And cer- tainly, as we already said earlier, being evil resides in cognitive knowl- edge;
cognition
is the source of evil.
Schelling-Philosophical-Investigations-into-the-Essence-of-Human-Freedom
Inertia and gravity, just as their opposite, motion, are only appear- ances since space and body themselves are only appearances; that which is true, that which is of essence in them is persistency, [a] con- tinuation of existence which can and may not be interrupted.
Even its shape [Gestalt] shows that every thing strives only toward a state of persistency, and you, dear Theano, as a painter of nature, will be able to explain much for yourself from the form [Form] of things if you pay heed to it.
We want to take the easiest example from the system of things that can tie the most sprightly mobility with the greatest ho- mogeneity and, therefore, at the same time choose a shape for them- selves.
We name these fluid things.
Now then, Philolaus, all fluid things
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whose parts act homogenously toward each other without obstruc- tion, what kind of shape do they take?
Philolaus. The shape of a drop.
Theophron. And why the shape of a drop? Should we assume, for instance, a drop-forming principium in nature that arbitrarily loves this shape?
Philolaus. By no means! The drop is a sphere; and within a sphere, all parts come homogenously about at one midpoint in harmony and order. The sphere rests on itself: its gravity is in the middle, its shape is therefore the most beautiful state of persistency of homogenous be- ings that assemble around this midpoint and, with equal forces, lend the [proper] counterweight to each other. In accordance with neces- sary laws of harmony and order, a world will emerge in the drop.
Theophron. Consequently, dear Philolaus, you obtain in the law according to which the drop takes shape, at the same time, the rule according to which our earth, the sun, and all heavenly systems are formed. For our earth also emerged once from fluid status and gath- ered itself together in the drop. Thus the sun and this entire system in which the sun rules by gravitational force is a larger drop. Every- thing descends in radii and is being upheld in orbit by other forces; thus the orbit of all planets must approach more or less a circle. The sun in its system forms with millions of other suns in turn a cir- cle or an ellipse, since they move around a common middle or focal point, as the Milky Way proves, and as those systems of suns, [and] the nebular stars show. Altogether they are bright drops from the deity's sea that, by means of indwelling eternal laws of harmony and order, sought and found their state of persistency in their shape and in their course of movement [Lauf]. They were able to find their state of persistency in no other way than in the shape of a sphere and in a circular course, the product of opposite forces, and not through arbitrariness but rather through inner principles of homo- geneously acting forces in fluidity, in the sphere-shape, in the ellip- tic movement of a circle. The small tear, Theano, that every morn- ing you find in the calyx of a rose, shows the principle according to which earth, suns, and all solar, indeed, all world systems, were formed. For, if we allow ourselves the enormous flight of fancy of thinking the entire universe, then no giant emerges but rather a sphere that rests on itself.
HERDER | FROM GOD. SOME CONVERSATIONS | 127
Theano. I thank you, Theophron, for this vast viewpoint concern- ing such a simple law of nature that exists in itself; but do come back to our earth or at least back to our solar system: since I do not like to fly so high. You spoke of a second law of nature according to which everything that is similar unites and everything that is opposed separ- ates; don't you want to provide examples for this?
Theophron. I shall remain with my liquid drop. Surely, Theano, you are acquainted, with the stone of hate and love in the world of nature?
Theano. You mean the magnet?
Theophron. That very thing, and though its theory lies very much in obscurity, our experiences with it are that much more clear. So you know its two poles and their friendly or hostile activity?
Theano. I know of them and also know that a point of the greatest love and a point of complete indifference exists in its axis.
Theophron. Therefore, you know all that I need for my example. Consider the magnet as a round drop in which the magnetic force has distributed itself so homogeneously and regularly that its opposite ends comprise north pole and south pole. You are aware that one cannot come into being without the other.
Theano. I know this and that, if one alters one of them, one alters both.
Theophron. You therefore have in the magnet the most beautiful il- lustration of what hate and love in creation may be, and I am sure that one will discover the same thing in several and, possibly, in all fluids.
Philolaus. And this same thing is?
Theophron. That where a system of homogeneous forces achieves an axis the forces arrange themselves around this axis and around its middle point, in a manner such that every homogeneous thing flows to the homogeneous pole und organizes itself, in accordance with geometric laws, from this pole through all degrees of increase to the culmination and then through the point of indifference to the oppo- site pole. Every sphere would in this manner become the arrange- ment of two hemispheres with opposite forces, just as every ellipse with its two focal points; and the laws of this construction would lie-- according to fixed rules--in the active forces of the system that con- sequently forms itself. As much as in a sphere there cannot be a north pole without a south pole, in a system of forces that forms itself in a regular manner there cannot be a shape in which to the same degree
128 | PHILOSOPHICAL INVESTIGATIONS INTO THE ESSENCE OF HUMAN FREEDOM
[eben sowohl] that which is friendly would separate itself from that which is hostile. Consequently, it would form a whole exactly by means of the counterweight that both lend to each other according to decreasing and increasing degrees of connection. There probably could not be a system of electric forces in the world if it were not for two types of electricity opposing each other that one had actually discovered through experience. It is the same also with warmth and coldness as it is the same with probably every system of forces that can obtain unity only through multiplicity and coherence through that which is opposed to it. The remarkable teaching about nature, which is still so young, will eventually go a long way in these mat- ters, so that it will at last dispel every blind arbitrariness from the world, according to which everything would fall apart and all laws of nature would come to an end. For you must concede, my friends, if the magnet, electric force, light, warmth and coldness, attraction, gravity, and so on, act arbitrarily, then the triangle is no triangle, and compasses are no compasses; then we might declare all observa- tions of physics and mathematics as nonsense and wait for arbitrary revelation. But if it is certain that we have discovered accurate math- ematical laws of nature for so many forces, who wants to set the boundary for us where these laws are no longer to be found, but rather where God's blind will begins? In creation, everything is con- nection, everything is order; therefore, if one law of nature occurs somewhere, then laws of nature must preside everywhere, or crea- tion collapses like chaos.
Theano. You depart however, my friend, from the law of hate and love where according to your system one cannot be without the other. Theophron. Because everything in the world exists that can, then also that which is opposed must exist, and a law of the highest wis- dom must form a system everywhere precisely from this opposition [aus diesem Entgegengesetzten], from the north and south pole. In every circle of nature is the table of the thirty two currents of air, in every ray of sunshine is the full spectrum of colors, and it depends only on which current now and then flows, which color appears here and there. As soon as something solid emerges from a fluid, every- thing crystallizes and forms itself according to inner laws that lie in this system of active forces. All things gravitate toward, or repel, or re- main indifferent against, one other, and the axis of these active forces passes continuously [zusammenha? ngend] through all gradations.
