Only once,--it was after thy first alarm-
ing letter,--I had my Hermann in my arms, full of joy that
he was well again, when suddenly he stretched himself out,
turned pale, and all those appearances followed which are
indelibly fixed on my memory.
ing letter,--I had my Hermann in my arms, full of joy that
he was well again, when suddenly he stretched himself out,
turned pale, and all those appearances followed which are
indelibly fixed on my memory.
Fichte - Nature of the Scholar
His contributions to it form a most
important part of his works, and are devoted to the scientific
development of his system. In 1796 he published his
"Doctrine of Law," and in 1798 his " Doctrine of Morals,"
--separate parts of the application which he purposed to make of the fundamental principles of the Wissenschaftslehre to the complete circle of knowledge. But this period of literary tranquillity was destined to be of short duration, for
a storm soon burst upon him more violent than any he had
hitherto encountered, which once more drove him for a long
time from the path of peaceful inquiry into the angry field
of polemical discussion.
Atheism is a charge which the common understanding has repeatedly brought against the finer speculations of philosophy, when, in endeavouring to solve the riddle of
existence, they have approached, albeit with reverence and
humility, the Ineffable Source from which all existence pro-
ceeds. Shrouded from human comprehension in an obscu-
rity from which chastened imagination is awed back, and
thought retreats in conscious weakness, the Divine Nature is surely a theme on which man is little entitled to dogma- \tize. Accordingly, it is here that the philosophic intellect
becomes most painfully aware of its own insufficiency. It
feels that silence is the most fitting attitude of the finite
being towards its Infinite and Incomprehensible Original,
and that when it is needful that thought should shape itself
into words, they should be those of diffidence and modest
self-distrust. But the common understanding has no such
humility;--its God is an Incarnate Divinity; imperfection
imposes its own limitations on the Illimitable, and clothes
the inconceivable Spirit of the Universe in sensuous and in-
telligible forms derived from finite nature. In the world's
childhood,--when the monstrous forms of earth were looked
upon as the visible manifestations of Deity, or the unseen
essences of nature were imagined to contain His presence;--
in the world's youth,--when stream and forest, hill and
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? 92
MEMOIR OF FICHTE.
valley, earth, air, and ocean, were peopled with divinities,
graceful or grotesque, kind or malevolent, pure or polluted;
in the world's ages of toil,--when the crushed soul of the
slave looked to his God for human sympathy, and sometimes
fancied that he encountered worse than human oppression;
--in all ages, men have coloured the brightness of Infinity
with hues derived from their own hopes and fears, joys and
sorrows, virtues and crimes. And he who felt that the
Eidolon of the age was an inadequate representative of his
own deeper thoughts of God, had need to place his hopes of
justice in futurity, and make up his mind to be despised and
rejected by the men of his own day. Socrates drank the
poisoned cup because his conception of divine things sur-
passed the common mythology of Greece; Christ endured
the cross at the hands of the Jews for having told them the
truth which he had heard from the Father; Paul suffered
persecution, indignity, and death, for he was a setter forth
of strange Gods. Modern times have not been without their
martyrs. Descartes died in a foreign land for his bold
thought and open speech; Spinoza--the brave, kind-hearted,
incorruptible Spinoza--was the object both of Jewish and
Christian anathema. In our own land popular fanaticism
drove Priestley from his home to seek refuge in a far distant
clime;--and in our own days legalized bigotry tore asunder
the sacred bonds which united one of the purest and most
sensitive of living beings to his offspring,--the gentle, imagi-
native, deeply-religious Shelley was "an atheist! " And so,
too, Fichte--whose ardent love of freedom made him an
object of distrust and fear to timorous statesmen, and whose
daring speculations struck dismay into the souls of creed-
bound theologians--found himself assailed at once by reli-
gious and political persecution. But in him tyranny once
more found a man who had the courage to oppose himself,
alone and unfriended, against its hate; and whose steadfast
devotion to truth remained unshaken amid all the dangers
and difficulties which gathered round his way.
Fichte's doctrine concerning God has already been spoken
of in a general way. It was the necessary result of his
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? ACCUSATION OF ATHEISM.
93
speculative position. The consciousness of the individual
reveals itself alone; his knowledge cannot pass beyond the
limits of his own being. His conceptions of other things and
other beings are only his conceptions,--they are not those
things or beings themselves. Consciousness is here alone
with itself, and the world is nothing but the necessary limits
which are set to its activity by the absolute law of its own
being. From this point of view the common logical argu-
ments for the existence of God, and in particular what is
called the "argument from design" supposed to exist in the
material world, entirely disappear. We invest the outward
universe with attributes, qualities, and relations, which are
the growth and product of our own minds, and then build
up our faith in the Divine on an argument founded upon the
phenomena we have ourselves called into being. However
plausible and attractive such an argument may appear to
those who do not look below the mere surface of things, it
will not bear the light of strict scientific investigation. Only
from our idea of duty, and our faith in the inevitable conse-
quences of moral action, arises the belief in a principle of
moral order in the world;--and this principle is God. But
this living principle of a living universe must be Infinite;
while all our ideas and conceptions are finite, and applicable
only to finite beings--not to the Infinite. Thus we cannot,
without inconsistency, apply to the Divinity the common
predicates borrowed from finite existence. Consciousness,
personality, and even substance, carry with them the idea of
necessary limitation, and are the attributes of relative and
limited beings; to affirm these of God is to bring him down
to the rank of relative and limited being. The Divinity can
thus only be thought of by us as pure Intelligence, spiritual
life and energy;--but to comprehend this Intelligence in a
conception, or to describe it in words, is manifestly impos-
sible. All attempts to embrace the Infinite in the conceptions
of the Finite are, and must be, only accommodations to the
frailties of man. God is not an object of Knowledge but of
Faith,--not to be approached by the understanding, but by
the moral sense. Our intuition of a Moral Law, absolutely
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? 94
MEMOIR OF FICHTE.
imperative in its authority and universal in its obligation, is
the most certain and incontrovertible fact of our conscious-
ness. This law, addressed to free beings, must have a free
and rational foundation:--in other words, there must be a
living source of the moral order of the universe,--and this
source is God. Our faith in God is thus the necessary con-
sequence of our faith in the Moral Law; the former possesses
the same absolute certainty which all men admit to belong
to the latter. --In his later writings Fichte advanced beyond
this argument to a more comprehensive demonstration of the
Divine Existence than that by which the being of a lawgiver
is inferred from our intuition of the Moral Law. Of this
later view, however, we shall have to speak more fully in a
subsequent part of this memoir.
The Philosophical Journal for 1798 contained an essay by
Forberg "On the Definition of the Idea of Religion. " Fichte
found the principles of this essay not so much opposed to his
own, as only imperfect in themselves, and deemed it neces-
sary to prefix to it a paper "On the grounds of our faith in
a Divine Government of the world," in which, after pointing
out the imperfections and merely human qualities which are
attributed to the Deity in the common conceptions of His
being, and which necessarily flow from the "cause and effect"
argument in its ordinary applications, he proceeds to state
the true grounds of our faith in a moral government, or moral
order, in the universe,--not for the purpose of inducing faith
by proof, but to discover and exhibit the springs of a faith
already indestructibly rooted in our nature. The business
of philosophy is not to create but to explain; our faith in
the Divine exists without the aid of philosophy,--it is hers
only to investigate its origin, not for the conversion of the
infidel, but to explain the conviction of the believer. The
general results of the essay may be gathered from the con-
cluding paragraph :--
"Hence it is an error to say that it is doubtful whether or
not there is a God. It is not doubtful, but the most certain
of all certainties,--nay, the foundation of all other certainties,
--the one absolutely valid objective truth,--that there is a
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? THEORY OF GOD.
95
moral order in the world; that to every rational being is
assigned his particular place in that order, and the work
which he has to do; that his destiny, in so far as it is not
occasioned by his own conduct, is the result of this plan;
that in no other way can even a hair fall from his head, nor
a sparrow fall to the ground around him; that every true
and good action prospers, and every bad action fails; and
that all things must work together for good to those who
truly love goodness. On the other hand, no one who reflects
a moment, and honestly avows the result of his reflection,
can remain in doubt that the conception of God as a parti-
cular substance is impossible and contradictory: and it is
right candidly to say this, and to silence the babbling of the
schools, in order that the true religion of cheerful virtue may
be established in its room.
Two great poets have expressed this faith of good and
thinking men with inimitable beauty. Such an one may
adopt their language:--
"'Who darea to say,
"I believe in God"?
Who dares to name him--[seek ideas and words for him. ] ,
And to profess,
"I believe in him "?
