Fichte has been accused of teaching a system of mere Egoism, of elevating the subjective personality of man into the place of God. JS"o one who is acquainted with any of his later writings can fail to see the falsity of this charge, but as it has been alleged that in these works he abandoned the principles which he advocated in earlier life, it may not be unimportant to show that the charge is utterly groundless, and inapplicable even to the very first outlines of his philosophical theory. The following passages occur in a letter to Jacobi, dated 30th August 1795, when transmitting to him a copy of the first edition of the Wissenschaftslehre, and seem to be quite conclusive as to the fact that the Absolute Ego of his earlier teaching may be scientifi cally, as well as morally, identified with the highest results of his later doctrines.
jftrftte to jflacobi.
" I have read your writings again this summer during the leisure of a charming country residence, — read them again and again, and I am everywhere, but especially in "Allwill," astonished at the striking simi larity of our philosophical convictions. The public will scarcely believe in this similarity, and perhaps you yourself may not readily do so, for in that case it would be required of you to deduce the details of a whole system from the uncertain outlines of an introduc tion. You are indeed well known to be a Realist, and I to be a transcendental Idealist more severe than even Kant himself; — for with him there is still recognised a multiform object of experience, whilst I maintain, in plain language, that this object is itself produced by us through our own creative power. Permit me to come to an understanding with you on this point.
" My Absolute Ego is obviously not the Individual; — although this has been maintained by offended courtiers and chagrined philosophers, in order to im pute to me the scandalous doctrine of practical Ego ism. But the Individual must be deduced from the Absolute Ego. Thus the Wissenschaftslehre enters at once into the domain of natural right. A finite being — as may be shown by deduction — can only conceive of itself as a sensuous existence in a sphere of sensuous existences, over one portion of which — (a portion which can have no beginning) — it exercises causality, and with another portion of which — (a por tion to which we ascribe the notion of causality), — it stands in relations of reciprocal influence; — and in so far it is called an Individual: (the conditions of Indi viduality are Rights.} So surely as it affirms itself as an Individual, so surely does it affirm such a sphere; for both are reciprocal notions. When we regard our selves as Individuals — in which case we always look upon ourselves as living, and not as philosophizing or poetizing, — we take our stand upon that point of view which I call practical; — that of the Absolute Ego being speculative. Henceforward, from this practical point of view there is a world for us, independent of ourselves, which we can only modify; and thus too the Pure Ego, which does not disappear from this region, is necessarily placed without us, objectified, and called God. How could we otherwise have arrived at the qualities which we ascribe to God, and deny to our selves, had we not first discovered them in ourselves.
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and only denied them to ourselves in one particular respect — i.e. as Individuals? This practical point of view is the domain of Realism; by the deduction and recognition of this point from the side of speculation itself arises that complete reconciliation of philosophy with the Common Sense of man, which is promised in the Wissenschaftslehre.
" To what end, then, is the speculative point of view, and with it all philosophy, if it belong not to life? Had humanity never tasted of this forbidden fruit, it might indeed have done without philosophy. But there is implanted within us a desire to gaze upon this region which transcends all individuality, not by a mere reflected light, but in direct and immediate vision; and the first man who raised a question con cerning the existence of God, broke through the re strictive limits, shook humanity to its deepest founda tions, and set it in a controversy with itself wlu'ch is not yet adjusted, and which can only be adjusted by a bold advance to that highest region of thought from which the speculative and practical points of view are seen to be united. We begin to philosophize from presumption, and thus become bankrupt of our inno cence; we see our nakedness, and then philosophize from necessity for our redemption.
" But do I not philosophize as confidently with you, and write as openly, as if I were already assured of your interest in my philosophy? Indeed my heart tells me that I do not deceive myself in assuming the existence of this interest.
" Allwill gives the transcendental Idealists the hope of an enduring peace and even of a kind of alliance, if they will but content themselves with finding their own limits, and making these secure. I believe that I have now fulfilled this condition. If I have moreover, from this supposed hostile land, guaranteed and se cured to Realism itself its own proper domain, then I may lay claim not merely to a kind of alliance, but to an alliance of the completest kind."
