356 PHILOSOPHICAL THOUGHT. 



who were inspired by this new world of ideas saw in it 

 a definite something which strove for realisation, and 

 which only awaited a suitable form, the right word, the 

 adequate expression by which it should be rendered 

 intelligible to the expectant and receptive minds of 

 the younger generation ; a possession not limited to a 

 few creative intellects, but the common property of 

 the many that came under the influence of the great 

 educational movement which was spreading over most 

 of the countries and nations of Europe. In fact, the 

 problem of knowledge was for them not contained in the 

 questions, What is knowledge, and where and how is it 

 to be found ? They rather saw with their mind's eye 

 the existence of a higher kind of knowledge in the shape 

 of definite ideals, and the problem of knowledge con- 

 sisted in realising these ideals and finding a suitable 

 expression for them. No one had uttered himself more 

 clearly in these matters than Goethe himself, who at 

 that time had already in many ways declared that the 

 Highest reveals itself to the human mind only through 

 intuition, that it is not elaborated by thought but felt 

 and seen : he had in his own creations made it actually 

 visible to the increasing number of his admirers. If some 

 of the contemporaries of Kant, notably Hamann, Jacobi, 

 and Herder, had contented themselves with emphasising 

 the independence of feeling, belief, and faith, as the ulti- 

 mate original sources of knowledge, Goethe succeeded 

 through the wonderful intuitive powers of his mind in em- 

 bodying in the poetical creations of his artistic genius what 

 others only believed and felt, thus strengthening enor- 

 mously the constructive and creative movement of thought. 