Who can feel,
And yet affirm,
"I believe him not"?
The All-Embracer,--[when lie it approached through the moral
sense, not through theoretical speculation, and the world is
looked upon as the scene of living moral activity. ]
The All-Sustainer,
Doth he not embrace, support,
Thee, me, himself 1
Doth not the vault of heaven arch o'er us there 1
Doth not the earth lie firmly here below?
And do not the eternal stars
Rise on us with their friendly beams 1
Do not I see mine image in thine eyes?
And doth not the All
Press on thy head and heart,
And weave itself around thee, visibly and invisibly,
In eternal mystery 1
Fill thy heart with it till it overflow;
And in the feeling when thou'rt wholly blest,
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? 90
MKMOIR OF FICHTE.
Then call it what thou wilt,--
Happiness! Heart! Love! God!
I have no name for it:
Feeling is all; name is but sound and smoke,
Veiling the glow of heaven. ' *
"And the second sings:--
"'And God is ! --a holy will that abides,
Though the human will may falter;
High over both Space and Time it rides,
The high Thought that will never alter:
And while all things in change eternal roll,
It endures, through change, a motionless soul. ' "t
The publication of this essay furnished a welcome oppor-
tunity to those States to which Fichte was obnoxious on
account of his democratic opinions, to institute public pro-
ceedings against him. The note was sounded by the publi-
cation of an anonymous pamphlet, entitled "Letters of a
Father to his Son on the Atheism of Fichte and Forberg,"
which was industriously and even gratuitously circulated
throughout Germany. The first official proceeding was a
decree of the Electoral Government, prohibiting the sale of
the Philosophical Journal, and confiscating all copies of it
found in the electorate. This was followed up by a requisi-
tion addressed to the Duke of Saxe-Weimar, as the Conser-
vator of the University of Jena, in which Fichte and Forberg
were accused of "the coarsest atheism, openly opposed not
only to the Christian, but even to natural, religion;"--and
their severe punishment was demanded; failing which, it
was threatened that the subjects of the Elector should be
prohibited from resorting to the University. These pro-
ceedings were imitated by the other Protestant Courts of
Germany, that of Prussia excepted.
In answer to the official condemnation of his essay, Fichte
sent forth his "Appeal to the Public against the accusation
of Atheism," Jena 1799;--in which, with his accustomed
* Goethe's "Faust. "
t The above stanza of Schiller's "Worte des Glaubens" is taken from
Mr. Merivale's excellent translation.
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? APPEAL TO THE PUBLIC.
97
boldness, he does not confine himself to the strict limits of
self-defence, but exposes with no lenient hand the true cause
which rendered him obnoxious to the Electoral Government,
--not the atheism of which he was so absurdly accused, but
the spirit of freedom and independence which his philosophy
inculcated. He did not desire, he would not accept of any
compromise;--he demanded a free acquittal, or a public
condemnation. He adopted the same high tone in his de-
fence before his own Government. The Court of Saxe-
Weimar had no desire to restrain the liberty of thought, or
to erect any barrier against free speculation. It was too
wise not to perceive that a Protestant University in which
secular power should dare to invade the precincts of philo-
sophy, or profane the highest sanctuaries of thought, how-
ever great its reputation for the moment, must infallibly
decline from being a temple of knowledge into a mere
warehouse for literary, medical, or theological merchandize,
--a school-room for artizans,--a drill-yard for hirelings.
But, on the other hand, it was no part of the policy of the
Ducal Court to give offence to its more powerful neighbours,
or to enter upon a crusade in defence of opinions obnoxious
to the masses, because unintelligible to them. It was there-
fore intended to pass over this matter as smoothly as possible,
and to satisfy the complaining governments by administering
to Fichte a general rebuke for imprudence in promulgating
his views in language liable to popular misconstruction.
The appearance of his "Appeal to the Public," however,
rendered this arrangement less easy of accomplishment.
The opinion of the Government with respect to this publica-
tion was communicated to Fichte in a letter from Schiller,
--" that there was no doubt that he had cleared himself of the
accusation before every thinking mind; but that it was sur-
prising that he had not consulted with higher quarters before
he sent forth his appeal: why appeal to the public at all,
when he had to do only with a favourable and enlightened
Government 1" The obvious answer to which was, that the
"Appeal to the Public" was a reply to the public confiscation
of his work, while the private accusation before his Prince
o
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? 98
MEMOIR OB' FICHTE.
was answered by a private defence. In that defence the
Court found that the accused was determined to push the
investigation as far as his accusers could desire;--that he
demanded either an honourable and unreserved acquittal, or
deposition from his office as a false teacher. A further
breach between the Court and Fichte was caused by a letter
which, in the course of these proceedings, he addressed to a
member of the Council,-- his private friend,--in which he an-
nounced that a resignation of his professorship would be the
result of any reproof on the part of the Government. This
letter, addressed to an individual in his private capacity, was
most unjustifiably placed among the official documents con-
nected with the proceedings. Its tone, excusable perhaps in a
private communication, seemed presumptuous and arrogant
when addressed to the supreme authority;--it was the
haughty defiance of an equal, rather than the remonstrance
of a subject. This abuse of a private letter,--this betrayal
of the confidence of friendship,--cost Jena its most distin-
guished professor. On the 2d of April 1799, Fichte received
the decision of the Ducal Court. It contained a reproof for
imprudence in promulgating doctrines so unusual and so of-
fensive to the common understanding, and accepted Fichte's
resignation as a recognised consequence of that reproof.
It is much to be regretted that the timid policy of the
government, and the faults of individuals, prevented in
this instance the formal recognition of the great principle
involved in the contest, i. e. that civil governments have no
right to restrain the expression of any theoretical opinion what-
ever, when propounded in a scientific form and addressed to the
scientific world.
During these trying occurrences, the most enthusiastic
attachment was evinced towards Fichte by the students.
Two numerously signed petitions were presented to the Duke,
praying for his recall. These having proved unavailing, they
caused a medallion of their beloved teacher to be struck, in
testimony of their admiration and esteem.
Fichte's position was now one of the most difficult which
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? REMOVAL TO BERLIN.
99
can well be imagined. A prolonged residence at Jena was
out of the question,--he could no longer remain there. But
where to turn ? --where to seek an asylum? No neighbouring
state would afford him shelter; even the privilege of a private
residence was refused. At length a friend appeared in the
person of Dohm, Minister to the King of Prussia. Through
him Fichte applied to Frederick-William for permission to
reside in his dominions, with the view of earning a livelihood
by literary exertion and private teaching. The answer of
the Prussian monarch was worthy of his high character:--
"If," said he, "Fichte is so peaceful a citizen, and so free
from all dangerous associations as he is said to be, I willingly
accord him a residence in my dominions. As to his religious
principles, it is not for the State to decide upon them. " *
Fichte arrived in Prussia in July 1799, and devoted the
summer and autumn to the completion of a work in which
his philosophy is set forth in a popular form, but with ad-
mirable lucidity and comprehensiveness,--we allude to his
"Bestimmung des Menschen" (the Vocation of Man), an es-
say in which all the great phases of metaphysical specula-
tion are condensed into an almost dramatic picture of the
successive stages in the development of an individual mind.
A translation of the "Bestimmung des Menschen" forms a
part of the present volume. Towards the end of the year
he returned to Jena for the purpose of removing his family to
Berlin, where, henceforward, he fixed his place of residence.
The following extracts are from letters written to his wife
during their temporary separation:--
jFtctjte an Seeing jFrau.
"You probably wish to know how I live. For many
reasons, the weightiest of which lie in myself and in my
cough, I cannot keep up the early rising. Six o'clock is ge-
nerally my earliest. I go then to my writing desk, so that I
* The original phraseology of this last passage is peculiarly characteristic:
"3ft rt reobr, tap a mit ban titben (C)ofte in getnbfeltgreitrn bfgriffm Ifl; fo mag tut
Nr Vitit (Soft mit tbm abmadjen; mir tyut ba< nidjtf. "
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? 100
MEMOIR OF FICHTE.
am not altogether idle, although I do not get on as I could
wish. I am now working at the "Bestimmung des Men-
schen. " At half-past twelve I hold my toilet (yes! --get
powdered, dressed, &c. ), and at one I call on M. Veit, where
I meet Schlegel and a reformed preacher, Schlegel's friend. *
At three I return, and read a French novel, or write as I do
now to you. If the piece be at all tolerable, which is not
always the case, I go to the theatre at five. If it be not, I
walk with Schlegel in the suburbs, in the zoological gardens,
or under the linden trees before the house. Sometimes I
make small country parties with Schlegel and his friends.