Still more decisive on this point is the following passage from a review of Schulz's " ^Enesidemus," in the Literatur Zeitung for 1794: — " In the Pure Ego, Reason is not practical, neither is it so in the Ego as Intelligence; it only becomes so by the effort of these to unite. That this principle must lie at the root of Kant's doctrine itself, although he has nowhere distinctly declared it; — further, how a practical philosophy arises through the representation of this hyper-physical effort by the intelligent Ego to itself, in its progressive ascent through the various steps which man must traverse in theoretical philoso phy, — this is not the place to show. Such an union, — an Ego in whose Self-determination all the I^on-Ego is determined (the Idea of God] — is the highest object of this effort. Such an effort, when the intelligent Ego conceives this object as something external to it self, is faith: — (Faith in God.} This effort can never cease, until after the attainment of its object; that is, Intelligence cannot regard as the last any moment of its existence in which this object has not yet been attained, — (Faith in an eternal existence.} In these ideas, however, there is nothing possible for us but Faith; — i.e. Intelligence has here no empirical per ception for its object, but only the necessary effort of the Ego; and throughout all Eternity nothing more 82 MEMOIR OF FICHTE.
than this can become possible. But this faith is by no means a mere probable opinion; on the contrary, it possesses, at least according to the testimony of our inmost convictions, the same degree of certainty with the immediately certain postulate '/ am,' — a certainty infinitely superior to all objective certainty, which can only become possible mediately, through the existence of the intelligent Ego. ^Enesidemus indeed demands an objective proof for the existence of God and the Immortality of the soul. What can he mean by this? Or does objective certainty appear to him superior to subjective certainty? The axiom — ' / am myself — possesses only subjective certainty; and so far as we can conceive of the self-consciousness of God, even God is subjective so far as regards himself. And then, as to an objective existence of Immortality! (these are.^Enesidemus' own words), — should any being whatever, contemplating its existence in time, declare at any moment of that existence — ' Now, I am eter nal!' — then, on that very account, it could not be eternal."
We have seen that the attitude of the finite Ego towards the Non-Ego is practical; towards the Infinite Ego, speculative. In the first relation we find our selves surrounded by existences, over one part of which we exercise causality, and with the other (in whom we suppose an independent causality) we are in a state of reciprocal influence. In these relations the active and moral powers of man find their sphere. The moral law imparts to its objects — to all things whose exist ence is implied in its fulfilment — the same certainty which belongs to itself. The outward world assumes MORAL RELATIONS OF THE FINITE EGO. 83 a new reality, for we have imperative duties to perform which demand its existence. Life ceases to be an empty show without truth or significance; — it is our field of duty, the theatre on which our moral destiny is to he wrought out. The voice of conscience, of highest reason, bids us know, love, and honour be ings like ourselves, and those beings crowd around us. The ends of their and our existence demand the powers and appliances of physical life for their attainment; — that life, and the means of sustaining and using it, stand before us. The world is nothing more than the sphere and object of human activity; it exists because the purposes of our moral life require its existence. Of the law of duty we are immediately certain; the world becomes a reality to us by means of that pre vious certainty. Our life begins with an action, not a thought; we do not act because we know, but we know because we are called upon to act.
But not only does the law of human activity require our faith in its immediate objects and implements; it also points to a purpose, an aim, in our actions lying beyond themselves, to which they stand related as means to an end. Not that the moral law is depen dent on the perception of this end — the moral law is absolute and imperative in itself — but we necessarily connect with our actions some future result as a con sequence to which they inevitably tend, as the final accomplishment of the purpose which gave them birth. The moral sense cannot find such a fulfilment in the present life; — the forces of nature, the desires and passions of men, constantly oppose its dictates. It revolts against the permanence of things as they now are, and unceasingly strives to make them better. Nor 84 MEMOIR OF FICHTE.
