We will finish characterizing the essence of logos as Heraclitus thought it by drawing special attention to two implicit points that have not yet been brought into relief.

1. Saying and hearing are proper only when they are intrinsically directed in advance toward Being, toward logos. Only where logos opens itself up does vocabulary become word. Only where the self-opening Being of beings is apprehended does merely keeping one’s ears open become hearing. But those who do not grasp λόγος ἀκοῦσαι οὐκ ἐπιστάμενοι οὐδ᾽ εἰπεῖν, “are able neither to hear nor to say” (fragment 19). They are incapable of bringing their Dasein to stand in the Being of beings. Only those who are capable of this, rule over the word—the poets and thinkers. The others just reel about within the orbit of their caprice and lack of understanding. They accept as valid only what comes directly into their path, what flatters them and is familiar to them. They are like dogs: κύνες γὰρ καὶ βαΰζουσιν ὧν ἂν μὴ γινώσκωσι: “for dogs also bark at everyone they do not know” (fragment 97). They are donkeys: ὄνους σύρματ’ ἂν ἑλέσθαι μᾶλλον ἢ χρυσόν, “donkeys like chaff better than gold” (fragment 9). They continually deal with beings everywhere. Yet Being remains concealed to them. Being cannot be caught or touched, can neither be heard with the ears nor smelled. Being is completely different from vapor and smoke: εἰ πάντα τὰ ὄντα καπνὸς γένοιτο, ῥῖνες ἂν διαγνοῖεν, “If all beings went up in smoke, it would be noses that would distinguish and grasp them” (fragment 7).

2. Being as logos is originary gathering, not a heap or pile where everything counts just as much and just as little—and for this reason, rank and dominance belong to Being. If Being is to open itself up, it itself must have rank and maintain it. Heraclitus’s reference to the many as dogs and donkeys is characteristic [102|141] of this attitude, one that belongs essentially to Greek Dasein.