纪念罗尔斯逝世20周年丨如何研读文本

Let me say that in looking at a text of this sort, which is so large, and with so many elements in it, if you are to get as much out of it as you can, you must try to interpret it in the best and most interesting way. There is no point in trying to defeat it, or to show the author was wrong in some way, or that his argument doesn’t follow. The thing is to make as much out of it as you can and to try to get a sense of how the overall view might go, if you put it in the best way. Otherwise, I think it is a waste of time to read it, or to read any of the important philosophers.

John Rawls, Lectures on the History of Political Philosophy, ed.Samuel Freeman (MA: Harvard University Press, 2007), pp.52.