HERDER | FROM GOD. SOME CONVERSATIONS | 129
Chemists arrange nothing but weddings and separations, nature does this in a much richer and more profound manner. All things seek and find themselves that love each other, and the teaching about nature it- self could not help but assume the concept of an elective-attraction [Wahl-Anziehung] for the naming of its bodies. What is opposite de- parts the one from the other and comes together only through the point of indifference. Often, the forces vary rapidly; whole systems be- have differently as do the system's single forces among each other: hate can become love, love can become hate, and everything because of one and the same reason, namely, because every system seeks per- sistency in itself and arranges its forces accordingly. You see how cau- tious one thus has to be with respect to those analogies of external oc- currences in so far as one is not immediately justified, for example, to perceive magnetism and electricity as one, because one discovers in both some similar laws. The systems of forces can be very different from each other und still behave in accordance with all the same laws, since in nature, everything ultimately has to be connected, and there can only be one main law according to which even the most different forces arrange themselves.
Theano. Your principle of persistency, of hate and love comes--as it seems to me--very close to this main law: since it appears every- where, regardless of all the countless differences and opposed ap- pearances in nature. For a few moments I would like to be a higher spirit in order to observe this great workshop in its inner workings [in ihrem Innern].
Theophron. Do not wish for this, Theano. The spectator from out- side is better off, perhaps, at least more comfortable than the ob- server from inside who, however, also could never gain a synoptic view [u? bersehen] of the whole. The spectator in front of the stage stands more comfortably than he who eavesdrops behind the scenes. The exploration of the truth has greater appeal; possessing it per- haps makes [one] sated and dull. To investigate nature, to have a first premonition of her high laws, then to comment, to verify, to assure oneself about these laws, to find them now confirmed a thousand times and newly applied; to perceive finally the same wisest rule, the same holy necessity everywhere, to fall in love, to educate oneself, precisely this accounts for what a man's life is worth. For, dear Theano, are we only spectators, are we not actors ourselves, partici- pants in nature and her emulators? Is it not true that hate and love
130 | PHILOSOPHICAL INVESTIGATIONS INTO THE ESSENCE OF HUMAN FREEDOM
rules in the empire of men? And are not both equally necessary for the formation of the whole? He who cannot hate cannot love; he just has to learn to hate properly and to love properly. There is a point of indif- ference among men; but this is, thank God, within the entire magnetic axis only one point.
[. . . ]
Notes
Introduction
1. Martin Heidegger, Schelling's Treatise on the Essence of Human Freedom, trans. Joan Stambaugh (Athens: University of Ohio Press, 1985). See Wal- ter Schulz, Die Vollendung des deutschen Idealismus in der Spa? tphilo- sophie Schellings (Pfullingen: Neske, 1975); Manfred Frank, Der unend- liche Mangel an Sein (Mu? nchen: Wilhelm Fink Verlag, 1992); Slavoj ? Zi? zek, The Indivisible Remainder: An Essay on Schelling and Related Matters (London: Verso, 1996). We should note that, of these authors, only Hei- degger and ? Zi? zek focus on the Philosophical Investigations, while Frank makes no attempt to hide his distaste.
2. This is not to say, however, that the Philosophical Investigations has not received attention as an attempt at theodicy: see, for example, Friedrich Hermanni, Die letzte Entlastung: Vollendung und Scheitern des abendla? ndi- schen Theodizeeprojekts in Schellings Philosophie (Vienna: Passagen Ver- lag, 1994).
3. Richard Bernstein, Radical Evil: A Philosophical Investigation (Oxford: Polity Press, 2002), 3-4. But see Odo Marquard, "Unburdenings: Theo- dicy Motives in Modern Philosophy," in In Defense of the Accidental, trans. Robert M. Wallace (New York: Oxford UP, 1991), 8-28. For another opposing view, see Joseph Laurence's excellent essay, "Schelling's Meta- physics of Evil," in The New Schelling, ed. Judith Norman and Alistair Welchman (London: Continuum, 2004), 167-189.
4. Heidegger's influence here, as elsewhere, is probably determinative, since he did not take the theodical aspect of the Philosophical Investiga- tions seriously, considering it the "package in which 'the problem of evil' is passed around" and that it would be better to refer to the Philosophi- cal Investigations as an attempt at "systemadicy" [Systemadicee] (Hei- degger, Schelling's Treatise, 15).
5. Z? iz? ek, The Indivisible Remainder, 42.
6. But this may be a less justifiable statement now given the steep increase
in interest in Schelling exhibited by a series of new translations and essay collections including The New Schelling and Schelling Now. See The New Schelling above as well as Schelling Now: Contemporary Read- ings, ed. Jason M. Wirth (Bloomington: University of Indiana Press, 2005). Also see the recent collection of essays in German devoted to Schelling's remarkable and influential concept of personality: Alle Perso? nlichkeit ruht auf einem dunkeln Grunde: Schellings Philosophie der
132 | NOTES TO PAGES IX-XXIX
Perso? nlichkeit, eds. Thomas Buchheim and Friedrich Hermanni (Berlin:
Akademie Verlag, 2004).
7. Leibniz writes:
Mathematics or the art of measuring can elucidate such things very nicely, for everything in nature is, as it were, set out in num- ber, measure and weight or force. If, for example, one sphere meets another sphere in free space and if one knows their sizes and their paths and directions before collision, one can then fore- tell and calculate how they will rebound and what course they will take after the impact. Such splendid laws also apply, no matter how many spheres are taken or whether objects are taken other than spheres. From this one sees then that everything proceeds mathematically--that is, infallibly--in the whole wide world, so that if someone could have sufficient insight into the inner parts of things, and in addition had remembrance and intelligence enough to consider all the circumstances and to take them into account, he would be a prophet and would see the future in the present as in a mirror.
This is quoted in Ernst Cassirer's book Determinism and Indeterminism in Modern Physics. Cassirer comments that the "same infallibility that dis- closes itself in mathematical thought and inference must obtain in nature, for if nature did not possess this infallibility it would be inaccessible to mathematical thought. In this mode of argument there is expressed the characteristic subjective fervor that inspired the first founders and champions of classical rationalism. " It is worthwhile to add that the es- sence of the modern striving to mathematize nature is an overcoming of the reticence of Greek and Christian culture in regard to the possibility of obtaining true knowledge, the prerogative of the gods or God. See, E. Cas- sirer, Determinism and Indeterminism in Modern Physics: Historical and Systematic Studies of the Problem of Causality (New Haven: Yale UP, 1956), 11-12. See also Martin Heidegger, The Metaphysical Foundations of Logic, trans. Michael Heim (Bloomington: Indiana UP, 1984), 37-50, 57-69.
8. Hans Blumenberg, The Legitimacy of the Modern Age, trans. Robert M. Wallace (Cambridge, Mass. : MIT Press, 1983), 55-56.
