Vico’s Ring
97
but endowed with a capacity to think the infinite, and so on. As
claimed above, the forgetful functors resulted, in Vico’s hands, in
«discovering the idea hidden in the real», and now the
idea
, the
truth
(the
vero
) become the source of a contravariant functor that
“enriches”, transforms these universal, undefined entities back
into “philological” propositions. Indeed, the deep and radical
“philosophical” reflections have the potential of casting earlier
“philological” theorems in a new light, as well as leading to en-
tirely new propositions. The influence, so to speak, that “philos-
ophy” exerts on “philology” is alluded to by the Vichian phrase
in the prologue, entitled
Idea of the Work,
of
Scienza nuova
: «phi-
losophy undertakes to examine philology […] and reduces it to
the form of a science (
e la riduce in forma di
Scienza) by discover-
ing in it the design of an ideal eternal history»
215
. The term «re-
duce» occurs a number of times in
Scienza nuova
216
, and important
aspects of its import in the present context, has been succinctly
brought by both G. Cacciatore and A. Battistini, respectively: «La
ragione filosofica con le sue “pruove” aiuta a distinguere e a chi-
arire le prove filologiche, così da poter “ridurre a certezza
l’umano arbitrio” (Philosophical reason with its “proofs” aids in
distinguishing and clarifying the philological proofs, thus being
able to “reduce the human will to certainty”)», and «[…] Vico af-
ferma di volere “ridurre” la filologia “in forma di scienza”, nel
senso che il momento analitico che raccoglie i dati è poi sottopo-
sto a un vaglio che con una drastica sintesi ne restringe la mole
(Vico affirms wanting to “reduce” philology “in form of a sci-
ence” in the sense that the analytical moment that gathers the da-
ta is then subjected to an examination that by a drastic synthesis
restricts the massive amount of material)»
217
. The process of de-
veloping “philological” constructs motivated by, and imbued
with, historical reality, must at the same time be fully cognizant
of the fundamental
truths
coming out of “philosophy”, and en-
sure that these are embedded in its theoretical framework
218
. The
desired final outcome is described in Axiom CXIII (§ 324): «The