal and ahlutenor into the world of things. Thk "In-between" is the essence

of practical zeason. One goes astray in the interpretation. of theKaTatian ethics i f m e does not see the inner E u n d ~ n f the Lawfo r Dasein. Certainly there is something in the m d aw whichgoes beyond sensibility. However, the question is, what i s the

character of the jnner structure of itseIf? Is this S~IU~~U.E

finite or infinite? There lies in this question a redly centcaI pb-lem. Just in that which one puts forward as constitutive infinity,the character of the h i t e comes to light. Kant designates theimagination of the schemarim as exhibitkt o r i g i h . This powerof origination is , i t is true, in a certain way, a creative powerthere, but as exhibitiu it m o t ispense with receptivity. Manis ram infinite and a h l u t e in the matian of "that-which-is"itself [des Seienden ~ e I b ~ t ] ,ut he ir infinite in the s e n e ofthe understanding d Being [des Seins]. This infinity of theontobgical js by its very nature bound to ontic experience, sothat one must say just the opposite: this i n h i t p which breaksforth in the imagination is precisely the most acute argument

for finitude, Ontology is an ndex of finitude.Cod

does not haveit. [i.e., ontoIogy1-The~upon CaJsirer's next question with ref-erence to the concept of truth ax i s* At tbe most profound leveltruth itself is at one with ihe m u c t u r e of tmmcendence & m g hthe fact that Dasein is "something-which-is" which i s open to

other "things-which-sre" and to itself. W e are "somethingwhich-is" thst keeps itselE in the unhiddenness of "that-

which-is." [P. zo.] To keep oneself in th i s way in theopenness of "thatwhich-is" is what I cell Beingin-the-truth



[In-dm-Wahrheitsein]. And I go further. Because of its fini-tude man's Being-in-thetruth is a t the same time a Being-in-the-untruth. Untruth belongs to the inmost core of D ~ e i n .

I believe & at I have found only here the root which establishes a metaphysical explanation for what Kant called "meta-physical illusion."-To take Cassirer's question concerning uni-versalIy valid eternal truths. When J say truth is relativeto Dasein, t h a t is no ontic statement in the sense that whatis m e is always only what the individual man thinks. Th eproposition is metaphysical. Truth as such can only be as truth

if Dasein exists. Only with tbe existence of something such asDasein does tnrth first come about But now to the question:W h a t about tbe validity, the etemitp OF truth? O n e commonlyformulates this question in terms of he problem of validity, i.e.,in t e rms of the asserted proposition. The problem must be

broached differently. Truth is relative to Dasein. T h e ranssub-jectivity of truth, this breaking-out of truth beyond t h e indi-vidual, signifies that ~eing-in-the-truth means to be given averto end to be taken up with "thatwhich-is." W h a t can here be

separated as objective knowledge, taking into account the par-ticular matted-fact individual existence, has a truth contentwhich says something about "that-which-%." T h i s is, however,badly interpreted if i t is said that over against the flow of ex-perience there i s something permanent, the eternal, the mean-ing and concept. At this point, then, I pose the question: W h a t

does eternal really mean here7 Is this eternity not merelypermanence in the sense of the aei [the "forevern] OF time? Is i t

possible only by r e a m of an inner transcendence of time itself?What do a11 those expressions of transcendental metaphysics,a prim+, aei on, ow&$ mean? They are only to be undmtood

end are only possible through the fact that time itself has thecharacter of horizon, so that I have always conjointly in an an-ticipatory remembering stance, s horizon of present, EUturi~,and pastmess, and, consequently, there is given a transcendental-

ontological time determination dthin which alone somethingmch as the permanence of substance is constituted.-My entireinterpretation of temporality f o be understood from this point

of view. The whole problematic in Sein und Zeit, which treatsof the Dasein of man, is no philosophical snthropalogy. It is



DISCUSSXON B E T W E E N CASSIRBR AND HETDEGGER 1197

much tao limited and much too sketchy for that. Here there is aproblematic which has not as such hitherto been broached.T h e question [of Sein tlnd Z e i t ] i s this: if the possibility of the

understanding of "that-which-is"i s

basedon

an understandingof Being, and if this ontological understanding is in some sense

in terms of time [P. 211, hen the task i s to expose the t e m prality af Dasein in terms of the possibility of the understandingof Being. And a l l problems [in Sein 1md Zeit] are in terms o f

this. The analysis of death i s intended to expose in one directionDasein's radical futurity, and not to furnish a final and mea-

physical teaching concerning the essence of death. T h e analysisof dread [Angst] has the sole function of preparing the ques-tion: On she basis of what metaphysical meaning of Dasein it-self is i t possible that man as such can be put before such a thingas Nothjng [das Nichts]? Only if I understand Nothing orDread do I have the possibility of understanding Being. Only in

the unityof the

understanding of Being and Nothing does thequestion of the origin of the ' W y " uddenly arise. This cen-

tral problem of Being, of Nothing, and of the Why, i s the mostelementary, the most concrete problem. T h e entire Analytic ofDusein is directed toward this. A t the same time I pose a furtherquestion of method. In what way must a metaphysics of Das&be initiated? Is there not a definite wer-all view of life

