FOUNDING OF THE BERLIN UNIVERSITY. 689 



found nothing to induce liim to cultivate the study. The succession of 

 shifting systems which it describes, wherein what has been built up is 

 destroyed, what has beenjiraised to the skies is degraded and censured, 

 and ideas rejected but now appear in new guises and fresh colors, 

 rather had the effect of instilling distrust of hunuin wisdom into him." 

 Eylert then describes how the King learned to love Kant : " But when,'' 

 the biographer goes on, " after the death of Kant, Fichte raised a new 

 system, and the divine homage paid to the former was transferred to 

 the latter, who in turn was put into the shade by Sclielling, and the 

 members of philosophic dynasties continued to be deposed and enthroned 

 in rapid succession until llegel was called to Berlin, the King became 

 disgusted. He lost whatever desire he may have had to work his way 

 through the labyrinth of ideas, and ceased wholly to take interest." 



It seems, then, that the King sjieedily arrived at the conclusion 

 reached on devious paths by the bulk of the cultured, even by the 

 learned. It is certain that with the death of Hegel the university was 

 forever delivered from the magic spell thrown over it by philosophical 

 systems. No philosoi)lier since then has occupied, nor to be Just has 

 claimed, an equally authoritative position. But as for the conditions 

 prevailing during the reign of Frederick William III no epithet can 

 more comprehensively describe them than the expression, ''the philo- 

 sophic age." 



A term of that kind is open to misconstruction. We have since then 

 had eminent philosophers among our teachers, excellent men, fitted to 

 explain to their audiences the nature of i)liilosophy, the laws of thought, 

 the method of perceiving and judging, the course and degree of intel- 

 lectual development, but hapi)ily not one of them has invented a 

 system of philosophy or sought to introduce it into the speech of our 

 youth by the agency of artistically constructed phrases. To be sure, a 

 strong motive for studying philosophy has thus been removed, for many 

 minds are more attracted by what is dark and unintelligible than by 

 what is clear and perspicuous. It is possible, too, that after the study 

 of a delinite system of philosophy ceased to be the rule, the desire 

 to devote study to philosophy in general was permanently impaired. 

 Among us teachers it is a recognized fact that the training of many of 

 our students in logic and dialectics falls far short of the standard that 

 ought to be set up for every academic citizen, indeed for every man of 

 education. Therefore we are not wanting in admonitions to our stu- 

 dents to make up their serious deficiencies in this direction by their 

 own efforts. It is hard to establish since when this lamentable condi- 

 tion has existed. The school of "Naturphilosophie," which was pro- 

 ductive of a host of faulty methods and invalid conclusions in its very 

 exponents, was by its nature ill fitted to discipline students to that 

 degree of proficiency in thinking which we at present require. In view 

 of De Wette's discovery of a contradiction between the logic of Aristotle 

 and that of Hegel seventy-seven years ago, consolation may be derived 

 SM9I 44 



