168 



PHILOSOPHICAL THOUGHT. 



categories of Hegel's metaphysics were applied in the 

 mind of Strauss to the theological subjects which were 

 dealt with in Schleiermacher's lectures. 1 From Hegel 

 Strauss adopted the speculative principle of his work. 

 This may be variously expressed. For Strauss it took 

 the form of the immanence of the Divine Spirit in the 

 world. This signifies that the Divine Spirit works in 

 the world from inside, not from outside, that its activity 

 is orderly, continuous, and connected, excluding every- 

 thing that is miraculous as an external influence, as 

 a casual interference or interruption. How this idea 

 was worked out by the interpretation of the gospel 

 records as mythical creations, and how the whole con- 

 ception was upheld by a formidable array of critical and 

 exegetical erudition, need not occupy us at the moment. 

 It is sufficient to emphasise the fact that it was by no 

 means a sober, critical investigation, but rather a specu- 

 lative construction, under the sanction of the canons of 

 Hegel's philosophy, which made Strauss celebrated ; 

 perhaps also not less the fact that what appeared 

 abstruse and unintelligible in Hegel was set out and 



Schleiermacher was in life and 

 learning the representative of sub- 

 jectivity, the man of the most 

 restless mobility, of biting wit, as 

 well as easily stirred feeling. There 

 was in him a wonderful elasticity 

 and agility of mind. ... To state 

 it concisely, there was in him a 

 rare combination of deep and sub- 

 lime religious feeling, of mysticism, 

 in the best sense of the word, and 

 of an intensely mobile logical 

 intellect " (see Carl Schwarz, 

 ' Zur Qeschichte der Neuesten 



Theologie,' 3rd ed., 1864, p. 29, 

 &c.) 



1 Notably to the ' Life of Jesus,' 

 on which subject " Schleiermacher 

 was the first to deliver lectures full 

 of dissolvent scepticism and with 

 great power of combination. Princi- 

 pally in order to hear them David 

 Strauss then a lecturer on theo- 

 logy went in 1831 from Tubingen 

 to Berlin. They gave him the 

 strongest impulse to his later de- 

 structive work" (Ibid., p. 28). 