[Weltanschm~.~g] t its basis? I t is not the task of philosaphyto provide such an over-all view of life, though certainly such a

is already the presupposition of the activity of philosophiz-ing. The over-all view o f life which th e philosopher provides isnot a direct m e in the sense of a doctrine, but rests in this, tha t

in the act of philosophizing i t comes about that the transcend-ence of Dmein itself, i.e., the inner possibility gossessed by thisfinite being to be in relation to "that-which-is" in i t s totality, i s

made radical. The question, how is hedm possible, dws notmake sense because freedom is not an object of theoretical com-prehension, but an object of the act of philosophizing. That canmean nothing else than that freedom is, and can only be, in theace of freeing. The sole adequate relation which man has to free

dam is [in terms of] the act by which freedom sets itself free inman.



1 9 ~ MARTIN FtEIQEGGRR

Q d m dd~ese~lo Cassirer (by a student of philosophy):

I . What way can man find to infinity? In what fashion canman participate ia infinity?

Z. Is infinity M be achieved as a privative determination offinitude, or is i t a domain in its own right?

[P. 22.3

3. To what extent should it be the task of philosophy to eF-

fect a liberation from dread, or is it its task to hand man wer

quite radically to dread?

CASSIRER: Ad r . In no other way than through the mediumof F m . The function of Fonn is such that man, while hechanges his existence [ h e i n ] in to Form, i.e., while he has to

transform everything which is in him as experience into somekind of objective structure, does not, i t is true, thereby b m eradically freed from the finitude of the point af departure (Forthis is still definitely related to his finitude), but in so f a t as hiswistmce develops out of finitude, his existence leads finitudeout of itself into something new, immanent infinity. Man can-not make the jump out of his own finitude into a realisticallyunderstood infinity. Howmr, he can have, and must have, ametnbaris which leads him from the i m m d a c y of his o w nexistence into the region of pure F m . H e possesses his in-finity excIusivcly in this Form. Tram the chalice of this realmof spirits, infinity pours forth for him." The reah of spirits isnot a metaphysical realm of spirits. T h e realm of spirits is justthat spiritual m l d which he himhimself has created. That hecould create it is the seal of his infinity,-Ad 2. It i s not only a

privative determinatim, but is a domain in its own right. Not,however, a domain that i s won only in i n f l i c t with finitude, butrather infinity is precisely the totality, the p e r k t fulfillment offinitude itself. And this fulfinment of finitude is just what con-

stitutes infinitg. Thus Coethe's 'Wouldst thou stride into the

4 The h n ext reads: #Aus d m Ke'lche diem Ckistmeichesstrtht ihm die Unmdlichkeit*" Cf. Schiller's poem "Die Freund-

shaft," lines 5 e o ; nd Hegel's Phiinamenulagic dcr Geirtes, con-cluding lines.



infinite, thou hast but to go in the finite in every direction."'Ad 3. T h a t is a question which goes right to the mots, and one

can answer it only with a kind of pmksion of faith. Philosophy

has allowed man to become free just x, far as he can becomefree. Thereby i t frees him radically, to be sure, from dread as apure state of feeling. T h e aim i s liberation in this sense : *Castthe anxiety of the terrestrial from yourselves." That is the posi-tion of Idedirm which I have myself always p f d .

