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Fichte’s Life and Philosophical Trajectory

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The Palgrave Fichte Handbook

Part of the book series: Palgrave Handbooks in German Idealism ((PHGI))

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Abstract

J. G. Fichte presented his transcendental idealism in many different ways, but despite radical changes in terms, style, and method throughout his philosophical development, each version retained the essence of the one and only Wissenschaftslehre. His philosophical task was always to relate life or human consciousness (that is, sensible experience at the empirical standpoint) to its supersensible ground (that is, pure consciousness at the transcendental standpoint). Although life and philosophy are opposites, life presumes concepts and principles that can only be justified by philosophy at the transcendental standpoint, and philosophy presupposes feelings, intuitions, and beliefs that can only be discovered at the empirical standpoint.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    For biographies of Fichte, see Anthony J. La Vopa, Fichte: The Self and the Calling of Philosophy (1762–1799) (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001); Robert Adamson, Fichte (Edinburgh/London: Blackwood, 1881). See also “Introduction,” in AD.

  2. 2.

    For Fichte’s account of the influence of Hume, as well as the critical skeptics Schulze and Maimon, on his development, see EPW 94 (GA I/2:109). See also Fichte’s untitled fragment in GA II/3:389.

  3. 3.

    See EPW 53–77. See also David Hume on Faith, in Jacobi: The Main Philosophical Writings and the Novel Allwill, trans. George di Giovanni (Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1994), 336.

  4. 4.

    For a detailed discussion of Reinhold’s early philosophy, see Daniel Breazeale, “The Aenesidemus Review and the Transformation of German Idealism,” in Thinking Through the Wissenschaftslehre (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013), 23–41.

  5. 5.

    See, for example, NM 126–27 (GA IV/2:36–37). Fichte borrowed this principle from Maimon. See Maimon, Versuch einer neuen Logik oder Theorie des Denkens (Berlin: Felisch, 1794), 20, 310–14, 433.

  6. 6.

    See Fichte’s April 22, 1799 letter to Reinhold: EPW 428–37 (GA III/3, no. 440). See also Daniel Breazeale, “The Standpoint of Life and the Standpoint of Philosophy,” in Thinking Through the Wissenschaftslehre, 360–403.

  7. 7.

    For detailed discussion, see La Vopa, Fichte, 249–69, 333, 368, 404, 413.

  8. 8.

    For a discussion of the relation between ideal and real thinking and the ideal and real activity of the I, see Günter Zöller, Fichte’s Transcendental Philosophy: The Original Duplicity of Intelligence and Will (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998).

  9. 9.

    For a detailed account of intellectual intuition, the five-fold synthesis (see below), and the pure will, see Yolanda Estes, “Intellectual Intuition, the Pure Will, and the Categorical Imperative,” in New Essays on Fichte’s Later Jena Wissenschaftslehre, ed. Daniel Breazeale and Tom Rockmore (Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 2002), 209–25.

  10. 10.

    This is followed by a proof based on the concept of the I (SE 27–28 [GA I/5:39–41]). This proof also appears in FNR (18–21 [GA I/3:329–332]). See also NM 358–463 (GA IV/2:255–59).

  11. 11.

    For an excellent discussion of these issues in Fichte’s practical philosophy, see Owen Ware, “Fichte on Conscience,” Philosophical and Phenomenological Research 95, no. 2 (2017): 376–94. For differing opinions, see: Daniel Breazeale, “In Defense of Fichte’s Account of Ethical Deliberation,” Archiv für Geschichte der Philosophie 94 (2012): 178–207; Günter Zöller, “The Choice of the Philosopher,” comments on Michelle Kosch, “Agency and Self-Sufficiency in Fichte’s Ethics,” refereed symposium session, Pacific APA, 2013.

  12. 12.

