same thing, the representation of the ideal must make the poet. And these are also the two only possible modes in which the poetic genius can find expression. They are, as we see, entirely distinct; but there is a higher conception which comprehends them both, and we need not be surprised to find this conception coinciding with the idea of humanity.

This is not the place to pursue farther this thought, which only a special discussion can place in its full light. But whoever knows how to institute a comparison between the ancient and modern poets*, not only according to accidental forms, but according to the spirit, can easily be satisfied of its truth. The former affect us through their nature, through sensuous truth, through living presence: the latter affect us through ideas.

Moreover, this path which the modern poets travel, is the same which man must commonly pursue, as well in the part as in the whole. Nature makes him one with himself, Art separates and divides him, the Ideal restores his unity. But since the ideal is an infinity which man never reaches, the cultivated man can never become perfect in his mode, as the natural man is able to become in his. Then he must be infinitely inferior to the latter in perfection, if regard is had only to the relation in which both stand to their mode and their maximum. On the contrary, if we compare together the modes themselves, it is evident that the goal for which the man strives through culture, is infinitely superior to that which he attains through nature. The one then acquires his value through positive attainment of a finite, the other desires it through approximation to an infinite, magnitude. But since the latter has only degree and progress, the relative worth of the cultivated man, taken as a whole, is never determinable, although when partially regarded he is found in necessary inferiority to him in whom nature acts in her whole perfection. But in so far as the final goal of humanity can only be reached through that progress, and the natural man can only proceed according as he cultivates himself, and consequently passes over into the other condition.-there is no question to which of the two the preference is to be awarded, with respect to that final goal.

What has here been said of the two distinct forms of humanity, may also be applied to both those poetic forms corresponding to them.

For this reason we ought not to compare to

* Perhaps it is not superfluous to mention, that if the modern poets are here set opposite to the ancient, we are to understand not so much the difference in time as the difference in manner. We have also in modern and even in the latest times, naive poems in all classes, though no longer of a style entirely pure; and there is no want of the sentimental among the old Latin, and even Grecian poets. We frequently find both kinds united, not only in the same poet, but even in the same work, as for example in the Sorrows of Werter. Productions of this kind will always have a superior effect.

gether ancient and modern-naive and sentimental poets, or, if we do, only beneath a higher conception common to both: for such an one there really is. For certainly, if we have once partially abstracted the generic conception of poetry from the old poets, nothing is easier, but nothing also is more trivial, than to undervalue the moderns in comparison. If we only call that poetry, which has uniformly affected simple nature in all times, the only result will be to render dubious the name of poet as applied to moderns exactly in their highest and most peculiar beauty, because it is precisely here that they speak only to the disciple of art, and have nothing to say to simple nature. The richest contents will be empty show, and the highest flight of poetry will be exaggeration to him whose mind is not already prepared to pass out of reality into the province of ideas. The wish can never occur to a reasonable man, to set a modern side by side with that in which Homer is great; and it sounds laughable enough to hear a Milton or a Klopstock styled the modern Homer. And just as little would any ancient poet, least of all Homer, be able to maintain a comparison with the modern poet in his characteristics. The former, if I may so express it, is powerful through the art of limitation; the latter through the art of illimitation.

And from the fact that the strength of the ancient artist (for what has here been said of the poet, can also be applied in general to the liberal artist, under the restrictions which naturally occur) consisted in limitation, we may explain the high superiority which the plastic art of antiquity asserts over that of modern times; and, in general, the unequal relation of value in which modern poetry and modern plastic art stand to both species of art in antiquity. A work for the eye finds its perfection only in limitation: a work for the imagination can also attain it through the unlimited. Hence a modern's preponderance in ideas helps him little in plastic works; he is compelled here to define in space most rigidly the image of his fancy, and consequently to measure himself with the ancient artist precisely in that quality, in which the latter holds the indisputable palm. It is otherwise in poetic works; and though the ancient poets conquer here also in the simplicity of their means, and in that which is sensuously

* It became Moliere at any rate, as a naive poet, to leave to the decision of his maid-servant, what should stand in his comedies and what should be subtracted. It were to be wished that the masters of the French cothurn had also tried that test upon their tragedies. But I do not mean to propose that a similar test should be applied to the Odes of Klopstock, to the finest passages in the Messiah, in Paradise Lost, in Nathan the Wise, and many other pieces. But what do I say? This test is actually applied, and Moliere's maid reasons at full sweep, in our critical libraries, philosophical and literary annals and travels, upon poetry, art, and the like; only, as is reasonable, a little more insipidly on German than on French soil, and in keeping with the style in the servants'-hall of German literature.

presentable and corporeal,-the moderns in their turn leave them behind in profusion of material, in that which is irrepresentable and ineffable, and in short, in that which we call spirit in a work of art.

