The short treatise titled "Metaphysics," attributed to Aristotle's student Theophrastus, offers a compact yet critical reconstruction of unresolved systematic foundational problems in classical Greek philosophy, starting from the Pre-Socratics through Plato and the Academy to Aristotle. It primarily addresses fundamental aporias of ontology and natural philosophy, such as the question of the interdependence of ideal principles and perceivable phenomena, or the plausibility of teleology as a methodological principle of natural explanation. Theophrastus analyzes and evaluates the common competing solutions and relentlessly points out their deficiencies: a piece of synoptic metaphysical critique that recalls contemporary forms of deconstruction. The text holds its value as a document for the transition from a constructive to.