So we did, for example, the day before yesterday, with the
most lively remembrance of thee and the little one. We had
no wine to drink your health,--only sour beer, and a slice of
black bitter bread with a thin bit of half-decayed ham stuck
upon it with dirty butter. Politeness makes me put up with
many things here which are scarcely tolerable. But I have
thought of a better method for country parties.
"In the evening I sup on a roll of bread and a quart of
Medoc wine, which are the only tolerable things in the
house; and go to bed between ten and eleven, to sleep
without dreaming.
Only once,--it was after thy first alarm-
ing letter,--I had my Hermann in my arms, full of joy that
he was well again, when suddenly he stretched himself out,
turned pale, and all those appearances followed which are
indelibly fixed on my memory.
"I charge thee, dearest, with thy own health and the
health of the little one. --Farewell. "
******
"I am perfectly secure here. Yesterday I visited the
Cabinet Councillor Beyme, who is daily engaged with the
King, and spoke to him about my position. I told him
honestly that I had come here in order to take up my abode,
and that I sought for safety because it was my intention
that my family should follow me. He assured me, that far
from there being any desire to hinder me in this purpose, it
Schleiermacher.
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? LETTERS TO HIS WIFE.
101
would be esteemed an honour and advantage if I made my
residence here,--that the King was immovable upon certain
principles affecting these questions, &c. "
******
"I work with industry and pleasure. My work on the
'Vocation of Man' will, I think, be ready at Michaelmas,--
written, not printed,--and it seems to me likely to succeed.
You know that I am never satisfied with my works when
they are first written, and therefore my own opinion on this
point is worth something By my
residence in Berlin I have gained this much, that I shall
thenceforth be allowed to live in peace elsewhere ;--and this is
much. I venture to say that I should have been teased and
perhaps hunted out of any other place. But it is quite another thing now that I have lived in Berlin under the eye of the King. By and by, I think, even the Weimar Court
will learn to be ashamed of its conduct, especially if I make
no advances to it. In the meantime something advan-
tageous may happen . So be thou calm and of good courage,
dear one, and trust in thy Fichte's judgment, talent, and
good fortune. Thou laughst at the last word. Well, well!
--I assure you that good fortune will soon come back
again. "
******
"I have written to Reinhold a cold, somewhat upbraiding
letter. The good weak soul is full of lamentation. I shall
immediately comfort him again, and take care that he be
not alienated from me in future. If I was beside thee, thou
wouldst say--'Dost thou hear, Fichte? thou art proud--I
must tell it thee, if no one else will. ' Very well, be thou
glad that I am proud. Since I have no humility, I must be
proud, so that I may have something to carry me through
the world. "
******
"Of all that thou writest to me, I am most dissatisfied
with this, that thou callest our Hermann an ill-bred boy.
No greater misfortune could befall me on earth than that
this child should be spoiled; and I would lament my absence
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? 102
MEMOIE OF FICHTE.
from Jena only if it should be the cause of that. I adjure
thee by thy maternal duties, by thy love to me, by all that
is sacred to thee, let this child be thy first and only care,
and leave everything else for him. Thou art deficient in
firmness and coolness;--hence all thy errors in the educa-
tion of the little one. Teach him that when thou hast once
denied him anything, it is determined and irrevocable, and
that neither petulance nor the most urgent entreaties will
be of any avail:--once fail in this, and you have an ill-
taught obstinate boy, particularly with the natural disposi-
tion to strength of character which our little one possesses;
and it costs a hundred times more labour to set him right
again. For indeed it should be our first care not to let his
character be spoiled; and believe me, there is in him the
capacity of being a wild knave, as well as that of being an
honest, true, virtuous man. In particular, do not suppose
that he will be led by persuasion and reasoning. The most
intelligent men err in this, and thou also in the same way.
He cannot think for himself yet, nor will he be able to do so
for a long time;--at present, the first thing is that he should
learn obedience and subjection to a foreign mind. Thou
mayst indeed sometimes gain thy immediate purpose by
persuasion, not because he understands thy reasons and is
moved by them, but because thou in a manner submittest
thyself to him and makest him the judge. Thus his pride
is flattered; thy talk employs his vacant time and dispels
his caprices. But this is all;--while for the future thou
renderest his guidance more difficult for thee, and confirmest
thyself in a pernicious prejudice. "
? >>>>***
"Cheerfulness and good courage are to me the highest
proof that thou lovest me as I should be loved. Dejection
and sorrow are distrust in me, and make me unhappy
because they make thee unhappy. It is no proof of love
that thou shouldst feel deeply the injustice done to me;--
to me it is a light matter, and so must it be to thee, for thou
and I are one.
"Do not speak of dying; indulge in no such thoughts;
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? RESIDENCE AT BERLIN.
103
for they weaken thee, and thus might become true. No!
we shall yet live with each other many joyful and happy
days; and our child shall close our eyes when he is a mature
and perfect man: till then he needs us.
"In the progress of my present work, I have taken a
deeper glance into religion than ever I did before. In me
the emotions of the heart proceed only from perfect intel-
lectual clearness:--it cannot be but that the clearness I
have now attained on this subject shall also take possession
of my heart.
"Believe me, that to this disposition is to be ascribed, in
a great measure, my steadfast cheerfulness, and the mildness
with which I look upon the injustice of my opponents. I do
not believe that, without this dispute and its evil conse-
quences, I should ever have come to this clear insight, and
the disposition of heart which I now enjoy; and so the
violence we have experienced has had a result which neither
you nor I can regret.
"Comfort the poor boy, and dry thy tears as he bids thee.
Think that it is his father's advice, who indeed would say
the same thing. And do with our dear Hermann as I wrote
thee before. The child is our riches, and we must use him
welL"
If the spectacle of the scholar contending against the hin-
drances of fortune and the imperfections of his own nature,
--struggling with the common passions of mankind and the
weakness of his own will,--soaring aloft amid the highest
speculations of genius, and dragged down again to earth by
its coarsest attractions;--if this be one of the most painful
spectacles which the theatre of life presents, surely it is one
of the noblest when we see such a man pursuing some lofty
theme with a constancy which difficulties cannot shake, nor
the whirlwind of passion destroy. Nor is the scene less in-
teresting and instructive, if the inherent nobility of its
central figure have drawn around him a few souls of kindred
nobleness, whose presence sheds a genial brilliance over a
path otherwise solitary, although never dark or doubtful.
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MEMOIR OF FICHTE.
Such was now Fichte's position. The first years of his resi-
|dence at Berlin were among the most peaceful in his life of
vicissitude and storm. Withdrawn from public duties, and
uninterrupted by the sources of outward annoyance to which
he had lately been exposed, he now enjoyed a period of tran-
quil retirement, surrounded by a small circle of friends
worthy of his attachment and esteem. Friedrich and Wil-
Ihelm Schlegel, Tieck, Woltmann, Reichhardt, and Jean
Paul Friedrich Richter, were among his chosen associates;
Bernhardi, with his clear and acute yet discursive thought,
his social graces and warm affections, was his almost daily
companion. Hufeland, the king's physician, whom he had
known at Jena, now became bound to him by the closest
ties, and rendered him many kind offices, over which the
delicacy of friendship has thrown a veil.
Amid the amenities of such society, and withdrawn from
the anxieties and disturbances of public life, Fichte now
devoted himself to the development and completion of his
philosophical theory. The period of danger and difficulty
through which he had lately passed, the loss of many valued
and trusted friends, and the isolation of his own mental
position, naturally favoured the fuller development of that
profound religious feeling which lay at the root of his cha-
racter. It was accordingly during this season of repose,
that the great leading idea of his system first revealed itself
to his mind in perfect clearness, and impressed upon his
subsequent writings that deeply religious character to which
we have already adverted. The passage from subjective
reflection to objective and absolute being, had hitherto, as
we have seen, been attempted by Fichte on the ground of
moral feeling only. Our Faith in the Divine is the inevi-
table result of our sense of duty; it is the imperative
demand of our moral nature. We are immediately conscious
of a Moral law within us, whose behests are announced to
us with an absolute authority which we cannot gainsay; the
source of that authority is not in us, but in the Eternal
Fountain of all moral order,--shrouded from our intellectual
vision by the impenetrable glories of the Infinite. But this
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? FINAL DEVELOPMKNT OF HIS PHILOSOPHY. 105
inference of a Moral Lawgiver from our intuition of a Moral
Law is, after all, but the ordinary " cause and effect" argu-
ment applied to moral phenomena, and is not, strictly
speaking, more satisfactory than the common application of
the same course of reasoning to the phenomena of the phy-
sical world. Besides, it does not wholly meet the facts of
the case, for there can be no doubt that in all men, and
more especially among savages and half-civilized people, the
recognition of a Divinity precedes any definite conception of
a Moral Law. And therefore we do not reach the true and
ultimate ground of this Faith until we penetrate to that in-
nate feeling of dependence, underlying both our emotional
and intellectual nature, which, in its relation to the one,
gives birth to the Religious Sentiments, and, when recog-
nised and elaborated by the other, becomes the basis of a
scientific belief in the Absolute or God,--the materials of
the edifice being furnished by our intuitions of the Good,
the Beautiful, and the True. Fichte's thoughts being now
directed more steadily to the strictly religious aspect of his
theory, he sought to add such an intellectual validity to our
moral convictions, to raise our Faith in the Divine from the
rank of a mere inference from the Moral Sense, to that of a
direct intuition of Reason. This he accomplished by a
deeper analysis of the fact of consciousness. What is the
essential character of our knowledge--that which it pre-
serves amid all the diversities of the individual mind 1 It
is this:--that it announces itself as a representation of
something else, a picture of something superior to, and inde-
pendent of, itself. It is thus composed of a double concep-
tion :--a Higher Being which it imperfectly represents; and
itself, inferior to, derived from, and dependent upon the first.
