Proceeding from the general characterization enlightened thought developed by Adorno and Horkheimer in their Dialectics of Enlightenment, Adorno`s Negative Dialectic is presented as the expression of the adornian way of thinking. Enlightened thought is dealt with on the basis of those characteristics employed by Adorno to define it as systematic. As an alternative to systematic thought, the adornian way of thinking, therefore, is not itself a system, but a discipline that seeks to dispute thought`s traditional preocupation with its own internal consistency, whose consequences are much to the prejudice of thought`s contact with reality. The present dissertation thus aims at an exposition of this discipline`s way of proceeding, but such exposition is prepared by analyses of Plato`s Gorgias and of Hegel`s Faith and Knowledge and Phenomenology of Spirit. By looking for the objects behind those texts` argumentative consistence, those analyses criticize the indiference towards reality practiced by those authors, and brings to light their questionable affirmation of the omnipotency of thinking.