can the individual look for such an accomplishment of the moral law of his nature in the progressive improve ment of his species. Were the highest grade of earthly perfection conceived and attained in the physical and moral world — (as it is conceivable and attainable) — Reason would still propose a higher grade beyond it. And even this measure of perfection could not be appropriated by humanity as its own, — as the result of its own exertions, — but must be considered as the creation of an unknown power, by whose unseen agency the basest passions of men, and even their vices and crimes, have been made the instruments of this consummation; while too often their good resolutions appear altogether lost to the world, or even to retard the purposes which they were apparently designed to promote. The chain of material causes and effects is not affected by the motives and feelings which prompt an action, but solely by the action itself; and the pur poses of mere physical existence would be as well, or even better promoted by an unerring mechanism as by the agency of free beings. Nevertheless, if moral obe dience be a reasonable service, it must have its result; if the Reason which commands it be not an utterly vain delusion, its law must be fulfilled. That law is the first principle of our nature, and it gives us the assurance, our faith in which no difficulty can shake, that no moral act can be fruitless, no work of Reason utterly lost. A chain of causes and effects, in which Freedom is superfluous and without aim, cannot thus be the limit of our existence; the law of our being cannot be fulfilled in the world of sense; — there must then be a super-sensual world in which it may be ac complished. In this purely spiritual world, will alone MORAL RELATIONS OF THE FINITE EGO. 85 is the first link of a chain of consequences which per vades the whole invisible realm of being; as action, in the sensual world, is the first link of a material chain which runs through the whole system of nature. Will is the active living principle of the super-sensual world; it may break forth in a material act, which belongs to the sensual world, and do there that which pertains to a material act to do; — but, independently of all phy sical manifestation, it flows forth in endless spiritual activity. Here human Freedom is untrammeled by earthly obstructions, and the moral law of our being may find that accomplishment which it sought in vain in the world of sense.
But although we are immediately conscious that our Will, our moral activity, must lead to consequences beyond itself, we yet cannot know what those conse quences may be, nor how they are possible. In re spect of the nature of these results, the present life is, in relation to the future, a life in faith. In the future life we shall possess these results, for we shall then make them the groundwork of new activity, and thus the future life will be, in relation to the present, a life in sight. But the spiritual world is even now with us, for we are already in possession of the principle from which it springs. Our Will, our free activity, is the only attribute which is solely and exclusively our own; and by it we are already citizens of the eternal world; the kingdom of heaven is here, or nowhere — it cannot become more immediately present at any point of finite existence. This life is the beginning of our being; the outward world is freely given to us as a firm ground on which we may commence our course; the future life is its continuation, for which we must i 86 MEMOIR OF FICHTE.
ourselves create a starting-period in the present; and should the aim of this second life prove as unattainable to finite power as the end of the first is to us now, then the fresh strength, the firmer purpose, the clearer sight which shall be its immediate growth, will open to us another and a higher sphere of activity. But the world of duty is an infinite world; — every finite exer tion has but a definite aim; — and beyond the highest point toward which our labouring being strives, a higher still appears; and to such progression we can conceive no end. By free determination — in the effort after moral perfection, — we have laid hold on Eternal Life.
In the physical world we see certain phenomena following each other with undeviating regularity. We cannot see that what we name cause has in itself any power over that which we call effect, — that there is any relation between them except that of invariable sequence. But we suppose a law under which both sub sist, which regulates the mode of their existence, and by the efficiency of which the order of their succession is determined. So likewise, in the spiritual world, we entertain the firmest conviction that our moral Will is connected with certain consequences, though we cannot understand how mere Will can of itself produce such consequences. We here again conceive of a law under which our Will, and the Will of all finite beings, exists, in virtue of which it is followed by certain results, and out of which all our rela tions with other beings arise. So far as our Will is simply an internal act, complete in itself, it lies wholly within our own power; — 'so far as it is a fact in the super-sensual world — the first of a train of spiritual consequences, it is not dependent on ourselves, but on FAITH IN THE ABSOLUTE. 87 the law which governs the super-sensual world. But the super-sensual world is a world of Freedom, of living activity; its principle cannot therefore be a me chanical force, but must itself possess this Freedom — this living activity. It can be nothing else than self- determining Reason. But self-determining Reason is Will. The law of the super-sensual world must thus be a Will: — a will operating without material implement or manifestation, which is in itself both act and pro duct, which is eternal and unchangeable, — so that on it finite beings may securely rely, as the physical man does on the laws of his world, that through it, all their moral acts of Will, and these only, shall lead to certain and unfailing results. In this Living Will, as the principle of the spiritual world, has our moral Will its first consequence, and through Him its energy is propagated throughout the series of finite beings who are the products of the Infinite Will. He is the spi ritual bond which unites all free beings together: — not immediately can they know or influence each other, for they are separated from each other by an impassable barrier; — their mutual knowledge comes through Him alone, to whom all are equally related. Our faith in duty, and in the objects of duty, is only faith in Him, in His wisdom, in His truth. He is thus the creator and sustainer of all things; for in Him alone all the thronging forms which people our dream of life " live and move and have their being." All partake His essence: — material nature disappears, but its images are invested with a new reality. All our life is His life; and we are eternal, for He is eternal. Birth and the grave are no more; but, in their stead, undying energy and immortal youth. Of him — the Infinite S8 MEMOIR OF FICHTE.