HEIDHOCER:n his first lecture Cassirer has used the expres$ions tennixus a qm m d tmmhw ad q m . One couldthat the terminus ad quem is a complete Philosophy OFCulturein the sans of a dadicalpjon of h e wholeness of the Fom of astructure-cteating cansciouwess. T h e xm~i+l*; qw h Cassireris completely [P. 23.1 My podtion is the o pposite: the m i n z r r a quo i s my central problematic The que+

tioni s

whether the terminus ad quemis

just as clear for me.This, I h d d , consists not in a mmp1ete Philosophy of Culture,but in rbe question: t i to on? T h e problematic of a metaphysicsof Dasein, for me, grows out of this question. Or, o come onceagain to the heart of the Kant interpretation, I attempted to

show that to s taa from a concept of the logos is not quite suchan obvious p d u ~ut, on the mntrary, that the question of

the pmsibihty of metaphysics requixes a metaphysics of D d nitself, in such a way that the question, what man is, doem'thave to be a n m d 0 much in he sense of an anthropologicalsystem, but that this question must f i s t of all be d l y clarifiedwith mipet to the perspective in which it wi l lbe posed. A= theconcepts tenninzcs a quo and t m m i m s ad qum only a heuristicformulation of the question or are they based in rbe essence o f

philosophy itself? This problematic does not seem to me to bc

clearly worked out in Cassirer's philosophy up till now. W h a tmatters first of all for Csssirer is to expose the diEennt Forms OF

the fom-giving activity and then, subsequendy, to push h d

fTom there into a certain dimension of the b m a t a t i n g p e ~

themselves. Now one muld say i t follows t h a t t h i s dimen-

sion is stiIl basically the same as that which I call Dasein.6"Gott, Gemtit und Welt," Spr ikhe In Rcimtm



This would be wrong, however. T h e difference appean mostclearly in the concept of freedom. I have spoken of an a c t of

freeing in the sense that the setting free o f the inner transcend-

ence of Dasein is the very character ofthe

act of philosophizing.And h a he real meaning of this act of reeing consists in be-coming free for the finitude of Dmeis entering directly intothe thrownness [Gworfenheit] of Dasein. I have not givenf d o m to m y d f although I can be the self that I m onlythrough being free. The self that I am, however, n ow not inthe sense of a n undiRerentiated ground of explanation, but in

the sense that Dasein is the really fundamental event in whichthe act of exisring of man, and with t h a t , every ofexistence as such essentially comes about.-I believe that what Idesignate with the term Dnsdn cannot be translated by one ofCaniret's concepts. W h a t I call D&n i s e m t i a l l y characterizcd not only through that which is designated as "spirit," oras "life; bt rather i t is the original unity and the immanents ~ ~ c t u r e f the relatedness of a man who, in his shacklednessto the body, stands in a special boundness with 'that-which-is"[P. 41, in the sense that Dasein as bee, thrown in the midstof "thatulhich-is:' effects a breaking-in to "thatuvhich-is," abreaking-into which is always historically in the final sense for-tuitous; x, fortuitous that man exists at the highhest point of bisown pwibil i ty only in a wry faK moments of Dwa'fi's durationbetween life and death.-ln all my philosophical work I havecompletely left out of consideration the traditional form anddivision of the philosophical disciplines, because I believe tha torienting oneself in terms of these constitutes the greatest snarein the way of getting hck to the inner pbIemstic af philoso-phy. Neid~a lato nor Aristode knew anything about such adivision in phikmphy. This was an affair of the Schools. EfFoais required to break through these disciplines and to come backagain to the @ ta l ly metaphysical mode of Being of the re

spective areas [underlying these disciplines]. Art is not merely aForm of the foment ing consciousness, rather art has itself ametaphysical sense within the fundamental event tha t Dasdnitself- i s . 4 have intentionally stressed these differences. T h e

work that really has to be done is n o t helped by smoothing themover. For h e sake of clarity I would like K, place o u r entire



divrussion once more under the sign oE Ksnt's Critique of PzueRmm, and once more to fm upon the question, what man is ,

as the central question. This question need not be put anthm-pocentrically, but it must be shown, &rough the fact tha t manis the being who transcends, i.e., i s open o "that-which-is" in itstotality and to himself, that by means of this eccentric characterman i s also a t the same time put into the totality of "that-which-is" as such. The question and the idea of a philosophicala n & m p 1 0 ~ as this meaning. not that of investigating manempiricalIy as a given object. Rather i t has to be motivated out

of the central problematic of philosophy itself which must leadman back beyond himself into the whole of "that-which-is," inorder to make manifet to him, for all his freedom, the nothing-ness of his Dmei7t. T h i s nothingness is not an inducement to

p~simirm nd dejection, but to the understanding of this,namely, that there is genuine activity only where there is opps

sition aad that philosophy has the task of thrct*g man backinto the h a d n s of his fate from out u# the sofmess of one whomerely lives off the work of the spirit.