Hence, it must renounce the thought of itself as the only
being whose existence it reveals, and regard itself rather as
the image or reflection of a truly Highest and Ultimate
Being revealed in human thought, and indeed its essential
foundation. And this idea cannot be got rid of on the
ground that it is a merely subjective conception; for we have
here reached the primitive essence of thought itself,--and to
p
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MEMOIR OF FICHTE.
deny this would be to deny the very nature and conditions
of knowledge, and to maintain an obvious contradiction;
this namely,--that there can be a conception without an
object conceived, a manifestation without substance, and
that the ultimate foundation of all things is nothing. By
this reconciliation, and indeed essential union of the sub-
jective with the objective, Reason finally bridges over the
chasm by which analysis had formerly separated it from the
simple Faith of common humanity. Consciousness becomes
the manifestation,--the self-revelation of the Absolute;--
and the Absolute itself is the ground and substance of the
phenomena of Consciousness,--the different forms of which
are but the various points wherein God is recognised, with
greater or less degrees of clearness and perfection, in this
manifestation of himself;--while the world itself, as an infi-
uite assemblage of concrete existences, conscious and uncon-
scious, is another phase of the same Infinite and Absolute
Being. Thus Consciousness, far from being a purely sub-
jective and empty train of fancies, contains nothing which
does not rest upon and image forth a Higher and Infinite
Reality; and Idealism itself becomes a sublime and Abso-
lute Realism.
This change in the spirit of his philosophy has been
ascribed to the influence of a distinguished contemporary,
who afterwards succeeded to the chair at Berlin of which
Fichte was the first occupant. It seems to us that it was
the natural and inevitable result of his own principles and
mode of thought; and that it was even theoretically con-
tained in the very first exposition of his doctrine, although
it had not then attained in his own mind that vivid reality
with which it shines, as a prophet-like inspiration, through-
out his later writings. In this view we are fully borne out
by the letter to Jakobi in 1795, and the article from the
Literatur Zeitung, already quoted. * In the development of
the system, whether in the mind of its author or in that of
any learner, the starting point is necessarily the individual
* See pages 60 and 62.
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? FINAL DEVELOPMENT OF HIS PHILOSOPHY. 107
consciousness,--the finite Ego. But when the logical pro- } \cesses of the understanding have performed their office, and led us from this, the nearest of our spiritual experiences, to /\ ' . that higher point in which all finite individuality disappears
in the great thought of an all-embracing consciousness,--an
Infinite Ego,--it becomes unnecessary to reiterate the initial
steps of the investigation,--to imitate the gropings of the schoolboy rather than the comprehensive vision of the man.
From this higher point of view Fichte now looked forth on
the universe and human life, and saw there no longer the
subjective phenomena of a limited and finite nature, but the
harmonious, although diversified, manifestation of the One Universal Being,--the self-revelation of the Absolute,--the
infinitely varied forms under which God becomes " manifest
in the flesh. "
The first traces of this change in his speculative position
are observable in his "Bestimmung des Menschen," pub-
lished in 1799, in which, as we have already said, may be
found the most systematic exposition of his philosophy
which has been attempted in a popular form. In 1801 ap-
peared his "Antwortschreiben an Reinhold" (Answer to
Reinhold), and his "Sonnenklarer Bericht an das grossere
Publicum iiber das eigentliche Wesen der neuesten Philoso-
phic" (Sun-clear Intelligence to the general public on the
essential nature of the New Philosophy. ) These he intended
to follow up in 1802 with a more strictly scientific and com- yplete account of the Wissenschaftslehre, designed for the
philosophical reader only. But he was induced to postpone
this purpose, partly on account of the recent modification of
his own philosophical point of view, and partly because the attention of the literary world was now engrossed by the. >>*
brilliant and poetic Natur-Philosophie of Schelling. Before \'communicating to the world the work which should be
handed down to posterity as the finished institute of his
theory, it appeared to him necessary, first of all to prepare
the public mind for its reception by a series of introductory applications of his system to subjects of general interest.
But this purpose was likewise laid aside for a time,--princi-
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? 108
MEMOIR OF FICHTE.
pally, it would seem, from dissatisfaction with the reception
which his works had hitherto received, from the harassing
misconceptions and misrepresentations which he had en-
countered, and from a doubt, amounting almost to hopeless-
ness, of making his views intelligible to the general public.
These feelings occasioned a silence of four years on his part,
and are characteristically expressed in the prefaces to seve-
ral of his subsequent works.
In the meantime, although Fichte retired for a season
from the prominent position which he had hitherto occupied
in the public eye, it was impossible for him to remain inact-
ive. Shut out from communication with the "reading pub-
lic," he sought to gather around him fit hearers to whom he
might impart the high message with which he was charged.
This was indeed his favourite mode of communication: in
the lecture-room his fiery eloquence found a freer scope than
the form of a literary work would permit. A circle of pupils
soon gathered around him at Berlin. His private lectures
were attended by the most distinguished scholars and states-
men: W. Schlegel, Kotzebue, the Minister Schrotter, the
High Chancellor Beyme, and the Minister von Altenstein,
were found among his auditory.
In 1804 an opportunity presented itself of resuming his
favourite vocation of an academic teacher. This was an in-
vitation from Russia to assume the chair of Philosophy in
the University of Charkow. The existing state of literary
culture in that country, however, did not seem to offer a
promising field for his exertions; and another proposal, which
appeared to open the way to a more useful application of his
powers, occurring at the same time, he declined the invitation
to Charkow. The second invitation was likewise a foreign
one,--from Bavaria, namely, to the Philosophic chair at
Landshut. It was accompanied by pecuniary proposals of a
most advantageous nature. But experience had taught
Fichte to set a much higher value upon the internal condi-
tions of such an office, than upon its outward advantages. In
desiring an academic chair, he sought only an opportunity
of carrying out his plan of a strictly philosophical education,
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? ACADEMIC PROJECTS.
109
with a view to the future reception of the Wissenschaftslehre
in its most perfect form. To this purpose he had devoted
his life, and no pecuniary considerations could induce him
to lay it aside. But its thorough fulfilment demanded ab-
solute freedom of teaching and writing as a primary condi-
tion, and therefore this was the first point to which Fichte
looked in any appointment which might be offered to him.
He frankly laid his views on this subject before the Bava-
rian Government. "The plan," he says, "might perhaps be
carried forward without the support of any government, al-
though this has its difficulties. But if any enlightened
government should resolve to support it, it would, in my
opinion, acquire thereby a deathless fame, and become the
benefactor of humanity. " Whether the Bavarian Govern-
ment was dissatisfied with the conditions required does not
appear,--but the negotiations on this subject were shortly
afterwards broken off.
At last, however, an opportunity occurred of carrying out
his views in Prussia itself. Through the influence of his
friends, Beyme and Altenstein, with the Minister Harden-
berg, he was appointed Professor of Philosophy at the Uni-
versity of Erlangen, with the liberty of returning to Berlin
during the winter to continue his philosophical lectures there.
In May 1805 he entered upon his new duties with a brilliant
success which seemed to promise a repetition of the epoch
of Jena. Besides the course of lectures to his own students,
in which he took a comprehensive survey of the conditions
and method of scientific knowledge in general, he delivered
a series of private lectures to his fellow professors and others,
in which he laid down his views in a more abstract form.
