370 



PHILOSOPHICAL THOUGHT. 



from it. Illustrious examples of this kind are to be 

 found, e.g., in J. von Liebig, Johannes Miiller, E. von Baer, 1 

 G. T. Fechner, 2 who nevertheless in their further develop- 

 ment retained a large share of the idealistic spirit. 

 Fortunately, however, for the idealistic school, it could 

 count on the support of two movements which were 

 then much more prominent in Germany than the culture 

 of the exact sciences, whose only great popular exponent 

 and later patron, A. von Humboldt, was then travelling 

 in the tropical regions of the New World. 3 These two 



1 See vol. i. of this History 

 passim, especially pp. 207, 208. 



2 The influence of Schelling upon 

 Fechner is important and probably 

 typical. It is described by Fechner 

 himself in a characteristic passage 

 quoted by J. E. Kuntze ('G. T. 

 Fechner,' 1892). "Through my 

 medical studies I had become a 

 complete atheist, alienated from 

 religious ideas ; I saw in the world 

 only a mechanical scheme. At 

 that time I came across Oken's 

 ' Naturphilosophie,' which I began 

 to read with a friend. A new light 

 seemed to me all at once to illumin- 

 ate the whole world and the science 

 of the world. I was as if dazzled by 

 it. In truth I did not really under- 

 stand anything properly how could 

 that have been possible ? and I did 

 not advance beyond the first chap- 

 ters ; but, in effect, I had at once 

 gained the position for a grand 

 united view of the world, began 

 to study Schelling, Steffens, and 

 other philosophers of nature, failed 

 indeed to find in any of them clear- 

 ness, but thought I could myself 

 do something in that direction, of 

 which some Essays in ' Stapelia 

 Mixta ' (1824) bear testimony. But 

 even now I remember that I once 

 put to myself the question : Could 

 anything, by the ways of Oken- 



Schelling, have been found of the 

 beautiful and orderly connection of 

 optical phenomena which Biot lays 

 before us with such clearness ? 

 Certainly natural science does not 

 lie in these ways. . . . The influ- 

 ence of that period in the direction 

 of a uniting activity and a spiritual 

 penetration of nature has remained 

 for me and has found expression 

 in later writings, although I could 

 then no longer consider the view of 

 Schelling - Oken to be adequate " 

 (pp. 39,40). 



3 There lived in Germany at that 

 time, at the University of Gotting- 

 en, another prominent representa- 

 tive of the genuine scientific spirit, 

 the great mathematician, C. F. 

 Gauss. Although, however, he had 

 already published in 1801 his most 

 original work, ' Disquisitiones 

 Arithmeticas ' (see vol. i. of this 

 History, p. 120), he was practically 

 unknown to German scholars and 

 thinkers. Not a great teacher, 

 he belonged to the small in- 

 ternational society of foremost 

 mathematicians and astronomers 

 of the age, for many of whom 

 his labours furnished the starting- 

 point of entirely new developments. 

 His ' Theoria motus corporum 

 ccelestium ' was published in 1809 

 (see ibid., p. 324). 



