OF SOCIETY. 



551 



that of restless striving, as indeed the whole of his 

 system is based upon the metaphysical and ethical 

 principle that the true and ultimate reality is activity 

 and not repose, an unlimited striving, not enjoyment 

 and quietism, not a negation but an assertion of the 

 good will. We may thus say that the principle of 

 this genuine socialism is the sanctity of labour and 

 the right to work, and not merely a pleasurable exist- 

 ence, whether this pleasure be found in the region of 

 the physical (sensual) or of the higher (intellectual and 

 aesthetic) enjoyments. 1 



1 I shall have another oppor- 

 tunity of referring to the pro- 

 phetic character of Fichte's phil- 

 osophy, and how this explains the 

 renewed interest which has been 

 taken in the works of this highly 

 abstract philosopher by prominent 

 thinkers at the present day. It 

 must here suffice to associate his 

 name in this respect with that of 

 Goethe, and to quote the words 

 with which Prof. Schmoller closes 

 his Essay already referred to (loc. 

 cit., p. 99 sqq.). "It is remark- 

 able that another of the German 

 intellectual heroes of that age, 

 who otherwise differed so much 

 from Fichte, trod very similar 

 paths. This was Goethe in the 

 ' Wanderjahre. ' Here also an ideal 

 society is depicted, an attempt is 

 made to solve, from an ethical 

 point of view, the great problems 

 of labour, property, family, edu- 

 cation, individuality, association, 

 publicity, in the face of the 

 egoism of the age. The great 

 thinker and the great poet are 

 alike impressed by problems 

 unsolved and scarcely dreamt of 

 by professional science which 

 refer to new forms of the moral 

 life, resulting from the great 

 transformation, especially of 



economic conditions. Both see 

 in moral education of the indi- 

 vidual, in his partaking of the life 

 of the community, in all forms 

 of association, iu culture and 

 divided spheres of labour, in 

 renunciation and devoted work, 

 the necessary counterpart to 

 economic developments. Both see 

 in opposition to French socialism 

 the foundations of social welfare 

 in secure, though limited, per- 

 sonal property and in the sanctity 

 of married life. It is hardly possible 

 to imagine two more different 

 personalities : here the stoical un- 

 bending thinker who in ideal flight 

 bears in his bosom the fate of his 

 age and nation ; who, discarding 

 the realities of the world, aspires 

 to subject, from the depths of his 

 sublime but austere character, his 

 age to his high moral standard, 

 creating the world and its phil- 

 osophy with one sublime stroke 

 of reasoning ; there the sensitive 

 realistic poet who knows how to 

 follow the secret pulsations of life, 

 who, as no other, has person- 

 ally watched it in the cottage of 

 the labourer, in the workshop of 

 the tradesman, in the house of 

 the citizen, and the palace of 

 princes ; who has himself often 