As the naive poet follows only simple nature and perception, and confines himself only to imitation of reality, he can only hold a single relation to his subject, and in this respect, he has no choice in his mode of handling. The different impression of naive poems depends (presupposing that we abstract all therein which pertains to the contents, and regard that impression only as the pure effect of the poetic handling), only, I remark, upon the different degree of one and the same perceptive method. Even the difference in the external forms can make no alteration in the quality of that aesthetic impression. Let the form be lyric or epic, dramatic or descriptive, we may indeed experience emotions more or less powerful, but never of different kinds, supposing the contents abstracted. Our feeling is altogether the same, composed entirely of one element, so that we can distinguish in it nothing else. Even the difference of tongues and times makes no alteration in this respect; for this pure unity of their origin and their effect is precisely one characteristic of naive poetry.

The case is entirely different with the sentimental poet. He reflects upon the impression which the objects make upon him, and the emotion into which he throws us and is thrown himself, is only based upon that reflection.

Here the object is related to an idea, and its poetic power only rests upon that relation. Hence the sentimental poet is always involved with two conflicting representations and perceptions, with reality as a limit and with his idea as the unlimited: and the mingled feeling which he excites will always betray this twofold source.* Since, then, a plurality of principles here occurs, it depends upon which of the two predominates in the poet's perception and in his representation, and a difference in the handling is consequently possible. For now the question arises, whether he will be more occupied with the real, or more with the ideal, whether he will treat the former as an object of aversion, or the latter as an object of inclination. Then his representation will either be satirical, or it will be elegiac (in a wider signi fication of this word, hereafter to be explained). Every sentimental poet will conform to one of these two methods of perception.

*Whoever notices the impression which naive poems make upon himself, and is able to disconnect therefrom the sympathy created by the contents, will find this im pression, even in very pathetic subjects, always cheerful, always pure, always tranquil: while that of sentimental poems is always somewhat grave and intensive. The reason is, that while in the case of naive representations, be the action what it will, we always rejoice at the truth, at the living presence of the object in our imagination, and seek nothing more than this, in the sentimental, on the contrary, we have to unite the presentation of the imagination with an idea of the reason, which always leaves us irresolute between two different conditions.

Fichte recalls more than any modern the heroes of the Stoa. The stern Promethean vigor of that ancient school flowers anew in his word and in his character, which was no less emphatic than his word. Goethe, with customary aptness of characterisation, calls him "one of the most vigorous personalities"† that ever was seen. Few philosophers have so honored their theory with personal illustrations. He carried his philosophy into life and his life into philosophy, acting as he spoke, from an eminence above the level of the world. He created for himself, out of the fruitful bosom of his own ideality, a world of his own,—a world of great thoughts and lofty aims, in which he had his being and lived apart from his contemporaries, even while he mingled with them in the thickest tumult of life, and threw himself with all his presence into the sore conflict of his time.

In speculation, Fichte was closely and genetically related to Kant. The Wissenschaftslehre would never have been conceived, it is probable, had not the Kritik der reinen Vernunft preceded.

But he differed from his predecessor in the practical tendency of his nature; and this it is which gives so decided a moral tone and direction to his philosophy. Kant was satisfied with the bare contemplation of abstract truth. Fichte would fain realise the truth in action; he would bring it to bear on the civil and social existence of man, or at least, on his own. He would make the word flesh in his life. The one resembled a mountain-lake embosomed in

* Kant, Fichte, Schelling, Hegel.

† Eine der tüchtigsten (doughtiest) Persönlichkeiten.

must make a special pilgrimage to visit. The other was like a river, which, springing from that lake, precipitates itself with passionate force on the plain below, and then, more calmly, gathers up its channelled waters and hastens with its full heart to make glad the region through which it flows. Fichte took a lively interest in the social and political questions of the day, and, as far as his function permitted, an active part in the great movements by which those questions were tried. He was an apostle of liberty to his countrymen, and by his “Reden an die Deutschen" did much to awaken that resistance to Napoleon which finally resulted in their emancipation from his dominion.

