essential affinity and agreement between philosophy andnpoetry. And this again has to do with the plainness ofnlanguage. But first of all I have to say what Aristotle andnThomas mean. They mean what they say: Philosophy andnpoetry are both dealing with what they call the mirandum.nThe mirandum means that which gives rise, or which oughtnto give rise, to astonishment and wonder; it means thennon-self-evidency of what seems to be obvious. This idea isnbased on the conviction that being itself is a mystery—ninexhaustible by any language or terminology. And this isnone of the ideas that have consequences for the language ofnphilosophy as well. Not that philosophy should use anpoetical way of expression; nor that philosophy would be ankind of conceptual poetry. No, the affinity means that thenlanguage of philosophy, in spite of its plainness, must notncover up the unfathomability of being, but on the contrarynought to keep it within the range of vision — as poetry alsondoes.nThe false mysticism of an arbitrarily constructed jargon asnwell as the exactness of a pseudo-philosophical scientisticnterminology—both are making us forget that the roadnleading from true philosophy to genuine poetry has alreadynbeen paved: it is only the water of plain language, by itsnundemanding simplicity permitting the light to penetrate itnto the bottom, that is capable of being changed into thenwine of poetry.nnnAPRIL 19881 13n