In addition to these labours, he delivered to the whole stu-
dents of the University his celebrated lectures on the "Nature
of the Scholar. " These remarkable discourses must have
had a powerful effect on the young and ardent minds to
which they were addressed. Never, perhaps, were the moral
dignity and sacredness of the literary calling set forth with
more impressive earnestness.
Encouraged by the brilliant success which had attended
?
important part of his works, and are devoted to the scientific
development of his system. In 1796 he published his
"Doctrine of Law," and in 1798 his " Doctrine of Morals,"
--separate parts of the application which he purposed to make of the fundamental principles of the Wissenschaftslehre to the complete circle of knowledge. But this period of literary tranquillity was destined to be of short duration, for
a storm soon burst upon him more violent than any he had
hitherto encountered, which once more drove him for a long
time from the path of peaceful inquiry into the angry field
of polemical discussion.
Atheism is a charge which the common understanding has repeatedly brought against the finer speculations of philosophy, when, in endeavouring to solve the riddle of
existence, they have approached, albeit with reverence and
humility, the Ineffable Source from which all existence pro-
ceeds. Shrouded from human comprehension in an obscu-
rity from which chastened imagination is awed back, and
thought retreats in conscious weakness, the Divine Nature is surely a theme on which man is little entitled to dogma- \tize. Accordingly, it is here that the philosophic intellect
becomes most painfully aware of its own insufficiency. It
feels that silence is the most fitting attitude of the finite
being towards its Infinite and Incomprehensible Original,
and that when it is needful that thought should shape itself
into words, they should be those of diffidence and modest
self-distrust. But the common understanding has no such
humility;--its God is an Incarnate Divinity; imperfection
imposes its own limitations on the Illimitable, and clothes
the inconceivable Spirit of the Universe in sensuous and in-
telligible forms derived from finite nature. In the world's
childhood,--when the monstrous forms of earth were looked
upon as the visible manifestations of Deity, or the unseen
essences of nature were imagined to contain His presence;--
in the world's youth,--when stream and forest, hill and
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? 92
MEMOIR OF FICHTE.
valley, earth, air, and ocean, were peopled with divinities,
graceful or grotesque, kind or malevolent, pure or polluted;
in the world's ages of toil,--when the crushed soul of the
slave looked to his God for human sympathy, and sometimes
fancied that he encountered worse than human oppression;
--in all ages, men have coloured the brightness of Infinity
with hues derived from their own hopes and fears, joys and
sorrows, virtues and crimes. And he who felt that the
Eidolon of the age was an inadequate representative of his
own deeper thoughts of God, had need to place his hopes of
justice in futurity, and make up his mind to be despised and
rejected by the men of his own day. Socrates drank the
poisoned cup because his conception of divine things sur-
passed the common mythology of Greece; Christ endured
the cross at the hands of the Jews for having told them the
truth which he had heard from the Father; Paul suffered
persecution, indignity, and death, for he was a setter forth
of strange Gods. Modern times have not been without their
martyrs. Descartes died in a foreign land for his bold
thought and open speech; Spinoza--the brave, kind-hearted,
incorruptible Spinoza--was the object both of Jewish and
Christian anathema. In our own land popular fanaticism
drove Priestley from his home to seek refuge in a far distant
clime;--and in our own days legalized bigotry tore asunder
the sacred bonds which united one of the purest and most
sensitive of living beings to his offspring,--the gentle, imagi-
native, deeply-religious Shelley was "an atheist! " And so,
too, Fichte--whose ardent love of freedom made him an
object of distrust and fear to timorous statesmen, and whose
daring speculations struck dismay into the souls of creed-
bound theologians--found himself assailed at once by reli-
gious and political persecution. But in him tyranny once
more found a man who had the courage to oppose himself,
alone and unfriended, against its hate; and whose steadfast
devotion to truth remained unshaken amid all the dangers
and difficulties which gathered round his way.
Fichte's doctrine concerning God has already been spoken
of in a general way. It was the necessary result of his
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? ACCUSATION OF ATHEISM.
93
speculative position. The consciousness of the individual
reveals itself alone; his knowledge cannot pass beyond the
limits of his own being. His conceptions of other things and
other beings are only his conceptions,--they are not those
things or beings themselves. Consciousness is here alone
with itself, and the world is nothing but the necessary limits
which are set to its activity by the absolute law of its own
being. From this point of view the common logical argu-
ments for the existence of God, and in particular what is
called the "argument from design" supposed to exist in the
material world, entirely disappear. We invest the outward
universe with attributes, qualities, and relations, which are
the growth and product of our own minds, and then build
up our faith in the Divine on an argument founded upon the
phenomena we have ourselves called into being. However
plausible and attractive such an argument may appear to
those who do not look below the mere surface of things, it
will not bear the light of strict scientific investigation. Only
from our idea of duty, and our faith in the inevitable conse-
quences of moral action, arises the belief in a principle of
moral order in the world;--and this principle is God. But
this living principle of a living universe must be Infinite;
while all our ideas and conceptions are finite, and applicable
only to finite beings--not to the Infinite. Thus we cannot,
without inconsistency, apply to the Divinity the common
predicates borrowed from finite existence. Consciousness,
personality, and even substance, carry with them the idea of
necessary limitation, and are the attributes of relative and
limited beings; to affirm these of God is to bring him down
to the rank of relative and limited being. The Divinity can
thus only be thought of by us as pure Intelligence, spiritual
life and energy;--but to comprehend this Intelligence in a
conception, or to describe it in words, is manifestly impos-
sible. All attempts to embrace the Infinite in the conceptions
of the Finite are, and must be, only accommodations to the
frailties of man. God is not an object of Knowledge but of
Faith,--not to be approached by the understanding, but by
the moral sense. Our intuition of a Moral Law, absolutely
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? 94
MEMOIR OF FICHTE.
imperative in its authority and universal in its obligation, is
the most certain and incontrovertible fact of our conscious-
ness. This law, addressed to free beings, must have a free
and rational foundation:--in other words, there must be a
living source of the moral order of the universe,--and this
source is God. Our faith in God is thus the necessary con-
sequence of our faith in the Moral Law; the former possesses
the same absolute certainty which all men admit to belong
to the latter. --In his later writings Fichte advanced beyond
this argument to a more comprehensive demonstration of the
Divine Existence than that by which the being of a lawgiver
is inferred from our intuition of the Moral Law. Of this
later view, however, we shall have to speak more fully in a
subsequent part of this memoir.
The Philosophical Journal for 1798 contained an essay by
Forberg "On the Definition of the Idea of Religion. " Fichte
found the principles of this essay not so much opposed to his
own, as only imperfect in themselves, and deemed it neces-
sary to prefix to it a paper "On the grounds of our faith in
a Divine Government of the world," in which, after pointing
out the imperfections and merely human qualities which are
attributed to the Deity in the common conceptions of His
being, and which necessarily flow from the "cause and effect"
argument in its ordinary applications, he proceeds to state
the true grounds of our faith in a moral government, or moral
order, in the universe,--not for the purpose of inducing faith
by proof, but to discover and exhibit the springs of a faith
already indestructibly rooted in our nature. The business
of philosophy is not to create but to explain; our faith in
the Divine exists without the aid of philosophy,--it is hers
only to investigate its origin, not for the conversion of the
infidel, but to explain the conviction of the believer. The
general results of the essay may be gathered from the con-
cluding paragraph :--
"Hence it is an error to say that it is doubtful whether or
not there is a God. It is not doubtful, but the most certain
of all certainties,--nay, the foundation of all other certainties,
--the one absolutely valid objective truth,--that there is a
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? THEORY OF GOD.
95
moral order in the world; that to every rational being is
assigned his particular place in that order, and the work
which he has to do; that his destiny, in so far as it is not
occasioned by his own conduct, is the result of this plan;
that in no other way can even a hair fall from his head, nor
a sparrow fall to the ground around him; that every true
and good action prospers, and every bad action fails; and
that all things must work together for good to those who
truly love goodness. On the other hand, no one who reflects
a moment, and honestly avows the result of his reflection,
can remain in doubt that the conception of God as a parti-
cular substance is impossible and contradictory: and it is
right candidly to say this, and to silence the babbling of the
schools, in order that the true religion of cheerful virtue may
be established in its room.
Two great poets have expressed this faith of good and
thinking men with inimitable beauty. Such an one may
adopt their language:--
"'Who darea to say,
"I believe in God"?
Who dares to name him--[seek ideas and words for him. ] ,
And to profess,
"I believe in him "?
Who can feel,
And yet affirm,
"I believe him not"?
The All-Embracer,--[when lie it approached through the moral
sense, not through theoretical speculation, and the world is
looked upon as the scene of living moral activity. ]
The All-Sustainer,
Doth he not embrace, support,
Thee, me, himself 1
Doth not the vault of heaven arch o'er us there 1
Doth not the earth lie firmly here below?