Notwithstanding this strong practical bias, Fichte was a thorough idealist in philosophy. A more radical and consistent system of idealism than the Wissenschaftslehre was never offered to the world. What Kant had indicated critically and negatively, Fichte endeavored to establish constructively; i. e. the subjectiveness of all our cognitions and experience. He reascends the path by which Kant had descended in his analysis, and taking his stand in the conscious I, endeavors thence to construct a world. Nothing exists but the I; and all our experience, and the external world, as the object of that experience, is a creation of the I, but a necessary creation. Fichte endeavors to develop the laws by which this creation proceeds. The idea of duty in this system is a creative principle. Beings exist for us only as we have duties toward them. The fact of moral obligation is the central fact which determines all things for moral agents.

The system was never popular, as, indeed, no idealistic system ever was or can be. It was made the subject of numberless satires, of which the most remarkable is the Clavis Fichtiana of Jean Paul. But Fichte's influence is independent of his system; the great thoughts which he put forth still heave the heart of Germany, and his word is one of the powers which now mould the world.

Fichte was the son of a ribbon-manufacturer at Rammenau, near Bischoffswerda, in Upper Lusatia. The distinguished promise of his childhood procured him a patron in a certain Herr von Miltitz, and, through him, the means of education which his father's poverty would not allow. He was placed at the High School, Schulpforte, then a Saxon Seminary. He studied theology successively at Jena, Leipzig, and Wittenberg. In 1788, he accepted the office of private tutor to a family in Zurich. Here he became acquainted with his future wife and was betrothed. In 1790, he returned to Leipzig, and devoted himself to study, particularly the study of the Kantian philosophy. In 1791, he went to Warsaw in compliance with an invitation to become a teacher in that city. But the situation did not please him, and he soon abandoned it. On his return, he tarried some time in Königsberg, where he became acquainted with Kant, and where, with the hope of making himself better known to that great philosopher, he published his "Kritik aller Offenbarung" (criticism of all revelation). The work was anonymous, and was universally believed to be Kant's, until he himself pointed out the true author. Then Fichte's name blossomed at once into a wide and brilliant reputation, as the second great philosopher of Germany; and in 1794, he was called to succeed Reinhold in the Professorial chair of Philosophy at Jena. His influence on the students was great and beneficent, but misunderstandings between him and his colleagues, the charge

of atheism with which it was attempted to prejudice the Government against him, together with numerous other vexations, induced him to resign his office; and in 1799, he went to Berlin, where he lived for awhile in literary retirement. He was afterwards made Professor of Philosophy in Erlangen; but the war-troubles of that stormy period drove him to Königsberg, and later to Copenhagen. In 1807, he returned to Berlin once more, and with his "Addresses to the German Nation," and his lectures, labored intrepidly and indefatigably for the cause of freedom and German independence. In 1809, he was made Professor of Philosophy at the new University of Berlin, to which he rendered incalculable service, both as lecturer and as counsellor in its affairs. During the "war of liberation," as it is called, he distinguished himself anew by his courage and his patriotism, and died January 27th, 1814, of a fever contracted by assiduous watching at the sick-bed of his wife, who had contracted the same by her own ministrations to the sick and wounded, in a time of general distress.

In the first church-yard from the Oranienburg gate, of Berlin, stands a tall obelisk with this inscription:

THE TEACHERS SHALL SHINE

AS THE BRIGHTNESS OF THE FIRMAMENT; AND THEY THAT TURN MANY TO RIGHTEOUSNESS AS THE STARS FOREVER AND EVER.

It marks the grave of FICHTE. The faithful partner of his life sleeps at his feet.

THE DESTINATION OF MAN.

INTRODUCTORY REMARK.

[THIS work is intended to present, in a popu lar form, certain results of the Transcendental Philosophy, or rather of the last Fichtean modification of that Philosophy. "Whatever of the new philosophy is available out of the School," says the author in his preface, "is to constitute the subject of this work; presented in that order in which it would naturally unfold itself to artless reflection."-"The book is not designed for philosophers by profession, and they will find nothing in it which has not already been set forth in the author's previous writings. It was meant to be intelligible to all readers who are capable of understanding a book at all. Undoubtedly, it will be thought unintelligible by those who seek for nothing but a repetition, in a somewhat different order, of phrases which

they have already learned by heart, and who mistake this act of memory for an act of the understanding."

