448 PHILOSOPHICAL THOUGHT. 



it was their and his object to raise the interests and 

 thoughts of the academic youth of Germany. That this 

 was not only an aim which he had constantly in view, 

 but that he also, to a large extent, realised it, is known 

 by the reform which he worked among the students of 

 the University of Jena. From this reform emanated, to 

 a large extent, a wave of elevated feeling and aspiration ; 

 it stirred up the life which had for a long time been 

 stagnant in the German high schools and universities. 

 From that age onward they entered into a new phase 

 and put on an entirely changed character. In this 

 respect Fichte joined hands, from the highest regions of 

 philosophic thought, with Pestalozzi who worked upwards 

 from the innermost recesses of the hearts of the people. 

 Fichte did for the select few what Pestalozzi did for 

 the many. This practical tendency in Fichte's nature 

 allowed him to realise, better than any other disciple 

 of Kant's, the great moral influence of Kant's practical 

 philosophy. He felt distinctly what Kant meant by the 

 Categorical Imperative, by the self -restraining power of 

 the human Will. In his search for an expression where- 

 with to describe the essence of the truly Keal or the 

 Absolute, he fixed upon this idea contained in Kant's 

 philosophy ; the truly Eeal was to him Action or Self- 

 realisation. 



Now, if we try to analyse this idea of Self-realisation 

 which seems to me to be the most suitable rendering of 

 the somewhat abstruse sentences and oracular sayings in 

 which Fichte's discourses abound, we shall at once see 

 how this conception led Fichte away from the position 

 occupied by Kant into entirely different lines of reason- 