And do not the eternal stars
Rise on us with their friendly beams 1
Do not I see mine image in thine eyes?
And doth not the All
Press on thy head and heart,
And weave itself around thee, visibly and invisibly,
In eternal mystery 1
Fill thy heart with it till it overflow;
And in the feeling when thou'rt wholly blest,
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? 90
MKMOIR OF FICHTE.
Then call it what thou wilt,--
Happiness! Heart! Love! God!
I have no name for it:
Feeling is all; name is but sound and smoke,
Veiling the glow of heaven. ' *
"And the second sings:--
"'And God is ! --a holy will that abides,
Though the human will may falter;
High over both Space and Time it rides,
The high Thought that will never alter:
And while all things in change eternal roll,
It endures, through change, a motionless soul. ' "t
The publication of this essay furnished a welcome oppor-
tunity to those States to which Fichte was obnoxious on
account of his democratic opinions, to institute public pro-
ceedings against him. The note was sounded by the publi-
cation of an anonymous pamphlet, entitled "Letters of a
Father to his Son on the Atheism of Fichte and Forberg,"
which was industriously and even gratuitously circulated
throughout Germany. The first official proceeding was a
decree of the Electoral Government, prohibiting the sale of
the Philosophical Journal, and confiscating all copies of it
found in the electorate. This was followed up by a requisi-
tion addressed to the Duke of Saxe-Weimar, as the Conser-
vator of the University of Jena, in which Fichte and Forberg
were accused of "the coarsest atheism, openly opposed not
only to the Christian, but even to natural, religion;"--and
their severe punishment was demanded; failing which, it
was threatened that the subjects of the Elector should be
prohibited from resorting to the University. These pro-
ceedings were imitated by the other Protestant Courts of
Germany, that of Prussia excepted.
In answer to the official condemnation of his essay, Fichte
sent forth his "Appeal to the Public against the accusation
of Atheism," Jena 1799;--in which, with his accustomed
* Goethe's "Faust. "
t The above stanza of Schiller's "Worte des Glaubens" is taken from
Mr. Merivale's excellent translation.
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? APPEAL TO THE PUBLIC.
97
boldness, he does not confine himself to the strict limits of
self-defence, but exposes with no lenient hand the true cause
which rendered him obnoxious to the Electoral Government,
--not the atheism of which he was so absurdly accused, but
the spirit of freedom and independence which his philosophy
inculcated. He did not desire, he would not accept of any
compromise;--he demanded a free acquittal, or a public
condemnation. He adopted the same high tone in his de-
fence before his own Government. The Court of Saxe-
Weimar had no desire to restrain the liberty of thought, or
to erect any barrier against free speculation. It was too
wise not to perceive that a Protestant University in which
secular power should dare to invade the precincts of philo-
sophy, or profane the highest sanctuaries of thought, how-
ever great its reputation for the moment, must infallibly
decline from being a temple of knowledge into a mere
warehouse for literary, medical, or theological merchandize,
--a school-room for artizans,--a drill-yard for hirelings.
But, on the other hand, it was no part of the policy of the
Ducal Court to give offence to its more powerful neighbours,
or to enter upon a crusade in defence of opinions obnoxious
to the masses, because unintelligible to them. It was there-
fore intended to pass over this matter as smoothly as possible,
and to satisfy the complaining governments by administering
to Fichte a general rebuke for imprudence in promulgating
his views in language liable to popular misconstruction.
The appearance of his "Appeal to the Public," however,
rendered this arrangement less easy of accomplishment.
The opinion of the Government with respect to this publica-
tion was communicated to Fichte in a letter from Schiller,
--" that there was no doubt that he had cleared himself of the
accusation before every thinking mind; but that it was sur-
prising that he had not consulted with higher quarters before
he sent forth his appeal: why appeal to the public at all,
when he had to do only with a favourable and enlightened
Government 1" The obvious answer to which was, that the
"Appeal to the Public" was a reply to the public confiscation
of his work, while the private accusation before his Prince
o
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? 98
MEMOIR OB' FICHTE.
was answered by a private defence. In that defence the
Court found that the accused was determined to push the
investigation as far as his accusers could desire;--that he
demanded either an honourable and unreserved acquittal, or
deposition from his office as a false teacher. A further
breach between the Court and Fichte was caused by a letter
which, in the course of these proceedings, he addressed to a
member of the Council,-- his private friend,--in which he an-
nounced that a resignation of his professorship would be the
result of any reproof on the part of the Government. This
letter, addressed to an individual in his private capacity, was
most unjustifiably placed among the official documents con-
nected with the proceedings. Its tone, excusable perhaps in a
private communication, seemed presumptuous and arrogant
when addressed to the supreme authority;--it was the
haughty defiance of an equal, rather than the remonstrance
of a subject. This abuse of a private letter,--this betrayal
of the confidence of friendship,--cost Jena its most distin-
guished professor. On the 2d of April 1799, Fichte received
the decision of the Ducal Court. It contained a reproof for
imprudence in promulgating doctrines so unusual and so of-
fensive to the common understanding, and accepted Fichte's
resignation as a recognised consequence of that reproof.
It is much to be regretted that the timid policy of the
government, and the faults of individuals, prevented in
this instance the formal recognition of the great principle
involved in the contest, i. e. that civil governments have no
right to restrain the expression of any theoretical opinion what-
ever, when propounded in a scientific form and addressed to the
scientific world.
During these trying occurrences, the most enthusiastic
attachment was evinced towards Fichte by the students.
Two numerously signed petitions were presented to the Duke,
praying for his recall. These having proved unavailing, they
caused a medallion of their beloved teacher to be struck, in
testimony of their admiration and esteem.
Fichte's position was now one of the most difficult which
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? REMOVAL TO BERLIN.
99
can well be imagined. A prolonged residence at Jena was
out of the question,--he could no longer remain there. But
where to turn ? --where to seek an asylum? No neighbouring
state would afford him shelter; even the privilege of a private
residence was refused. At length a friend appeared in the
person of Dohm, Minister to the King of Prussia. Through
him Fichte applied to Frederick-William for permission to
reside in his dominions, with the view of earning a livelihood
by literary exertion and private teaching. The answer of
the Prussian monarch was worthy of his high character:--
"If," said he, "Fichte is so peaceful a citizen, and so free
from all dangerous associations as he is said to be, I willingly
accord him a residence in my dominions. As to his religious
principles, it is not for the State to decide upon them. " *
Fichte arrived in Prussia in July 1799, and devoted the
summer and autumn to the completion of a work in which
his philosophy is set forth in a popular form, but with ad-
mirable lucidity and comprehensiveness,--we allude to his
"Bestimmung des Menschen" (the Vocation of Man), an es-
say in which all the great phases of metaphysical specula-
tion are condensed into an almost dramatic picture of the
successive stages in the development of an individual mind.
A translation of the "Bestimmung des Menschen" forms a
part of the present volume. Towards the end of the year
he returned to Jena for the purpose of removing his family to
Berlin, where, henceforward, he fixed his place of residence.
The following extracts are from letters written to his wife
during their temporary separation:--
jFtctjte an Seeing jFrau.
"You probably wish to know how I live. For many
reasons, the weightiest of which lie in myself and in my
cough, I cannot keep up the early rising. Six o'clock is ge-
nerally my earliest. I go then to my writing desk, so that I
* The original phraseology of this last passage is peculiarly characteristic:
"3ft rt reobr, tap a mit ban titben (C)ofte in getnbfeltgreitrn bfgriffm Ifl; fo mag tut
Nr Vitit (Soft mit tbm abmadjen; mir tyut ba< nidjtf. "
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? 100
MEMOIR OF FICHTE.
am not altogether idle, although I do not get on as I could
wish. I am now working at the "Bestimmung des Men-
schen. " At half-past twelve I hold my toilet (yes! --get
powdered, dressed, &c. ), and at one I call on M. Veit, where
I meet Schlegel and a reformed preacher, Schlegel's friend. *
At three I return, and read a French novel, or write as I do
now to you. If the piece be at all tolerable, which is not
always the case, I go to the theatre at five. If it be not, I
walk with Schlegel in the suburbs, in the zoological gardens,
or under the linden trees before the house. Sometimes I
make small country parties with Schlegel and his friends.
So we did, for example, the day before yesterday, with the
most lively remembrance of thee and the little one. We had
no wine to drink your health,--only sour beer, and a slice of
black bitter bread with a thin bit of half-decayed ham stuck
upon it with dirty butter. Politeness makes me put up with
many things here which are scarcely tolerable. But I have
thought of a better method for country parties.
