If we wish to read Ernst Cassirer from a contemporary perspective and want to ascertain his philosophical significance, it might make some sense to follow how Foucault fared in his similar attempt with Hegel. In his inaugural address at the Collège de France – later published under the title The Order of Discourse – Foucault asserts that it is never easy to distance oneself from Hegel: "In order to really free oneself from Hegel, we first have to assess the cost of renouncing him. We have to realize the extent to which Hegel perhaps secretly influences us; that our thoughts against him might actually come from him.'¹ Of course Cassirer isn't Hegel, and we can't characterize the 65-odd years that separate us from Cassirer as a time of opposition against him, since Cassirer has been either ignored or forgotten for two-thirds of those 65 years.