[P. 5.1 CASSWR: believe it has already herome dearer inwhat the opposition m i s t s . It is, howeverp not fruitful to s h e sthis opposition repeatedly. We ere a t a point where little is to begained through purely logical arpmtmts. It seems, then, we arecondemned here to some sort of relativity. Howwer, we maynot persist in this relativity which would place empirical manin the center, W h a t Heidegger said st the end was most im-portant. His position cannot be a n t h m ~ a i cither. And then,I ask, where now ies the common center in our opposition? Wedo not need to look for this. For we have this center, and wehave i t indeed because there i s one ccnnmcm objective human

world in which, although the differences of individuals are inno way cancelled, a bridge is built from individual to indiridusl.T h a t I 6nd again and again in the primal phenomenon of lan-guage. Everyone speaks his own language, and yet we under-stand one another through the medium of language. There issomething such as the language, something such as a unity overand above the endlessly different ways of speaking. Thesein lies

the decisive pdint for me. And therefore I s t a d f*orm the ob-jectivity of the symbolic Form because here "the inmnceivabIe



26 2 M A RT I N FIEIDEGGER

is schieved,"fl That is what I should like to a11 the world OFobjective spirit. There is no other way from one existence[Dasein] to another existence [DmeinJ than through this world

of Form.If

it did not exist, then I would not h a w how such athing as a common understanding could be. Cognition, too, istherefore simpfy only a basic instance of this position, becausean objective assertion is formulated which no longer takes intoconsidera tion the subjectivity of the particular individual.-Hei-degger has correctly said t h a t the fundaments1 question of hismetaphysics i s the same one which formed Plata and Aristotle:

VVhat is, "bat-which-is*? And he has a i d fu&m that Kantonce again took up with this question. However, here an essen-tial difference seems to me to obtain, which i s in fact what Kantcalled the Copernican revolution. The question o f being seemsto me, I admit, to be in no way eliminated as a result of thisrevolution. However, the question of being acquires a muchmore complicated form. In what daes that rmolurion consist?The question of how objects are determined is preceded by a

question about the constitution of the being of a n objectivity assuch. W h a t is new in this revolution seems to me to lie in this,that there is now no longer r single such structure of being,-

but rather t h a t we have completely different structures o f be-ing. [P. 6.1 Each new st ru et u e of. being has new a priori p r e

suppositions. Kant s h m s h o w levmy kindOF

new Form alwaysbean upon a new world of objectivities. In that way a wholenew multiplicity enters into the problem of the object as such.By that means rhe old dogmatic metaphysics becomes the newKantian metaphysia Tbe being of the old metaphysics wassubstance, that onc which underlies. In the new metaphysicsbeing is in my language no longer the being of a substance,

but the being that proceeds from n manifold of bct imal determinations and meanings. Arid here appears to me to lie theessential point of distinction of my position in opposition toHeidegger.-I hoId to the Kantian formulation of the questionof the transmdenta1. The essential o f the trarascendentd

a ' r l le German text, in quotation marks here, reads: W d himnhdar Unbegr&#liche getmr* ist, It seems intended to recall "DmUnberehrcibliehe, Him ist cr gemM n F a t , Part IL



DISCUSSION B&TWT!EN CASSIRER kND HEIDEGGEIR 203

methad lies in this, tha t i t begins with s given. T h u s X inquireinto the possibility of the given called 'language." How is i t nm-

ceivable that we as one existence [Dasein] to another can under-stend

each other inthis

medium?Or,

howjs

i t possiblethat we

are able to see at all a work of a n as an objective determinatething? This question must be solved. Perhaps not all questionsin philosophy are to be solved an this basis. I believe that onlyif one has posed this question does he gain access to Heidegger's formulation of the question.

H B ~ B G G E R :O epeat Plato's question cannot mean that wef a l l back upan the answer of he Creeks. Being itself i s splinteredinto a multiplicity, and a central problem consists in gaining aposition from which to understand the inner diversity of theways of Being out of the idea of Being.-Just reconciling &Eer-ences will never be reaIly producthe. It is the eaence of phi-losophy, as a finite affair of man, that i t is limited within thefinitude of man. Since philosophy is concerned with the wholeof man and the highest in man, this finitude must show itselfin m a completely radical manner+-What mattersto me is that you retain this one thing Emm our confrontation:don't fasten on our differences as the disagffements of individ-uals engaged in philosophy, but rather come to feel that we areonce again on the way towards taking seriously the cenml ques-tion of metaphysics. W h a t you see bere on a small scale, thedifference of individuals engaged in philosophy within theunity of the pblIematic, i s also to be found, though quite dif-ferently, on e large scaIe [P. 271; and that is just the essentialthing in canfronting the history of philosophy, to see how t i s

precisely the differentiating of standpoints which is th e mt of

philosophical work.

Heidegger Contra Cassirer

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