"In the evening I sup on a roll of bread and a quart of
Medoc wine, which are the only tolerable things in the
house; and go to bed between ten and eleven, to sleep
without dreaming.
Only once,--it was after thy first alarm-
ing letter,--I had my Hermann in my arms, full of joy that
he was well again, when suddenly he stretched himself out,
turned pale, and all those appearances followed which are
indelibly fixed on my memory.
"I charge thee, dearest, with thy own health and the
health of the little one. --Farewell. "
******
"I am perfectly secure here. Yesterday I visited the
Cabinet Councillor Beyme, who is daily engaged with the
King, and spoke to him about my position. I told him
honestly that I had come here in order to take up my abode,
and that I sought for safety because it was my intention
that my family should follow me. He assured me, that far
from there being any desire to hinder me in this purpose, it
Schleiermacher.
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? LETTERS TO HIS WIFE.
101
would be esteemed an honour and advantage if I made my
residence here,--that the King was immovable upon certain
principles affecting these questions, &c. "
******
"I work with industry and pleasure. My work on the
'Vocation of Man' will, I think, be ready at Michaelmas,--
written, not printed,--and it seems to me likely to succeed.
You know that I am never satisfied with my works when
they are first written, and therefore my own opinion on this
point is worth something By my
residence in Berlin I have gained this much, that I shall
thenceforth be allowed to live in peace elsewhere ;--and this is
much. I venture to say that I should have been teased and
perhaps hunted out of any other place. But it is quite another thing now that I have lived in Berlin under the eye of the King. By and by, I think, even the Weimar Court
will learn to be ashamed of its conduct, especially if I make
no advances to it. In the meantime something advan-
tageous may happen . So be thou calm and of good courage,
dear one, and trust in thy Fichte's judgment, talent, and
good fortune. Thou laughst at the last word. Well, well!
--I assure you that good fortune will soon come back
again. "
******
"I have written to Reinhold a cold, somewhat upbraiding
letter. The good weak soul is full of lamentation. I shall
immediately comfort him again, and take care that he be
not alienated from me in future. If I was beside thee, thou
wouldst say--'Dost thou hear, Fichte? thou art proud--I
must tell it thee, if no one else will. ' Very well, be thou
glad that I am proud. Since I have no humility, I must be
proud, so that I may have something to carry me through
the world. "
******
"Of all that thou writest to me, I am most dissatisfied
with this, that thou callest our Hermann an ill-bred boy.
No greater misfortune could befall me on earth than that
this child should be spoiled; and I would lament my absence
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? 102
MEMOIE OF FICHTE.
from Jena only if it should be the cause of that. I adjure
thee by thy maternal duties, by thy love to me, by all that
is sacred to thee, let this child be thy first and only care,
and leave everything else for him. Thou art deficient in
firmness and coolness;--hence all thy errors in the educa-
tion of the little one. Teach him that when thou hast once
denied him anything, it is determined and irrevocable, and
that neither petulance nor the most urgent entreaties will
be of any avail:--once fail in this, and you have an ill-
taught obstinate boy, particularly with the natural disposi-
tion to strength of character which our little one possesses;
and it costs a hundred times more labour to set him right
again. For indeed it should be our first care not to let his
character be spoiled; and believe me, there is in him the
capacity of being a wild knave, as well as that of being an
honest, true, virtuous man. In particular, do not suppose
that he will be led by persuasion and reasoning. The most
intelligent men err in this, and thou also in the same way.
He cannot think for himself yet, nor will he be able to do so
for a long time;--at present, the first thing is that he should
learn obedience and subjection to a foreign mind. Thou
mayst indeed sometimes gain thy immediate purpose by
persuasion, not because he understands thy reasons and is
moved by them, but because thou in a manner submittest
thyself to him and makest him the judge. Thus his pride
is flattered; thy talk employs his vacant time and dispels
his caprices. But this is all;--while for the future thou
renderest his guidance more difficult for thee, and confirmest
thyself in a pernicious prejudice. "
? >>>>***
"Cheerfulness and good courage are to me the highest
proof that thou lovest me as I should be loved. Dejection
and sorrow are distrust in me, and make me unhappy
because they make thee unhappy. It is no proof of love
that thou shouldst feel deeply the injustice done to me;--
to me it is a light matter, and so must it be to thee, for thou
and I are one.
"Do not speak of dying; indulge in no such thoughts;
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? RESIDENCE AT BERLIN.
103
for they weaken thee, and thus might become true. No!
we shall yet live with each other many joyful and happy
days; and our child shall close our eyes when he is a mature
and perfect man: till then he needs us.
"In the progress of my present work, I have taken a
deeper glance into religion than ever I did before. In me
the emotions of the heart proceed only from perfect intel-
lectual clearness:--it cannot be but that the clearness I
have now attained on this subject shall also take possession
of my heart.
"Believe me, that to this disposition is to be ascribed, in
a great measure, my steadfast cheerfulness, and the mildness
with which I look upon the injustice of my opponents. I do
not believe that, without this dispute and its evil conse-
quences, I should ever have come to this clear insight, and
the disposition of heart which I now enjoy; and so the
violence we have experienced has had a result which neither
you nor I can regret.
"Comfort the poor boy, and dry thy tears as he bids thee.
Think that it is his father's advice, who indeed would say
the same thing. And do with our dear Hermann as I wrote
thee before. The child is our riches, and we must use him
welL"
If the spectacle of the scholar contending against the hin-
drances of fortune and the imperfections of his own nature,
--struggling with the common passions of mankind and the
weakness of his own will,--soaring aloft amid the highest
speculations of genius, and dragged down again to earth by
its coarsest attractions;--if this be one of the most painful
spectacles which the theatre of life presents, surely it is one
of the noblest when we see such a man pursuing some lofty
theme with a constancy which difficulties cannot shake, nor
the whirlwind of passion destroy. Nor is the scene less in-
teresting and instructive, if the inherent nobility of its
central figure have drawn around him a few souls of kindred
nobleness, whose presence sheds a genial brilliance over a
path otherwise solitary, although never dark or doubtful.
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? 104
MEMOIR OF FICHTE.
Such was now Fichte's position. The first years of his resi-
|dence at Berlin were among the most peaceful in his life of
vicissitude and storm. Withdrawn from public duties, and
uninterrupted by the sources of outward annoyance to which
he had lately been exposed, he now enjoyed a period of tran-
quil retirement, surrounded by a small circle of friends
worthy of his attachment and esteem. Friedrich and Wil-
Ihelm Schlegel, Tieck, Woltmann, Reichhardt, and Jean
Paul Friedrich Richter, were among his chosen associates;
Bernhardi, with his clear and acute yet discursive thought,
his social graces and warm affections, was his almost daily
companion. Hufeland, the king's physician, whom he had
known at Jena, now became bound to him by the closest
ties, and rendered him many kind offices, over which the
delicacy of friendship has thrown a veil.
Amid the amenities of such society, and withdrawn from
the anxieties and disturbances of public life, Fichte now
devoted himself to the development and completion of his
philosophical theory. The period of danger and difficulty
through which he had lately passed, the loss of many valued
and trusted friends, and the isolation of his own mental
position, naturally favoured the fuller development of that
profound religious feeling which lay at the root of his cha-
racter. It was accordingly during this season of repose,
that the great leading idea of his system first revealed itself
to his mind in perfect clearness, and impressed upon his
subsequent writings that deeply religious character to which
we have already adverted. The passage from subjective
reflection to objective and absolute being, had hitherto, as
we have seen, been attempted by Fichte on the ground of
moral feeling only. Our Faith in the Divine is the inevi-
table result of our sense of duty; it is the imperative
demand of our moral nature. We are immediately conscious
of a Moral law within us, whose behests are announced to
us with an absolute authority which we cannot gainsay; the
source of that authority is not in us, but in the Eternal
Fountain of all moral order,--shrouded from our intellectual
vision by the impenetrable glories of the Infinite. But this
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? FINAL DEVELOPMKNT OF HIS PHILOSOPHY. 105
inference of a Moral Lawgiver from our intuition of a Moral
Law is, after all, but the ordinary " cause and effect" argu-
ment applied to moral phenomena, and is not, strictly
speaking, more satisfactory than the common application of
the same course of reasoning to the phenomena of the phy-
sical world. Besides, it does not wholly meet the facts of
the case, for there can be no doubt that in all men, and
more especially among savages and half-civilized people, the
recognition of a Divinity precedes any definite conception of
a Moral Law. And therefore we do not reach the true and
ultimate ground of this Faith until we penetrate to that in-
nate feeling of dependence, underlying both our emotional
and intellectual nature, which, in its relation to the one,
gives birth to the Religious Sentiments, and, when recog-
nised and elaborated by the other, becomes the basis of a
scientific belief in the Absolute or God,--the materials of
the edifice being furnished by our intuitions of the Good,
the Beautiful, and the True. Fichte's thoughts being now
directed more steadily to the strictly religious aspect of his
theory, he sought to add such an intellectual validity to our
moral convictions, to raise our Faith in the Divine from the
rank of a mere inference from the Moral Sense, to that of a
direct intuition of Reason. This he accomplished by a
deeper analysis of the fact of consciousness. What is the
essential character of our knowledge--that which it pre-
serves amid all the diversities of the individual mind 1 It
is this:--that it announces itself as a representation of
something else, a picture of something superior to, and inde-
pendent of, itself. It is thus composed of a double concep-
tion :--a Higher Being which it imperfectly represents; and
itself, inferior to, derived from, and dependent upon the first.
