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According to Ricoeur, “It is here that Husserl’s work recovers its legitimacy.” 77 As amatter of fact, second degree reflection, seen from this point of view, holds a fundamentalfeature of the phenomenological dynamics, that is, the capacity to reconquer “a secondnaïveté presupposing an initial critical revolution, an initial loss of naïveté.” 78What can be said of Ricoeur’s position, which is a criticism and, at the same time, theproposal of a solution? A possible answer can be that offered by Spiegelberg, who explains:“Ricoeur makes it plain that he considers his epistemology “imperfect” . . . ThusRicoeur was clearly unprepared to go to the full length of Marcel’s “mystic” antirationalismand tried to supplement it by the “rationality” of the Husserlian approach.” 79But is Marcel really an “anti-rationalist,” a “mystic”? As we have said, Marcel’s seconddegree reflection seems to be very far from every form of “mystic” intuition, and Marcelhimself writes: “The incomparable merit of Kant and, I might add, of Fichte as well wasto be fully aware of the dynamic character of reason, even if they were wrong in tryingto fix it within immutable categories or within a dialectic that ultimately risks becomingtyrannical. This is sufficient to explain why I will never allow myself to be called an irrationalist.”80 Marcel keeps his distance from Husserl, saying that his own philosophicalthought is “essentially an opening on and toward drama and not at all, like Husserl’s thought,an opening on and toward science;” 81 but this affirmation need not be considered as away to keep distance from any form of reason whatsoever. Second degree reflection is indeed“a second naïveté”; it is not based on a phenomenological “epoché,” but on a wagerwhich rises from the paradox of existence and manifests itself as interpretation. In thissense, we can speak of a “Marcellian hermeneutics,” but a specification is necessary.Marcel “accuses” Husserl’s phenomenological perspective and Heidegger’s “mystic” philosophyof the same gap: he does not see concrete existence at the center of their thoughts.But a real, concrete philosophy must always have, at its center, the paradox of existence.As Kenneth T. Gallagher stresses, “The paradox is that this elusiveness is an essentialconstituent of his thought.” 82 And Marcel argues: “I insist very firmly that all this mustnot be interpreted in an irrational sense: or rather, that such an interpretation would postulatea degraded conception of reason which would amount to identifying it with understanding.”83The consideration of concrete reality as paradoxical refers to another Marcellian notion:the “reflective intuition” or “blind intuition” or “blinded intuition,” a fascinating notion nevercompletely elaborated. The ‘blinded intuition,’ which depends on second degree reflection,constitutes the height of the failure of reason but, with a paradoxical movement, constitutesalso an overturning of reason; in fact, there is no doubt for Marcel that the analyticaland reducing reason, clashing with existence, inevitably fails -- but, at the same time,there is no doubt that this crisis can transform reason, rather than destroy it. 84 Thepassage from the former to the latter level of reflection is therefore characterized as anoverturning of the conceptual activity, with ceases to proceed in the “traditional” and“rationalistic” way and becomes existential and practical. When reason reaches its own77Ibid., 492.78Ibid., 492. Ricoeur concludes: “This hard destiny is perhaps what distinguishes philosophy frompoetry and faith.”79Spiegelberg, The Phenomenological Movement, 590.80Marcel, “Reply to Paul Ricoeur,” 497.81Ibid.82Gallagher, The Philosophy of Gabriel Marcel, IX.83Gabriel Marcel, “Foreword,” in Gallagher, The Philosophy of Gabriel Marcel, XV.84See Xavier Tilliette, “Schelling e Gabriel Marcel: un ‘compagno esaltante,’” Annuario Filosofico3 (1987): 243-254. Tilliette emphasizes the relationship between the Marcellian “blind intuition” with theSchellingian “ecstasy of reason.”69