9. Martin Heidegger, The Principle of Reason, trans. Reginald Lilly (Bloom- ington: Indiana UP, 1991), 3-9.
10. Hermanni argues persuasively for the distinctive innovation of Leibniz's approach in regard to the traditional privation theory of evil. See Frie- drich Hermanni, "Die Positivita? t des Malum: Die Privationstheorie und ihre Kritik in der neuzeitlichen Philosophie," in Die Wirklichkeit des Bo? sen, ed. Peter Koslowski and Friedrich Hermanni (Munich: Wilhelm Fink Verlag, 1998), 49-55.
11. G. W. F. Hegel, Lectures on the Philosophy of World History: Introduction, trans. H. B. Nisbet (Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1975), 42-43. See, in this connection, Marquard, "Unburdenings," 14-17 and Wilhelm G. Jacobs,
"Die Theodizeeproblematik in der Sicht Schellings," in Studia Leibnitiana,
Supp 26, 1986, 217.
12. G. W. F. Hegel, The Phenomenology of Spirit, trans. A. V. Miller (Oxford: Ox-
ford UP, 1977), 19.
13. Here is a close connection between Hegel and Goethe, one that helps to
explain the effusive letter that is the centerpiece of Karl Lo? with's ac- count of their relationship in his From Nietzsche to Hegel. See Karl Lo? with, From Nietzsche to Hegel: The Revolution in Nineteenth-Century Thought, trans. David E. Green (New York: Columbia UP, 1964), 3-6.
14. See Bernstein, Radical Evil, 46. Also see William Desmond, "Dialectic and Evil," in Beyond Hegel and Dialectic: Speculation, Cult and Comedy (Al- bany: State University of New York Press, 1992), 189-250.
15. G. W. F. Hegel, Lectures on the Philosophy of Religion: Volume III, The Con- summate Religion, trans. R. F. Brown, P. C. Hodgson, and J. M. Stewart, with the assistance of H. S. Harris (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1985), 301. The key passage on p. 301 reads:
Being evil is located in the act of cognition, in consciousness.
And cer- tainly, as we already said earlier, being evil resides in cognitive knowl- edge; cognition is the source of evil. For cognition or consciousness means in general a judging or dividing, a self-distinguishing within oneself. Animals have no consciousness, they are unable to make distinctions within themselves, they have no free being-for-self in the face of objectivity generally. The cleavage, however, is what is evil; it is the contradiction. It contains the two sides: good and evil. Only in this cleavage is evil contained and hence it is itself evil. Therefore it is entirely correct to say that good and evil are first to be found in consciousness.
16. This seems to be one of the strands in the critique of Enlightenment that stems from Horkheimer and Adorno. See Max Horkheimer and Theodor W. Adorno, The Dialectic of Enlightenment, trans. Edmund Jephcott (Stan- ford: Stanford UP, 2002).
17. The paradigmatic modern example of this kind of questioning starts and ends with Auschwitz, which seems to mock any notion of theodicy in the traditional sense or even in the peculiar Nietzschean sense of the eternal return.
18. See Susan Neiman, Evil in Modern Thought (Princeton: Princeton UP, 2002), 62. Also see Bernstein, Radical Evil, 11-45 and, for a more wide- ranging discussion, Gordon E. Michalson, Jr. , Fallen Freedom: Kant on Radical Evil and Moral Regeneration (Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1990).
19. See Robert Pippin, Modernism as a Philosophical Problem, 2nd ed. (Ox- ford: Blackwell, 1999), 45.
20. See Michalson, Fallen Freedom, 107-124.
21. See, for example, the opening paragraphs of The Misfortunes of Virtue, an
early (and much tamer) draft of Justine. D. A. F. de Sade, The Misfortunes of Virtue, trans. David Coward (Oxford: Oxford UP, 1992), 1-2.
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134 | NOTES TO PAGES IX-XXIX
22. Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Emile, trans. Allan Bloom (New York: Basic Books, 1979), 292.
23. See Laurence, "Schelling's Metaphysics of Evil," 171.
24. This is a crucial aspect of Miklos Veto? 's provocative (and monumental)
study of German Idealism. See Miklos Veto? , De Kant a` Schelling: Les deux voies de l'Ide? alisme allemand, 2 vols. (Grenoble: Editions Je? ro^me Millon, 1978).
25. Michalson, Fallen Freedom, 17.
26. Concerning the notion of the "Kantian paradox," see Robert Pippin,
"Hegel's Practical Philosophy: The Realization of Freedom," in The Cam- bridge Companion to German Idealism, ed. Karl Ameriks (Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2000), 192 and Terry Pinkard, German Philosophy 1760- 1860: The Legacy of Idealism (Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2002), 59-60; for the more radical position regarding Kantian rhetoric, see Stanley Rosen, Hermeneutics as Politics (Oxford: Oxford UP, 1987), 3-18.
27. Schelling addresses this issue in the "Preface" to the Philosophical Inves- tigations, where he refers to an important work which, unfortunately, has not been translated, the Presentation of My System of Philosophy (1801). For further background, see F. W. J. Schelling, Ideas for a Philosophy of Nature, trans. Errol E. Harris and Peter Heath (Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1988), especially Schelling's introduction at pp. 9-55, and F. W. J. Schell- ing, First Outline of a System of the Philosophy of Nature, trans. Keith R. Pe- terson (Albany: State University of New York Press, 2004).
28. Regarding the meaning of ground, see Jason M. Wirth, The Conspiracy of Life: Meditations on Schelling and His Time (Albany: State University of New York Press, 2003), 165-168.
29. ? Ziz? ek, The Indivisible Remainder, 39, 45.
30. Is this merely a curious transfer of the "Kantian paradox" to God? It
would seem so, especially if any homology is to be maintained between God and man--a homology that would in fact seem necessary for there to be any relation between them (otherwise one returns to the problem of the relation between finite and infinite).
31. Z? iz? ek, The Indivisible Remainder, 64.
32. Simone de Beauvoir, "Must We Burn Sade? ," in D. A. F. de Sade, The 120
Days of Sodom and Other Writings, trans. Austryn Wainhouse and Richard
Seaver (New York: Grove Press, 1966), 3-64.
33. Wirth, The Conspiracy of Life, 170.
34. See Laurence, "Schellings Metaphysics of Evil," 171-172.
35. See Hermanni's elegant characterization of Schelling's theodicy as a two-
stage process. Hermanni, Die Entlastung, 15-26. Also see Christoph Schulte, Radikal bo? se: Die Karriere des Bo? sen von Kant bis Nietzsche (Mu- nich: Wilhelm Fink Verlag, 1991), 236-241.
