Nietzsche's Preface introduces The Gay Science's main themes, without employing the terms de-deification, naturalization, and beautification. To appreciate the significance of these themes, let us recall some major characteristics of the philosophical tradition Nietzsche intends to defy and overturn. Descartes' philosophy epitomizes that tradition. Yet some of its features appear in ancient Greek philosophy and in Kant, Hegel, and Husserl. That tradition considered philosophy a science par excellence, whose definitive beginning provided an indubitable foundation for the articulation of timelessly valid Truth. Attaining such absolute Truth required detachment from, and regulation of, bodily experience by the allegedly God-given intellect that was considered the genuine self.