    For a more detailed discussion of intellectual intuition and the summons in Fichte’s philosophy, see: Estes, “Intellectual Intuition,” 215–219; Yolanda Estes, “Morality, Right, and Philosophy in the Jena Wissenschaftslehre,” in Rights, Bodies, and Recognition: New Essays on Fichte’s Foundations of Natural Right, ed. Tom Rockmore and Daniel Breazeale (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2006), 59–70.

  13. 13.

    Friedrich Immanuel Niethammer was a professor of philosophy at the University of Jena and the founder of the journal, which was devoted to transcendental idealism.

  14. 14.

    AD 37–47 (“Entwicklung des Begriffs der Religion” in Die Schriften zu J. G. Fichtes Atheismus-Streit, 1798–1800, ed. Hans Lindau (Munich: Georg Müller, 1913), 37–58).

  15. 15.

    For a detailed discussion of this controversy, see the commentary in AD.

  16. 16.

    It explains what morality requires us to believe. See VM 264–71 (GA I/6:252–57) and AD 258 (GA I/6:377).

  17. 17.

    Fichte often refers to duty-based (or deontological morality) as “moralism” whereas he calls all forms of consequentialism (including virtue ethics and utilitarianism) “eudaemonism.” Moreover, he regards moralism as necessarily connected with spiritualism and philosophical idealism, and he regards eudaemonism as necessarily connected with sensualism and philosophical dogmatism. See, for example, AD 108–16 (GA I/5:434–41).

  18. 18.

    Conscience also serves as the sole form of revelation whereby a conviction in the reality of the natural world—and the sensible world order—is produced. See AD 23n, 24–27 (GA I/5:350n, 351–55); IWL 49–50 (GA I/4:219–20).

  19. 19.

    This “faction” consists of critics of transcendental philosophy, and particularly of the Wissenschaftslehre, most notably various dogmatic, obscurantist, and eudaemonistic philosophers, including various anonymous reactionary critics published in the journal Eudämonia, oder Deutsches Volksglück. For more details on the role of Eudämonia in the politics of the period, see Frederick Beiser, Enlightenment, Revolution, and Romanticism: The Genesis of Modern German Political Thought 1790–1800 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1992), 326–334. See also Daniel Breazeale’s discussion of Eudämonia: IWL 103n–104n.

  20. 20.

    In 1806, Fichte revisits and expands this discussion in his lectures on the Religionslehre, wherein he introduces the notion that the scope of human consciousness is determined by human moral development, which is characterized by different types of love or desire, and that the transition from one to another progressively expanded and elevated sphere of consciousness is initiated by despair over the inadequacy of the successive objects of desire. Hence, for the individual at lower levels of moral development, all desire is a Sehnen nach Genusse (yearning for pleasure, or happiness) and thus, all consciousness is awareness of sensible things; whereas, for the individual at higher levels of moral development, desire includes Sehnen nach Seligkeit (yearning for blessedness, or beatitude), and thus consciousness includes awareness of spiritual things. See RL 12–13, 151; cf. VM 24–25 (GA I/6:212–14); AD 25–26 (GA I/5:353); NM 294–95 (GA IV/2:136).

  21. 21.

    Cf. IWL 17–20, 94–95 (GA I/4:193–96, 261–62). See also AD 100–106 (GA I/5:424–31); AD 25–26 (GA I/5:353). For Fichte’s account of the conflict between the idealist and the dogmatist, see IWL 15–20 (GA I/4:191–96). For a discussion of this conflict, see Daniel Breazeale, “Idealism vs. Dogmatism,” in Thinking Through the Wissenschaftslehre, 301–34.

  22. 22.

    For a discussion of the many facets of enlightenment, including the Spinozism dispute and the pantheism dispute, see Frederick C. Beiser, The Fate of Reason: German Philosophy from Kant to Fichte (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1987).

  23. 23.

    Forberg, “Development of the Concept of Religion” (AD 37–47 [Lindau, ed., Schriften zu J. G. Fichtes Atheismus-Streit, 37–58]); Reinhold, “Letter to Fichte” (AD 134–43 [GA III/3, no. 436.I]).