36. Heidegger, Schelling's Treatise, 161.
37. See Hermanni, Die Entlastung, 19-23, 73-113.
38. See Friedrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil, trans. Marion Faber (Ox-
ford: Oxford UP, 1998), 8-9 (section 1, aphorism 6).
39. See Neiman, Evil in Modern Thought, 62.
40. It is important to keep in mind that Schelling is hardly an irrationalist.
Despite all his changes, his Protean philosophical personality, he never abandoned his essential adherence to understanding the nature of ra- tionality. See Dale E. Snow, Schelling and the End of Idealism (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1996).
41. F. W. J. Schelling, The Ages of the World, trans. Jason Wirth (Albany: State University of New York Press, 2000), 90.
Translators' Note
1. See F. W. J. Schelling, Philosophical Inquiries into the Nature of Human Freedom, trans. James Gutmann (La Salle: Open Court, 1936), 34. See also Priscilla Hayden-Roy's more recent (1987) translation in which she uses the terms "ruleless" and "something ruleless" to translate, respectively, "regellos" and "das Regellose. " F. W. J. Schelling, Philosophical Investiga- tions into the Essence of Human Freedom and Related Matters, trans. Pris- cilla Hayden-Roy (New York: Continuum, 1987), 238.
2. See "Translator's Introduction," in Schelling, The Ages of the World, xxxi- xxxii.
3. See F. W. J. Schelling, The Abyss of Freedom/Ages of the World, trans. Ju- dith Norman (Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 1997), 112.
4. F. W. J. Schelling, Philosophische Untersuchungen u? ber das Wesen der menschlichen Freiheit und die damit zusammenha? ngenden Gegensta? nde, ed. Thomas Buchheim (Hamburg: Felix Meiner Verlag, 1997). We have fol- lowed Buchheim's practice of giving the pagination of the German origi- nal both in the first edition, designated as "OA," and in the Collected Works compiled by Schelling's son and designated here as "SW. " See F. W. J. Schelling, Philosophische Untersuchungen u? ber das Wesen der menschli- chen Freiheit und die damit zusammenha? ngenden Gegensta? nde in Philoso- phische Schriften (Philipp Kru? ll: Landshut, 1809), 397-511 and in Sa? mmtliche Werke, ed. K. F. A. Schelling vol. VII (J. G. Cotta: Stuttgart,
1856-1861), 336-416.
We have also used Buchheim's very useful divisional headings for our
notes to the Philosophical Investigations. But, since these headings are not in Schelling's original text, we have avoided inserting them into the main body of our translation.
Philosophical Investigations into the Essence of Human Freedom and Matters Connected Therewith
Preface to the First Edition
1. The Philosophical Investigations first appeared in 1809 in volume 1 of what was to be a collected edition of Schelling's writings published by Philipp Kru? ll in Landshut. No further volumes were in fact published. Indeed, Schelling published only one other substantial work in his lifetime, a
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136 | NOTES TO PAGES 3-6
polemic against Jacobi called, F. W. J. Schelling's Memorial to Mr. Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi's Writing on the Divine Things etc. and to the Accusation Made against Him Therein Regarding an Intentionally Deceiving and Lying Atheism (F. W. J. Schellings Denkmal der Schrift von den go? ttlichen Dingen usw des Herrn Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi und der ihm in derselben gemach- ten Beschuldigung eines absichtlich ta? uschenden, Lu? ge redenden Atheis- mus), which appeared in 1812.
The other writings collected in the volume represent a selection from the very beginning of Schelling's philosophical activity, Of the I as Princi- ple of Philosophy or on the Unconditioned in Human Knowledge (1795)-- Schelling's second major work, which he published at the age of twenty--Philosophical Letters on Dogmatism and Criticism (1795), The Treatises in Explanation of the Doctrine of Science (1796-1797), along with a later work, his speech, On the Relation of the Fine Arts to Nature (1807). The ten-year lacuna (from 1797 to 1807) represented here is re- markable and poses a question that Schelling himself answers somewhat cryptically in the "Preface. " This cryptic answer emerges by inference from Schelling's claim that the Philosophical Investigations is the first treatise "in which the author puts forth his concept of the ideal part of philosophy with complete determinateness. " The inference is that the other works included in the volume show different stages of the develop- ment of Schelling's concept of the ideal part of philosophy and, there- fore, offer an interpretative path into the heart of the Philosophical Inves- tigations. This inference seems to be more persuasive when one takes into account Schelling's focus on the philosophy of nature between 1797 and 1800 and that he seems to regard two other important treatises, the Presentation of My System of Philosophy (1801) and Philosophy and Reli- gion (1804), as more or less unsuccessful precursors to the Philosophical Investigations.
This self-interpretation may seem somewhat disingenuous to those who emphasize "Protean" discontinuity in Schelling's work rather than its continuity (see Xaver Tilliette, Schelling: une philosophie en devenir, vol. 1 [Paris: J. Vrin, 1970], 12-13). For many among the former, the Philo- sophical Investigations is more representative of a rupture in Schelling's thought that lays the foundation for the investigations of the late philoso- phy. According to a typical periodization of Schelling's work that empha- sizes rupture rather than continuity, one identifies an early "Fichtean" pe- riod (1794-1797), followed by the natural philosophy (1797-1800), the philosophy of identity (1801-1804), and, finally, after a period of transi- tion that ends with the Philosophical Investigations, the late philosophy starting with the Ages of the World (1811-1854). But one ignores Schelling's self-interpretation at one's own risk; at the very least, Schelling's apparent willingness to place the Philosophical Investigations in a direct line of investigation stemming from his earliest major writings evinces a plea for continuity, and, if continuity is based as much on the nature of the problem to be solved as on the solutions proffered, this plea
should not be dismissed lightly. In this respect, Heidegger's own some- what exaggerated claim about Schelling, that "there was seldom a thinker who fought so passionately ever since his earliest periods for his one and unique standpoint," is worth taking seriously even though one may argue (as with most of Heidegger's grand assertions about other thinkers) that it applies more to Heidegger himself (Heidegger, Schelling's Treatise, 6).
2. This journal is the Philosophical Journal of a Society of German Scholars (Philosophisches Journal einer Gesellschaft teutscher Gelehrten) that served as a principal conduit of the Fichtean line of idealism at Jena and was edited by Fichte along with Immanuel Niethammer (1766-1848). Schelling's early publication in this journal is a sign of his being consid- ered a proper follower of Fichte.
3. This academic speech was given on October 12, 1807 for a celebration in honor of the nameday of King Maximilian I at the Bavarian Academy of Sciences (of which Schelling was a prominent member).
