[1][2] In 1853, he accepted the chair of classical philology at the newly founded Jewish Theological Seminary of Breslau, where he formed a close friendship with Theodor Mommsen.
In 1866, when Ritschl left Bonn for Leipzig, Bernays returned to his old university as extraordinary professor and chief librarian.
[1] His medical interpretation of catharsis greatly influenced Friedrich Nietzsche and Sigmund Freud.
[4] Bernays was the first scholar to suggest that Aristotle's Protrepticus inspired Cicero to write the Hortensius.
[6] His chief works, which deal mainly with the Greek philosophers, are: The last of these was a republication of his Grundzüge der verlorenen Abhandlungen des Aristoteles über die Wirkung der Tragödie (1857), which aroused considerable controversy.