One, — of the mode of His being, we know nothing, nor need we to know; we cannot pierce the inaccessible light in which He dwells, but through the shadows which veil His presence from us, an endless stream of of life, power, and action flows around and about us, bearing us and all finite things onward to new life, love, and beauty.
" The ONE remains, the many change and pass; Heaven's light for ever shines, Earth's shadows fly; Life, like a dome of many-coloured glass, Stains the white radiance of Eternity, Until Death tramples it to fragments."
All Death in nature is Birth, — the assumption of a new garment, to replace the old vesture which hu manity has laid aside in its progress to higher being. And serene above all change, the unattainable object of all finite eifort — fountain of our life — home of our spirits, — Thou art — the One Being, — the I AM, — for whom Reason has no idea, and Language no name.
" Sublime and living Will, named by no name, com passed by no thought, I may well raise my soul to Thee, for Thou and I are not divided. Thy voice sounds within me, mine resounds in Thee; and all my thoughts, if they are but good and true, live in Thee also. In Thee, the Incomprehensible, I myself, and the world in which I live, become clearly comprehensible to me, all the secrets of my existence are laid open, and perfect harmony arises in my soul.
" Thou art best known to the childlike, devoted, simple mind. To it Thou art the searcher of hearts, who seest its inmost depths; the ever-present true witness of its thoughts, who knowest its truth, who knowest it though all the world know it not. Thou ABSOLUTE RELIGION.
art the Father who ever desirest its good, who rulest all things for the best. To Thy will it unhesitatingly resigns itself: ' Do with me,' it says, ' what thou wilt; I know that it is good, for it is Thou who dost it.' The inquisitive understanding, which has heard of Thee, but seen Thee not, would teach us Thy nature; and, as Thy image, shows us a monstrous and in congruous shape, which the sagacious laugh at, and the wise and good abhor.
" I hide my face before Thee, and lay my hand upon my mouth. How Thou art, and seemest to Thine own being, I can never know, any more than I can assume Thy nature. After thousands upon thou sands of spirit-lives, I shall comprehend Thee as little as I do now in this earthly house. That which I conceive, becomes finite through my very conception of it; and this can never, even by endless exaltation, rise into the Infinite. Thou differest from men, not iu degree but in nature. In every stage of their advance ment they think of Thee as a greater man, and still a greater; but never as God — the Infinite, — whom no measure can mete. I have only this discursive, pro gressive thought, and I can conceive of no other: — how can I venture to ascribe it to Thee? In the idea of person there are imperfections, limitations: — how can I clothe Thee with it without these?
