Postmodernism: seeing both sides

"Both absolutism and relativism have bright and shadow sides. The virtue of the Absolute is the power it offers the soul; its danger is in the fanaticism into which the power can narrow. In the case of relativism, its virtue is tolerance, and nihilism is its danger. Where social considerations predominate it is the dark side of absolutism (fanaticism) and the bright side of relativism (tolerance) that are noticed, these being their social components. In both cases, the vertical dimensions (which would reverse our estimates of the two) are under-played if not ignored" (210).