LATER GERMAN PHILOSOPHY 105 



countrymen who were beginning to see in him a 

 philosophic force of far-reaching effect. 



Though the three men were so considerably sepa- 

 rated in years, they began to act upon the public 

 almost simultaneously. Lange's History of Material- 

 ism, so noted in its later form, first appeared in 1865 ; 

 Duhring's first important work, the Natural Dialectic, 

 was published the same year ; while Hartmann's 

 Philosophy of the Unconscious came first from the 

 press in 1868. The main lines of their several theo- 

 ries we are now to trace and endeavour to value. 



In opening a study of Hartmann and his large cir- 

 cle of readers, we come at once upon the sphere of 

 an influence whose reach in the present " enlight- 

 ened public" of Germany it is impossible to over- 

 look ; I refer, of course, to Schopenhauer. Hartmann 

 is generally and justly recognised as the mental heir 

 of Schopenhauer, in direct succession. His so-called 

 system, however, is far inferior in intellectual quality 

 to that of his predecessor. He differs from Schopen- 

 hauer in giving to the empirical a great predominance 

 over the a priori method, ^ and in his doctrine con- 

 cerning the nature of the Absolute. The former 

 fact expresses his deference to the " stupendous 



^The reader will easily recall his sijrnificant motto: *'' Speculative 

 results by the inductive method of the natural sciences.''^ 