4. Schelling is referring to Kant's Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Sci- ence (Metaphysische Anfangsgru? nde der Naturwissenschaft) (1786) and, in particular, to Kant's dynamic theory of matter, which had consider- able influence on Schelling as his first foray into Naturphilosophie, the Ideas for a Philosophy of Nature (1797) shows, especially in the discus- sion of matter set out in Book II. Kant's thinking proved attractive to Schelling because Kant does not consider matter to be some lifeless substrate but rather a balance of attractive and repelling forces that are in fact the condition for the very possibility of matter as such; in other words, matter is intrinsically dynamic, a tissue woven of oppos- ing forces and not a sort of static, homogenous "non-thing" that is the basis of things. (Immanuel Kant, Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science, trans. Michael Friedman [Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2004], 62-74.
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whose parts act homogenously toward each other without obstruc- tion, what kind of shape do they take?
Philolaus. The shape of a drop.
Theophron. And why the shape of a drop? Should we assume, for instance, a drop-forming principium in nature that arbitrarily loves this shape?
Philolaus. By no means! The drop is a sphere; and within a sphere, all parts come homogenously about at one midpoint in harmony and order. The sphere rests on itself: its gravity is in the middle, its shape is therefore the most beautiful state of persistency of homogenous be- ings that assemble around this midpoint and, with equal forces, lend the [proper] counterweight to each other. In accordance with neces- sary laws of harmony and order, a world will emerge in the drop.
Theophron. Consequently, dear Philolaus, you obtain in the law according to which the drop takes shape, at the same time, the rule according to which our earth, the sun, and all heavenly systems are formed. For our earth also emerged once from fluid status and gath- ered itself together in the drop. Thus the sun and this entire system in which the sun rules by gravitational force is a larger drop. Every- thing descends in radii and is being upheld in orbit by other forces; thus the orbit of all planets must approach more or less a circle. The sun in its system forms with millions of other suns in turn a cir- cle or an ellipse, since they move around a common middle or focal point, as the Milky Way proves, and as those systems of suns, [and] the nebular stars show. Altogether they are bright drops from the deity's sea that, by means of indwelling eternal laws of harmony and order, sought and found their state of persistency in their shape and in their course of movement [Lauf]. They were able to find their state of persistency in no other way than in the shape of a sphere and in a circular course, the product of opposite forces, and not through arbitrariness but rather through inner principles of homo- geneously acting forces in fluidity, in the sphere-shape, in the ellip- tic movement of a circle. The small tear, Theano, that every morn- ing you find in the calyx of a rose, shows the principle according to which earth, suns, and all solar, indeed, all world systems, were formed. For, if we allow ourselves the enormous flight of fancy of thinking the entire universe, then no giant emerges but rather a sphere that rests on itself.
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Theano. I thank you, Theophron, for this vast viewpoint concern- ing such a simple law of nature that exists in itself; but do come back to our earth or at least back to our solar system: since I do not like to fly so high. You spoke of a second law of nature according to which everything that is similar unites and everything that is opposed separ- ates; don't you want to provide examples for this?
Theophron. I shall remain with my liquid drop. Surely, Theano, you are acquainted, with the stone of hate and love in the world of nature?
Theano. You mean the magnet?
Theophron. That very thing, and though its theory lies very much in obscurity, our experiences with it are that much more clear. So you know its two poles and their friendly or hostile activity?
Theano. I know of them and also know that a point of the greatest love and a point of complete indifference exists in its axis.
Theophron. Therefore, you know all that I need for my example. Consider the magnet as a round drop in which the magnetic force has distributed itself so homogeneously and regularly that its opposite ends comprise north pole and south pole. You are aware that one cannot come into being without the other.
Theano. I know this and that, if one alters one of them, one alters both.
Theophron. You therefore have in the magnet the most beautiful il- lustration of what hate and love in creation may be, and I am sure that one will discover the same thing in several and, possibly, in all fluids.
Philolaus. And this same thing is?
Theophron. That where a system of homogeneous forces achieves an axis the forces arrange themselves around this axis and around its middle point, in a manner such that every homogeneous thing flows to the homogeneous pole und organizes itself, in accordance with geometric laws, from this pole through all degrees of increase to the culmination and then through the point of indifference to the oppo- site pole. Every sphere would in this manner become the arrange- ment of two hemispheres with opposite forces, just as every ellipse with its two focal points; and the laws of this construction would lie-- according to fixed rules--in the active forces of the system that con- sequently forms itself. As much as in a sphere there cannot be a north pole without a south pole, in a system of forces that forms itself in a regular manner there cannot be a shape in which to the same degree
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[eben sowohl] that which is friendly would separate itself from that which is hostile. Consequently, it would form a whole exactly by means of the counterweight that both lend to each other according to decreasing and increasing degrees of connection. There probably could not be a system of electric forces in the world if it were not for two types of electricity opposing each other that one had actually discovered through experience. It is the same also with warmth and coldness as it is the same with probably every system of forces that can obtain unity only through multiplicity and coherence through that which is opposed to it. The remarkable teaching about nature, which is still so young, will eventually go a long way in these mat- ters, so that it will at last dispel every blind arbitrariness from the world, according to which everything would fall apart and all laws of nature would come to an end. For you must concede, my friends, if the magnet, electric force, light, warmth and coldness, attraction, gravity, and so on, act arbitrarily, then the triangle is no triangle, and compasses are no compasses; then we might declare all observa- tions of physics and mathematics as nonsense and wait for arbitrary revelation. But if it is certain that we have discovered accurate math- ematical laws of nature for so many forces, who wants to set the boundary for us where these laws are no longer to be found, but rather where God's blind will begins? In creation, everything is con- nection, everything is order; therefore, if one law of nature occurs somewhere, then laws of nature must preside everywhere, or crea- tion collapses like chaos.
Theano. You depart however, my friend, from the law of hate and love where according to your system one cannot be without the other. Theophron. Because everything in the world exists that can, then also that which is opposed must exist, and a law of the highest wis- dom must form a system everywhere precisely from this opposition [aus diesem Entgegengesetzten], from the north and south pole. In every circle of nature is the table of the thirty two currents of air, in every ray of sunshine is the full spectrum of colors, and it depends only on which current now and then flows, which color appears here and there. As soon as something solid emerges from a fluid, every- thing crystallizes and forms itself according to inner laws that lie in this system of active forces. All things gravitate toward, or repel, or re- main indifferent against, one other, and the axis of these active forces passes continuously [zusammenha? ngend] through all gradations.
