8o POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



treated them as the suggestions of a very able man indeed, but as sugges- 

 tions in winch men of sound mind would soon lose their interest. 



In 1800, in order to meet and oppose romanticism, the theme dis- 

 cussed was 'Goths and Gothism.' A question which had been pro- 

 pounded several times without eliciting a satisfactory answer related 

 to the advance in German metaphysics since the time of Leibniz and 

 Wulff. The prize for the discussion of the theme which this question 

 presented was finally divided between three men, Schwab of Stuttgart, 

 receiving one half, Albricht of Erlangen one fourth, and another fourth 

 going to Eeinhold, the parish minister in Kiel. Although Kant wrote 

 on this theme as early as 1791, for some reason he did not send in his 

 paper to the academy, though some of his thoughts upon it were pub- 

 lished by Einkin in 1804. In one of his incomplete essays he defines 

 metaphysics as 'the science of advancing from the knowledge acquired 

 through the senses, by means of reason, to the supersensuous. ' Such 

 questions were also considered as 'What is the origin of all our knowl- 

 edge?' 'Is there an immediate inner perception?' 'What is the rela- 

 tion of the faculty of the imagination to that of feeling?' 'What was 

 the influence of Descartes upon Spinoza?' In 1796 a military man 

 living in Kopenick left 10,000 thalers ($7,500), the interest to be 

 given as a prize once in four years for the best treatment of some theme 

 in speculative philosophy. In 1805 this prize was won by Franke for a 

 treatise on analytic methods in philosophy. 



Interesting themes in philology were also suggested. A prize was 

 offered in 1794 for a satisfactory comparison of the chief languages of 

 Europe, living or dead, in reference to wealth, regularity, strength, har- 

 mony or other advantages, the successful essay to show in what respect 

 one language is superior to another, and which language, then existing 

 or having existed, comes nearest perfection. The prize was won by 

 Jenisch, a clergyman preaching in Berlin. There was great interest in 

 the jubilee prize of 1800 which was won by Gebhard, another Berlin 

 preacher, who sought to trace and estimate the influence which 

 Frederick the Great had exerted on the spirit of his age, in reference 

 to progress and freedom. In 1804 the academy asked, 'Why civiliza- 

 tion has always proceeded from the east and has never developed 

 originally in the west?' 



The fact that no one of the treatises on ten different themes in 

 mathematics, physics and astronomy was accounted worthy of a prize 

 seems to show that these branches of study were not pursued in Germany 

 to such an extent or with such thoroughness as in other European 

 countries. The backward state of chemistry is indicated by the question 

 for an essay, ' Has it been sufficiently demonstrated that there are only 

 five species of elementary earths? Can these elements be transmuted 

 into one another? If so, how is it done?' Practical matters, relating 