Hence, it must renounce the thought of itself as the only
being whose existence it reveals, and regard itself rather as
the image or reflection of a truly Highest and Ultimate
Being revealed in human thought, and indeed its essential
foundation. And this idea cannot be got rid of on the
ground that it is a merely subjective conception; for we have
here reached the primitive essence of thought itself,--and to
p
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? 106
MEMOIR OF FICHTE.
deny this would be to deny the very nature and conditions
of knowledge, and to maintain an obvious contradiction;
this namely,--that there can be a conception without an
object conceived, a manifestation without substance, and
that the ultimate foundation of all things is nothing. By
this reconciliation, and indeed essential union of the sub-
jective with the objective, Reason finally bridges over the
chasm by which analysis had formerly separated it from the
simple Faith of common humanity. Consciousness becomes
the manifestation,--the self-revelation of the Absolute;--
and the Absolute itself is the ground and substance of the
phenomena of Consciousness,--the different forms of which
are but the various points wherein God is recognised, with
greater or less degrees of clearness and perfection, in this
manifestation of himself;--while the world itself, as an infi-
uite assemblage of concrete existences, conscious and uncon-
scious, is another phase of the same Infinite and Absolute
Being. Thus Consciousness, far from being a purely sub-
jective and empty train of fancies, contains nothing which
does not rest upon and image forth a Higher and Infinite
Reality; and Idealism itself becomes a sublime and Abso-
lute Realism.
This change in the spirit of his philosophy has been
ascribed to the influence of a distinguished contemporary,
who afterwards succeeded to the chair at Berlin of which
Fichte was the first occupant. It seems to us that it was
the natural and inevitable result of his own principles and
mode of thought; and that it was even theoretically con-
tained in the very first exposition of his doctrine, although
it had not then attained in his own mind that vivid reality
with which it shines, as a prophet-like inspiration, through-
out his later writings. In this view we are fully borne out
by the letter to Jakobi in 1795, and the article from the
Literatur Zeitung, already quoted. * In the development of
the system, whether in the mind of its author or in that of
any learner, the starting point is necessarily the individual
* See pages 60 and 62.
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? FINAL DEVELOPMENT OF HIS PHILOSOPHY. 107
consciousness,--the finite Ego. But when the logical pro- } \cesses of the understanding have performed their office, and led us from this, the nearest of our spiritual experiences, to /\ ' . that higher point in which all finite individuality disappears
in the great thought of an all-embracing consciousness,--an
Infinite Ego,--it becomes unnecessary to reiterate the initial
steps of the investigation,--to imitate the gropings of the schoolboy rather than the comprehensive vision of the man.
From this higher point of view Fichte now looked forth on
the universe and human life, and saw there no longer the
subjective phenomena of a limited and finite nature, but the
harmonious, although diversified, manifestation of the One Universal Being,--the self-revelation of the Absolute,--the
infinitely varied forms under which God becomes " manifest
in the flesh. "
The first traces of this change in his speculative position
are observable in his "Bestimmung des Menschen," pub-
lished in 1799, in which, as we have already said, may be
found the most systematic exposition of his philosophy
which has been attempted in a popular form. In 1801 ap-
peared his "Antwortschreiben an Reinhold" (Answer to
Reinhold), and his "Sonnenklarer Bericht an das grossere
Publicum iiber das eigentliche Wesen der neuesten Philoso-
phic" (Sun-clear Intelligence to the general public on the
essential nature of the New Philosophy. ) These he intended
to follow up in 1802 with a more strictly scientific and com- yplete account of the Wissenschaftslehre, designed for the
philosophical reader only. But he was induced to postpone
this purpose, partly on account of the recent modification of
his own philosophical point of view, and partly because the attention of the literary world was now engrossed by the. >>*
brilliant and poetic Natur-Philosophie of Schelling. Before \'communicating to the world the work which should be
handed down to posterity as the finished institute of his
theory, it appeared to him necessary, first of all to prepare
the public mind for its reception by a series of introductory applications of his system to subjects of general interest.
But this purpose was likewise laid aside for a time,--princi-
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? 108
MEMOIR OF FICHTE.
pally, it would seem, from dissatisfaction with the reception
which his works had hitherto received, from the harassing
misconceptions and misrepresentations which he had en-
countered, and from a doubt, amounting almost to hopeless-
ness, of making his views intelligible to the general public.
These feelings occasioned a silence of four years on his part,
and are characteristically expressed in the prefaces to seve-
ral of his subsequent works.
In the meantime, although Fichte retired for a season
from the prominent position which he had hitherto occupied
in the public eye, it was impossible for him to remain inact-
ive. Shut out from communication with the "reading pub-
lic," he sought to gather around him fit hearers to whom he
might impart the high message with which he was charged.
This was indeed his favourite mode of communication: in
the lecture-room his fiery eloquence found a freer scope than
the form of a literary work would permit. A circle of pupils
soon gathered around him at Berlin. His private lectures
were attended by the most distinguished scholars and states-
men: W. Schlegel, Kotzebue, the Minister Schrotter, the
High Chancellor Beyme, and the Minister von Altenstein,
were found among his auditory.
In 1804 an opportunity presented itself of resuming his
favourite vocation of an academic teacher. This was an in-
vitation from Russia to assume the chair of Philosophy in
the University of Charkow. The existing state of literary
culture in that country, however, did not seem to offer a
promising field for his exertions; and another proposal, which
appeared to open the way to a more useful application of his
powers, occurring at the same time, he declined the invitation
to Charkow. The second invitation was likewise a foreign
one,--from Bavaria, namely, to the Philosophic chair at
Landshut. It was accompanied by pecuniary proposals of a
most advantageous nature. But experience had taught
Fichte to set a much higher value upon the internal condi-
tions of such an office, than upon its outward advantages. In
desiring an academic chair, he sought only an opportunity
of carrying out his plan of a strictly philosophical education,
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? ACADEMIC PROJECTS.
109
with a view to the future reception of the Wissenschaftslehre
in its most perfect form. To this purpose he had devoted
his life, and no pecuniary considerations could induce him
to lay it aside. But its thorough fulfilment demanded ab-
solute freedom of teaching and writing as a primary condi-
tion, and therefore this was the first point to which Fichte
looked in any appointment which might be offered to him.
He frankly laid his views on this subject before the Bava-
rian Government. "The plan," he says, "might perhaps be
carried forward without the support of any government, al-
though this has its difficulties. But if any enlightened
government should resolve to support it, it would, in my
opinion, acquire thereby a deathless fame, and become the
benefactor of humanity. " Whether the Bavarian Govern-
ment was dissatisfied with the conditions required does not
appear,--but the negotiations on this subject were shortly
afterwards broken off.
At last, however, an opportunity occurred of carrying out
his views in Prussia itself. Through the influence of his
friends, Beyme and Altenstein, with the Minister Harden-
berg, he was appointed Professor of Philosophy at the Uni-
versity of Erlangen, with the liberty of returning to Berlin
during the winter to continue his philosophical lectures there.
In May 1805 he entered upon his new duties with a brilliant
success which seemed to promise a repetition of the epoch
of Jena. Besides the course of lectures to his own students,
in which he took a comprehensive survey of the conditions
and method of scientific knowledge in general, he delivered
a series of private lectures to his fellow professors and others,
in which he laid down his views in a more abstract form.
In addition to these labours, he delivered to the whole stu-
dents of the University his celebrated lectures on the "Nature
of the Scholar. " These remarkable discourses must have
had a powerful effect on the young and ardent minds to
which they were addressed. Never, perhaps, were the moral
dignity and sacredness of the literary calling set forth with
more impressive earnestness.
Encouraged by the brilliant success which had attended
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