HERDER | FROM GOD. SOME CONVERSATIONS | 129
Chemists arrange nothing but weddings and separations, nature does this in a much richer and more profound manner. All things seek and find themselves that love each other, and the teaching about nature it- self could not help but assume the concept of an elective-attraction [Wahl-Anziehung] for the naming of its bodies. What is opposite de- parts the one from the other and comes together only through the point of indifference. Often, the forces vary rapidly; whole systems be- have differently as do the system's single forces among each other: hate can become love, love can become hate, and everything because of one and the same reason, namely, because every system seeks per- sistency in itself and arranges its forces accordingly. You see how cau- tious one thus has to be with respect to those analogies of external oc- currences in so far as one is not immediately justified, for example, to perceive magnetism and electricity as one, because one discovers in both some similar laws. The systems of forces can be very different from each other und still behave in accordance with all the same laws, since in nature, everything ultimately has to be connected, and there can only be one main law according to which even the most different forces arrange themselves.
Theano. Your principle of persistency, of hate and love comes--as it seems to me--very close to this main law: since it appears every- where, regardless of all the countless differences and opposed ap- pearances in nature. For a few moments I would like to be a higher spirit in order to observe this great workshop in its inner workings [in ihrem Innern].
Theophron. Do not wish for this, Theano. The spectator from out- side is better off, perhaps, at least more comfortable than the ob- server from inside who, however, also could never gain a synoptic view [u? bersehen] of the whole. The spectator in front of the stage stands more comfortably than he who eavesdrops behind the scenes. The exploration of the truth has greater appeal; possessing it per- haps makes [one] sated and dull. To investigate nature, to have a first premonition of her high laws, then to comment, to verify, to assure oneself about these laws, to find them now confirmed a thousand times and newly applied; to perceive finally the same wisest rule, the same holy necessity everywhere, to fall in love, to educate oneself, precisely this accounts for what a man's life is worth. For, dear Theano, are we only spectators, are we not actors ourselves, partici- pants in nature and her emulators? Is it not true that hate and love
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rules in the empire of men? And are not both equally necessary for the formation of the whole? He who cannot hate cannot love; he just has to learn to hate properly and to love properly. There is a point of indif- ference among men; but this is, thank God, within the entire magnetic axis only one point.
[. . . ]
Notes
Introduction
1. Martin Heidegger, Schelling's Treatise on the Essence of Human Freedom, trans. Joan Stambaugh (Athens: University of Ohio Press, 1985). See Wal- ter Schulz, Die Vollendung des deutschen Idealismus in der Spa? tphilo- sophie Schellings (Pfullingen: Neske, 1975); Manfred Frank, Der unend- liche Mangel an Sein (Mu? nchen: Wilhelm Fink Verlag, 1992); Slavoj ? Zi? zek, The Indivisible Remainder: An Essay on Schelling and Related Matters (London: Verso, 1996). We should note that, of these authors, only Hei- degger and ? Zi? zek focus on the Philosophical Investigations, while Frank makes no attempt to hide his distaste.
2. This is not to say, however, that the Philosophical Investigations has not received attention as an attempt at theodicy: see, for example, Friedrich Hermanni, Die letzte Entlastung: Vollendung und Scheitern des abendla? ndi- schen Theodizeeprojekts in Schellings Philosophie (Vienna: Passagen Ver- lag, 1994).
3. Richard Bernstein, Radical Evil: A Philosophical Investigation (Oxford: Polity Press, 2002), 3-4. But see Odo Marquard, "Unburdenings: Theo- dicy Motives in Modern Philosophy," in In Defense of the Accidental, trans. Robert M. Wallace (New York: Oxford UP, 1991), 8-28. For another opposing view, see Joseph Laurence's excellent essay, "Schelling's Meta- physics of Evil," in The New Schelling, ed. Judith Norman and Alistair Welchman (London: Continuum, 2004), 167-189.
4. Heidegger's influence here, as elsewhere, is probably determinative, since he did not take the theodical aspect of the Philosophical Investiga- tions seriously, considering it the "package in which 'the problem of evil' is passed around" and that it would be better to refer to the Philosophi- cal Investigations as an attempt at "systemadicy" [Systemadicee] (Hei- degger, Schelling's Treatise, 15).
5. Z? iz? ek, The Indivisible Remainder, 42.
6. But this may be a less justifiable statement now given the steep increase
in interest in Schelling exhibited by a series of new translations and essay collections including The New Schelling and Schelling Now. See The New Schelling above as well as Schelling Now: Contemporary Read- ings, ed. Jason M. Wirth (Bloomington: University of Indiana Press, 2005). Also see the recent collection of essays in German devoted to Schelling's remarkable and influential concept of personality: Alle Perso? nlichkeit ruht auf einem dunkeln Grunde: Schellings Philosophie der
132 | NOTES TO PAGES IX-XXIX
Perso? nlichkeit, eds. Thomas Buchheim and Friedrich Hermanni (Berlin:
Akademie Verlag, 2004).
7. Leibniz writes:
Mathematics or the art of measuring can elucidate such things very nicely, for everything in nature is, as it were, set out in num- ber, measure and weight or force. If, for example, one sphere meets another sphere in free space and if one knows their sizes and their paths and directions before collision, one can then fore- tell and calculate how they will rebound and what course they will take after the impact. Such splendid laws also apply, no matter how many spheres are taken or whether objects are taken other than spheres. From this one sees then that everything proceeds mathematically--that is, infallibly--in the whole wide world, so that if someone could have sufficient insight into the inner parts of things, and in addition had remembrance and intelligence enough to consider all the circumstances and to take them into account, he would be a prophet and would see the future in the present as in a mirror.
This is quoted in Ernst Cassirer's book Determinism and Indeterminism in Modern Physics. Cassirer comments that the "same infallibility that dis- closes itself in mathematical thought and inference must obtain in nature, for if nature did not possess this infallibility it would be inaccessible to mathematical thought. In this mode of argument there is expressed the characteristic subjective fervor that inspired the first founders and champions of classical rationalism. " It is worthwhile to add that the es- sence of the modern striving to mathematize nature is an overcoming of the reticence of Greek and Christian culture in regard to the possibility of obtaining true knowledge, the prerogative of the gods or God. See, E. Cas- sirer, Determinism and Indeterminism in Modern Physics: Historical and Systematic Studies of the Problem of Causality (New Haven: Yale UP, 1956), 11-12. See also Martin Heidegger, The Metaphysical Foundations of Logic, trans. Michael Heim (Bloomington: Indiana UP, 1984), 37-50, 57-69.
8. Hans Blumenberg, The Legitimacy of the Modern Age, trans. Robert M. Wallace (Cambridge, Mass. : MIT Press, 1983), 55-56.
9. Martin Heidegger, The Principle of Reason, trans. Reginald Lilly (Bloom- ington: Indiana UP, 1991), 3-9.
10. Hermanni argues persuasively for the distinctive innovation of Leibniz's approach in regard to the traditional privation theory of evil. See Frie- drich Hermanni, "Die Positivita? t des Malum: Die Privationstheorie und ihre Kritik in der neuzeitlichen Philosophie," in Die Wirklichkeit des Bo? sen, ed. Peter Koslowski and Friedrich Hermanni (Munich: Wilhelm Fink Verlag, 1998), 49-55.
