OF REALITY. 



463 



ing emblematic of the world-process in its symphonal 

 presentation and development. 1 



A further stage in Schelling's successive attempts 

 to fix the essence of the Absolute or the truly Eeal was 



1 For the understanding of the 

 development of philosophic thought 

 in Germany at the turn of the j 

 centuries it is essential to realise 

 the shortness of the period during 

 which it took place, the unusual 

 congregation of minds of the very 

 first but very different order at the 

 same place, the limited duration of 

 concord, the causes of arising differ- , 

 ences and discord, and, lastly, the 

 breaking up of this concourse 

 followed by the dispersion of the 

 new wealth of ideas into the differ- 

 ent centres of life and learning in 

 Germany. Schelling himself, whose 

 sensitive nature was quick to de- 

 tect nascent developments, speaks 

 of the disruption of what had 

 hitherto been the point of indiffer- 

 ence of North and South in Jena, 

 whence one part is thrown to the 

 south, another to the north. (See 

 ' Aus Schelling's Leben,' vol. i. p. 

 482.) We read also in the ' Life of 

 Schiller ' that in the last years of 

 his life, in the beginning of the 

 nineteenth century, he had to de- 

 plore the loss of many of the first 

 intellects which surrounded him at 

 Jena. The principal centre of 

 attraction seems to have been Ber- 

 lin, where, with the reign of 

 Frederick William III. and his 

 highly gifted Queen, a new era 

 in literature and art had arisen, 

 to be followed, later on, by politi- 

 cal regeneration and social reform. 

 The extravagant expectations with 

 which the beginning of the new 

 reign had been.heralded had indeed 

 not all been realised, but a hopeful 

 view existed. Many who had mi- 

 grated to Berlin, as, e.g., Fichte, ! 

 felt themselves stimulated in the 

 great moving life of the capital, 



where the indications of increasing 

 political weakness were known to 

 few, and where most felt as if they 

 were surrounded by new and aspir- 

 ing life. (See Karl Berger, ' Schiller, 

 Sein Leben und Seiue Werke,' 

 1911, vol. ii., 5th ed., p. 702.) On 

 the other side, the poetical element 

 which came from the South of 

 Germany felt itself repelled by the 

 rationalising tone which ruled in 

 the Prussian capital. This an- 

 tagonism is represented in philo- 

 sophic thought by the rupture of 

 Fichte and Schelling. It showed 

 itself publicly when Fichte, after 

 leaving Jena, allied himself with 

 the larger political, social, and 

 educational interests centred in 

 Berlin, and gave a turn in this 

 direction to his unfettered academic 

 influence at the Prussian University 

 of Erlangen and in several popular 

 courses in Berlin. This turn was 

 entirely opposed to Schelling's own 

 conception of what was needed to 

 further and deepen the philosophi- 

 cal movement of thought. And 

 this antagonism, this parting of the 

 ways, is very clearly indicated by 

 the polemics and criticisms which 

 Schelling published about the year 

 1806, on a Course of Lectures 

 ( ' tiber das Wesen des Gelehrten') 

 delivered by Fichte in the year 

 1805 at Erlangen. Fichte must 

 indeed have felt the great want in 

 the exposition of his System. 

 Through Schelling the apparent 

 depreciation of nature and of the 

 sensuous and intuitively receptive 

 sides of mental life which character- 

 ised his doctrine must have become 

 evident to him. He had also, as he 

 says himself, made a profounder 

 study of the religious problem with 