" I will not attempt that which the imperfection of my finite nature forbids, and which would be useless to me: — how Thou art, I may not know. But Thy rela tions to me — the mortal — and to all mortals, lie open before my eyes, — were I but what I ought to be, — and surround me as clearly as the consciousness of my own existence. Thou workest in me the knowledge of my I 2 90 MEMOIR OF FICHTE.
duty, of my vocation in the world of reasonable beings: — how, I know not, nor need I to know. Thou knowest what I think and what I will: — how Thou canst know, through what act thou bringest about that consciousness, I cannot understand, — nay, I know that the idea of an act, of a particular act of consciousness, belongs to me alone, and not to Thee, — the Infinite One. Thou wiliest that my free obedience shall bring with it eternal consequences: — the act of Thy will I cannot comprehend, — I only know that it is not like mine. Thou doest, and Thy will itself is the deed; but the way of Thy working is not as my ways, — I cannot trace it. Thou livest and art, for Thou knowest and wiliest and workest, omnipresent to finite Reason; but Thou art not as / now and always must conceive of being." * Such is a very broken and imperfect outline of the most complete system of Transcendental Idealism ever offered to the world. To those few among British students, who, amid the prevailing degradation of sentiment and frivolity of thought, have pondered the deep mysteries of being until the common logic, which pretends to grasp its secret, seems a vain and pre sumptuous trifling with questions which he far beyond its reach, and who find in the theological solution but a dry and worthless husk which conceals the kernel of truth it was only meant to preserve, — to such it may be no unacceptable service to have pointed the way to a modern Academe, where the moral dignity of the Athenian sage is united with the poetic sublimity and intellectual keenness of his two most distinguished " Bestimmung des Menschen," Book III.
INTERCOURSE WITH LAVATER, &C. 91 pupils. If by such bumble guidance any should be induced to turn aside towards that retreat, let them not be deterred if at first the path should seem to lack something of the smoothness of the well-trodden high way on which they have hitherto travelled; — let them proceed courageously; — it will lead them into calm sunshine, and beside clear and refreshing streams; — nor shall they return thence without nobler thoughts and higher aspirations.
Fichte lived in close retirement in Zurich. The manners of the inhabitants did not please him, and he seldom came out into society. His wife, his father- in-law, Lavater, and a few others, composed his circle. Rahn enjoyed in no ordinary degree the society of his distinguished son-in-law; and it is pleasing to know that the celebrated and venerable preacher preserved, even in advanced age, a keen relish for new truth, a perfect openness of mind not frequently met with in his profession. At his request Fichte prepared a short course of lectures, by which his friends might be intro duced to an acquaintance with the Critical Philosophy, the fame of which had now reached Switzerland. At the conclusion of the lectures Lavater addressed a letter of thanks to his young instructor, full of the strongest expressions of gratitude and esteem, in which he styles himself his " pupil, friend, and fellow-man." Up to the period of his death, this excellent man retained the warmest feelings of friendship towards the philo sopher; — and the following lines, written some years after Fichte's departure from Zurich, whatever may be their value in other respects, serve at least to show the respect, almost approaching to reverence, with 92 MEMOIR OF FICHTE.
which Fichte was regarded by one who was himself no ordinary man: — ' ltnerrekf)barer Tenter, £cin £>afei)n fcenmtf mir ba§ Eafepn, (StneS eroigen ©eijleS, Dem Ijofje ©etficr enjha&Ien! .Ronntcjt je £u jweifetn: tcf) jMIte £tcf> fcfcjl »or £>t<fc felfcft nur; 3etgte Sir in Dir fettft ben @tra^I beg ewigen Although Fichte had as yet published nothing to which his name was attached, he had nevertheless acquired an extensive philosophical reputation. In several powerful and searching criticisms which ap peared in the " Allgemeine Literatur Zeitung," the hand of the author of the " Critique of Revelation" was discovered. He was now generally looked upon as the man who was destined to complete the philosophy of Kant, and was thus led into literary correspondence with some of the most distinguished men of the day. At the head of these must be placed Reinhold, the professor of philosophy at Jena, who had hitherto stood foremost among the disciples of Kant. The re lation between these two celebrated men was a most remarkable one. Although their characters were very different, although they never saw each other, they lived on terms of the most intimate and trustful con fidence, such as is commonly attained by long-tried friendship alone. In their extensive correspondence, Fichte's powerful and commanding intellect evidently possesses great ascendency over the more diffident and pliable nature of Ileinhold; but his influence never interferes with the mental freedom of his friend. On the other hand, Reinhold's open and enthusiastic cha racter, and his pure love of truth, engaged the warm