11. G. W. F. Hegel, Lectures on the Philosophy of World History: Introduction, trans. H. B. Nisbet (Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1975), 42-43. See, in this connection, Marquard, "Unburdenings," 14-17 and Wilhelm G. Jacobs,
"Die Theodizeeproblematik in der Sicht Schellings," in Studia Leibnitiana,
Supp 26, 1986, 217.
12. G. W. F. Hegel, The Phenomenology of Spirit, trans. A. V. Miller (Oxford: Ox-
ford UP, 1977), 19.
13. Here is a close connection between Hegel and Goethe, one that helps to
explain the effusive letter that is the centerpiece of Karl Lo? with's ac- count of their relationship in his From Nietzsche to Hegel. See Karl Lo? with, From Nietzsche to Hegel: The Revolution in Nineteenth-Century Thought, trans. David E. Green (New York: Columbia UP, 1964), 3-6.
14. See Bernstein, Radical Evil, 46. Also see William Desmond, "Dialectic and Evil," in Beyond Hegel and Dialectic: Speculation, Cult and Comedy (Al- bany: State University of New York Press, 1992), 189-250.
15. G. W. F. Hegel, Lectures on the Philosophy of Religion: Volume III, The Con- summate Religion, trans. R. F. Brown, P. C. Hodgson, and J. M. Stewart, with the assistance of H. S. Harris (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1985), 301. The key passage on p. 301 reads:
Being evil is located in the act of cognition, in consciousness.
And cer- tainly, as we already said earlier, being evil resides in cognitive knowl- edge; cognition is the source of evil. For cognition or consciousness means in general a judging or dividing, a self-distinguishing within oneself. Animals have no consciousness, they are unable to make distinctions within themselves, they have no free being-for-self in the face of objectivity generally. The cleavage, however, is what is evil; it is the contradiction. It contains the two sides: good and evil. Only in this cleavage is evil contained and hence it is itself evil. Therefore it is entirely correct to say that good and evil are first to be found in consciousness.
16. This seems to be one of the strands in the critique of Enlightenment that stems from Horkheimer and Adorno. See Max Horkheimer and Theodor W. Adorno, The Dialectic of Enlightenment, trans. Edmund Jephcott (Stan- ford: Stanford UP, 2002).
17. The paradigmatic modern example of this kind of questioning starts and ends with Auschwitz, which seems to mock any notion of theodicy in the traditional sense or even in the peculiar Nietzschean sense of the eternal return.
18. See Susan Neiman, Evil in Modern Thought (Princeton: Princeton UP, 2002), 62. Also see Bernstein, Radical Evil, 11-45 and, for a more wide- ranging discussion, Gordon E. Michalson, Jr. , Fallen Freedom: Kant on Radical Evil and Moral Regeneration (Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1990).
19. See Robert Pippin, Modernism as a Philosophical Problem, 2nd ed. (Ox- ford: Blackwell, 1999), 45.
20. See Michalson, Fallen Freedom, 107-124.
21. See, for example, the opening paragraphs of The Misfortunes of Virtue, an
early (and much tamer) draft of Justine. D. A. F. de Sade, The Misfortunes of Virtue, trans. David Coward (Oxford: Oxford UP, 1992), 1-2.
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134 | NOTES TO PAGES IX-XXIX
22. Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Emile, trans. Allan Bloom (New York: Basic Books, 1979), 292.
23. See Laurence, "Schelling's Metaphysics of Evil," 171.
24. This is a crucial aspect of Miklos Veto? 's provocative (and monumental)
study of German Idealism. See Miklos Veto? , De Kant a` Schelling: Les deux voies de l'Ide? alisme allemand, 2 vols. (Grenoble: Editions Je? ro^me Millon, 1978).
25. Michalson, Fallen Freedom, 17.
26. Concerning the notion of the "Kantian paradox," see Robert Pippin,
"Hegel's Practical Philosophy: The Realization of Freedom," in The Cam- bridge Companion to German Idealism, ed. Karl Ameriks (Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2000), 192 and Terry Pinkard, German Philosophy 1760- 1860: The Legacy of Idealism (Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2002), 59-60; for the more radical position regarding Kantian rhetoric, see Stanley Rosen, Hermeneutics as Politics (Oxford: Oxford UP, 1987), 3-18.
27. Schelling addresses this issue in the "Preface" to the Philosophical Inves- tigations, where he refers to an important work which, unfortunately, has not been translated, the Presentation of My System of Philosophy (1801). For further background, see F. W. J. Schelling, Ideas for a Philosophy of Nature, trans. Errol E. Harris and Peter Heath (Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1988), especially Schelling's introduction at pp. 9-55, and F. W. J. Schell- ing, First Outline of a System of the Philosophy of Nature, trans. Keith R. Pe- terson (Albany: State University of New York Press, 2004).
28. Regarding the meaning of ground, see Jason M. Wirth, The Conspiracy of Life: Meditations on Schelling and His Time (Albany: State University of New York Press, 2003), 165-168.
29. ? Ziz? ek, The Indivisible Remainder, 39, 45.
30. Is this merely a curious transfer of the "Kantian paradox" to God? It
would seem so, especially if any homology is to be maintained between God and man--a homology that would in fact seem necessary for there to be any relation between them (otherwise one returns to the problem of the relation between finite and infinite).
31. Z? iz? ek, The Indivisible Remainder, 64.
32. Simone de Beauvoir, "Must We Burn Sade? ," in D. A. F. de Sade, The 120
Days of Sodom and Other Writings, trans. Austryn Wainhouse and Richard
Seaver (New York: Grove Press, 1966), 3-64.
33. Wirth, The Conspiracy of Life, 170.
34. See Laurence, "Schellings Metaphysics of Evil," 171-172.
35. See Hermanni's elegant characterization of Schelling's theodicy as a two-
stage process. Hermanni, Die Entlastung, 15-26. Also see Christoph Schulte, Radikal bo? se: Die Karriere des Bo? sen von Kant bis Nietzsche (Mu- nich: Wilhelm Fink Verlag, 1991), 236-241.
36. Heidegger, Schelling's Treatise, 161.
37. See Hermanni, Die Entlastung, 19-23, 73-113.
38. See Friedrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil, trans. Marion Faber (Ox-
ford: Oxford UP, 1998), 8-9 (section 1, aphorism 6).
39. See Neiman, Evil in Modern Thought, 62.
40. It is important to keep in mind that Schelling is hardly an irrationalist.
Despite all his changes, his Protean philosophical personality, he never abandoned his essential adherence to understanding the nature of ra- tionality. See Dale E. Snow, Schelling and the End of Idealism (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1996).