The plan of the work is this. The author supposes a mind, as yet unversed in metaphysical inquiries, but otherwise cultivated,-just beginning to speculate on its own nature and destiny, and the grounds of all being and knowing. He follows what he supposes to be the natural course of such a mind, through three successive stages, which constitute the three divisions of the work. The first book is headed, "Doubt." It leaves the inquirer in a state of painful conflict between the instinctive belief of the soul and the fatalistic conclusions to which his reasonings have brought him. The second book, entitled " Knowledge," overthrows the whole fabric of sensible experience, and de monstrates that we properly know nothing be yond our momentary consciousness, and that

consciousness, the mere reflection of a reflection, "the dream of a dream." I cannot say: I feel, perceive, think; but only: "there appears a thought" of somewhat, that I call me, feeling, perceiving, thinking. In short, this stage lands us in absolute Pyrrhonism. At the same time, the author refers us, for our satisfaction, to another "organ" than that of Knowledge. That other organ, "Faith," furnishes the title and constitutes the subject of the third book. Faith rebuilds, on moral grounds, the fabric which speculation had destroyed. Not speculation, but action, is the end of being. The call to act is instinctive; it is divine. If we accept that call in faith and obey it, we resolve ourselves of our doubts, so far as our act extends. We assure ourselves, at least, of the topics of action. Duty restores to us a God, an external world, our own identity and continuity of being; and unfolds to us, as individuals and as a race, a destination worthy all our powers and all our love.

Thus the inquiry ends by legitimating the innate convictions of the mind. It reconciles us to all that is or shall be, as divinely appointed process and end; and yields an impregnable peace, as its practical result. Tr.]

FROM THE FIRST BOOK.

DOUBT.

Now then, at length, I believe myself acquainted with a good part of the world which surrounds me! And indeed I have bestowed sufficient pains and care in becoming so. I have credited only the consenting testimony of my senses, and uniform experience. What I saw I have touched, what I touched I have analysed. I have repeated my observations and repeated them again. I have compared different appearances with each other; and not till I had comprehended their precise connection, not till I could explain and derive the one from the other, could calculate beforehand the result that was to follow, and the observation of the result corresponded to my calculation, have I allowed myself to be satisfied. Wherefore I am now as sure of the correctness of this portion of my knowledge, as of my own existence. I tread with firm step the familiar sphere of my world, and am ready at any moment to stake my being and well-being on the infallibility of my convictions.

But, what am I myself, and what is my destination?

Superfluous question! It is long ago since my instruction on this point was brought to a close. It would require time to repeat to myself all that I have heard in detail and learned and believed respecting it.

And in what way did I arrive at this knowledge which I dimly remember to possess? Did I, impelled by a burning thirst for knowledge, work my way through uncertainty, through doubt and contradiction? Did I, when anything credible offered itself, suspend my judgment,

prove what was probable, and prove it again, illustrate and compare; until an inward voice, unmistakeable and irresistible, called to me: It is so, and only so! as surely as thou livest and hast thy being? No! I remember no such state. Instruction on those subjects was offered me before I desired it. I was answered before I had put the question. I listened because I could not avoid it. There remained fixed in my memory so much as it pleased Chance to preserve. Without examination, and without interest, I let everything be as it was given.

How then can I persuade myself that I possess, in fact, any knowledge on this subject? If I can know and be convinced of that alone which I myself have discovered,-if I am actually acquainted with that only which I myself have experienced,—then I cannot say, in truth, that I possess the least knowledge respecting my own destination. I know only what others profess to know concerning it; and all that I can really affirm is this, that I have heard such and such things in relation to it.

So then, while I have investigated for myself with accurate care the less important, I have hitherto relied on the care and fidelity of strangers in regard to the most important. I have imputed to others an interest in the highest concerns of Humanity, an earnestness, a precision which I had by no means discovered in myself. I have estimated them unspeakably higher than myself.

Whatever truth they know, from whence can they know it except from their own reflection? And why may not I discover the same truth by the same reflection, since I avail as much as they? How have I hitherto undervalued and despised myself!

I will that it be so no longer. With this moment I will enter upon my rights and take possession of the dignity which belongs to me. Renounced be everything foreign! I will investigate for myself. Be it that secret wishes as to how the investigation may terminate,—be it that a fore-loving inclination to certain tenets stirs within me. I forget and deny it. I will allow it no influence on the direction of my thoughts. With severe accuracy I will go to work. With candor I will confess to myself the whole. Whatever I find to be truth, however it may sound, shall be welcome to me. I will KNOW. With the same certainty with which I reckon that this ground will bear me when I tread upon it, that this fire will burn me when I come in contact with it, I will be able to compute what I am and what I shall be. And if this shall be found impossible, I will at least know that it is impossible. And even to this issue of my investigation I will submit myself, if it shall discover itself to me as the Truth.-I hasten to solve the problem which I have proposed to myself.

I seize on-speeding Nature in her flight, arrest her for an instant, fix firmly in my eye the