Nothing arouses our philosopher so much as occlusive consonants, which sound forth only when released from detention by a following vowel. Thus certain signs of the complete alphabet note not sounds but the positions of the sound-making organs. Eat your hearts out, parodists. There are two more whole chapters from which I could continue to enchant you, had we but world enough and time, with quotations illustrating Herrenschmidt's peculiar combination of genuine expertise in the subject matter with extravagant flights of the intellect. There are no original insights, and much vagueness and inaccuracy.
Lesser men check their facts.
Oh, the polis, the polis. The superficiality of the historical narrative is dismaying. Vernant finds no difference between Solon's politics and the cosmic justice of Anaximander. Vernant on autopilot, with nothing new to say and no very firm grasp of the tales that many have told before. The Raw, the Cooked, and the Half-baked.