41. F. W. J. Schelling, The Ages of the World, trans. Jason Wirth (Albany: State University of New York Press, 2000), 90.
Translators' Note
1. See F. W. J. Schelling, Philosophical Inquiries into the Nature of Human Freedom, trans. James Gutmann (La Salle: Open Court, 1936), 34. See also Priscilla Hayden-Roy's more recent (1987) translation in which she uses the terms "ruleless" and "something ruleless" to translate, respectively, "regellos" and "das Regellose. " F. W. J. Schelling, Philosophical Investiga- tions into the Essence of Human Freedom and Related Matters, trans. Pris- cilla Hayden-Roy (New York: Continuum, 1987), 238.
2. See "Translator's Introduction," in Schelling, The Ages of the World, xxxi- xxxii.
3. See F. W. J. Schelling, The Abyss of Freedom/Ages of the World, trans. Ju- dith Norman (Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press, 1997), 112.
4. F. W. J. Schelling, Philosophische Untersuchungen u? ber das Wesen der menschlichen Freiheit und die damit zusammenha? ngenden Gegensta? nde, ed. Thomas Buchheim (Hamburg: Felix Meiner Verlag, 1997). We have fol- lowed Buchheim's practice of giving the pagination of the German origi- nal both in the first edition, designated as "OA," and in the Collected Works compiled by Schelling's son and designated here as "SW. " See F. W. J. Schelling, Philosophische Untersuchungen u? ber das Wesen der menschli- chen Freiheit und die damit zusammenha? ngenden Gegensta? nde in Philoso- phische Schriften (Philipp Kru? ll: Landshut, 1809), 397-511 and in Sa? mmtliche Werke, ed. K. F. A. Schelling vol. VII (J. G. Cotta: Stuttgart,
1856-1861), 336-416.
We have also used Buchheim's very useful divisional headings for our
notes to the Philosophical Investigations. But, since these headings are not in Schelling's original text, we have avoided inserting them into the main body of our translation.
Philosophical Investigations into the Essence of Human Freedom and Matters Connected Therewith
Preface to the First Edition
1. The Philosophical Investigations first appeared in 1809 in volume 1 of what was to be a collected edition of Schelling's writings published by Philipp Kru? ll in Landshut. No further volumes were in fact published. Indeed, Schelling published only one other substantial work in his lifetime, a
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136 | NOTES TO PAGES 3-6
polemic against Jacobi called, F. W. J. Schelling's Memorial to Mr. Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi's Writing on the Divine Things etc. and to the Accusation Made against Him Therein Regarding an Intentionally Deceiving and Lying Atheism (F. W. J. Schellings Denkmal der Schrift von den go? ttlichen Dingen usw des Herrn Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi und der ihm in derselben gemach- ten Beschuldigung eines absichtlich ta? uschenden, Lu? ge redenden Atheis- mus), which appeared in 1812.
The other writings collected in the volume represent a selection from the very beginning of Schelling's philosophical activity, Of the I as Princi- ple of Philosophy or on the Unconditioned in Human Knowledge (1795)-- Schelling's second major work, which he published at the age of twenty--Philosophical Letters on Dogmatism and Criticism (1795), The Treatises in Explanation of the Doctrine of Science (1796-1797), along with a later work, his speech, On the Relation of the Fine Arts to Nature (1807). The ten-year lacuna (from 1797 to 1807) represented here is re- markable and poses a question that Schelling himself answers somewhat cryptically in the "Preface. " This cryptic answer emerges by inference from Schelling's claim that the Philosophical Investigations is the first treatise "in which the author puts forth his concept of the ideal part of philosophy with complete determinateness. " The inference is that the other works included in the volume show different stages of the develop- ment of Schelling's concept of the ideal part of philosophy and, there- fore, offer an interpretative path into the heart of the Philosophical Inves- tigations. This inference seems to be more persuasive when one takes into account Schelling's focus on the philosophy of nature between 1797 and 1800 and that he seems to regard two other important treatises, the Presentation of My System of Philosophy (1801) and Philosophy and Reli- gion (1804), as more or less unsuccessful precursors to the Philosophical Investigations.
This self-interpretation may seem somewhat disingenuous to those who emphasize "Protean" discontinuity in Schelling's work rather than its continuity (see Xaver Tilliette, Schelling: une philosophie en devenir, vol. 1 [Paris: J. Vrin, 1970], 12-13). For many among the former, the Philo- sophical Investigations is more representative of a rupture in Schelling's thought that lays the foundation for the investigations of the late philoso- phy. According to a typical periodization of Schelling's work that empha- sizes rupture rather than continuity, one identifies an early "Fichtean" pe- riod (1794-1797), followed by the natural philosophy (1797-1800), the philosophy of identity (1801-1804), and, finally, after a period of transi- tion that ends with the Philosophical Investigations, the late philosophy starting with the Ages of the World (1811-1854). But one ignores Schelling's self-interpretation at one's own risk; at the very least, Schelling's apparent willingness to place the Philosophical Investigations in a direct line of investigation stemming from his earliest major writings evinces a plea for continuity, and, if continuity is based as much on the nature of the problem to be solved as on the solutions proffered, this plea
should not be dismissed lightly. In this respect, Heidegger's own some- what exaggerated claim about Schelling, that "there was seldom a thinker who fought so passionately ever since his earliest periods for his one and unique standpoint," is worth taking seriously even though one may argue (as with most of Heidegger's grand assertions about other thinkers) that it applies more to Heidegger himself (Heidegger, Schelling's Treatise, 6).
2. This journal is the Philosophical Journal of a Society of German Scholars (Philosophisches Journal einer Gesellschaft teutscher Gelehrten) that served as a principal conduit of the Fichtean line of idealism at Jena and was edited by Fichte along with Immanuel Niethammer (1766-1848). Schelling's early publication in this journal is a sign of his being consid- ered a proper follower of Fichte.
3. This academic speech was given on October 12, 1807 for a celebration in honor of the nameday of King Maximilian I at the Bavarian Academy of Sciences (of which Schelling was a prominent member).
4. Schelling is referring to Kant's Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Sci- ence (Metaphysische Anfangsgru? nde der Naturwissenschaft) (1786) and, in particular, to Kant's dynamic theory of matter, which had consider- able influence on Schelling as his first foray into Naturphilosophie, the Ideas for a Philosophy of Nature (1797) shows, especially in the discus- sion of matter set out in Book II. Kant's thinking proved attractive to Schelling because Kant does not consider matter to be some lifeless substrate but rather a balance of attractive and repelling forces that are in fact the condition for the very possibility of matter as such; in other words, matter is intrinsically dynamic, a tissue woven of oppos- ing forces and not a sort of static, homogenous "non-thing" that is the basis of things. (Immanuel Kant, Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science, trans. Michael Friedman [Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2004], 62-74.