  24. 24.

    See Yolanda Estes, Commentary on “Letter to Fichte” (AD 125–33); Commentary on “From a Private Letter” (AD 245–51); Commentary on “Concluding Remark by the Editor” (AD 269–75).

  25. 25.

    See AD 57–75 (GA I/6:121–38).

  26. 26.

    Paul Joachim Siegmund Vogel, “Theoretisch-praktischer Beweis des objectiven Daseyns Gottes,” Neuest theologisches Journal, 1, no. 1 (1799) 109–54.

  27. 27.

    Johann August Eberhard, Ueber den Gott des Herrn Professor Fichte und den Götzen seiner Gegner (Halle, 1799), 21.

  28. 28.

    Jacobi, Main Philosophical Writings, 523–26 (GA III/3, no. 428.I). Johann Kaspar Lavater agreed that a moral order was no substitute for a living, active and powerful God.

  29. 29.

    Ibid.

  30. 30.

    See Fichte’s discussions of philosophical terms, concepts, and arguments in EPW 192–216 and RL 32–33. See also VM 64–71, 111 (GA I/6:252–57, 296); NM 471nH (GA IV/2:265); AD 103–104, 107–108 (GA I/5:428, 433); AD 176–79 (GA I/6:49–52); AD 26 (GA I/5:354).

  31. 31.

    In this anonymous review of Appeal to the Public, which was published in columns 401–16 of the Oberdeutsche allgemeine Literaturzeitung (March 1, 1799), the author also criticizes Fichte for not accounting for the creation of the moral world order.

  32. 32.

    Jacobi, Main Philosophical Writings, 523–24 (GA III/3, no. 428.I).

  33. 33.

    See, for example, Johann Kaspar Lavater’s letter to Fichte of February 7–12, 1799 (GA III/3:187–93).

  34. 34.

    Ueber den Gott des Herrn Professor Fichte und den Götzen seiner Gegner (Halle, 1799), 21.

  35. 35.

    J. G. Dyck, Ueber des Herrn Professor Fichte Appellation an das Publikum. Eine Anmerkung aus der deutschen Uebersetzung des Ersten Bandes von Saint-Lamberts Tugendkinst besonders abgedruckt (Leipzig, 1799), 6. See also Jacobi’s discussion of Alleinphilosophen—“quintessential” or “one-sole-philosophy” philosophers—in Main Philosophical Writings, 503–506 (GA III/3, no. 428.I). According to Jacobi, Fichte wanted to contain the “foundation of all truth” within the Wissenschaftslehre, whereas he wanted to keep “this foundation (the true itself)” outside of philosophy and all other knowledge (ibid, 505–506 [GA III/3, no. 428.I]). Jacobi refers to his own mode of thinking as a non-philosophy that produces non-knowledge (ibid., 501, 505 [GA III/3, no. 428.I]). See also Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel’s critique of Jacobi in his review of Woldemar, in Deutschland, 3, no. 8 (1796): 202, 205, 210–11.

  36. 36.

    Jacobi, Main Philosophical Writings, 513 (GA III/3:239).

  37. 37.

    Johann Heinrich Gottlieb Heusinger, Ueber das idealistisch-atheistische System des Herrn Professor Fichte in Jena (Dresden/Gotha, 1799).

  38. 38.

    Jacobi, Main Philosophical Writings, 517–19 (GA III/3:243–45).

  39. 39.

    Father’s Letter: AD 58, 66, 72–74 (GA I/6:122, 129, 135–37); “Saxon Letter of Requisition to the Weimar Court”: AD 83 (FG 2:25–26); “Weimar Rescript to the University of Jena”: AD 84 (FG 6.1: 316); “Gotha Rescript to the University of Jena”: AD 213 (FG 6.1: 382).

  40. 40.

    For this reason, his opponents also failed to see the differences between philosophy, religion, theology, and ministry. For Fichte’s discussions of these particular differences, see VM 27, 59–60, 74–75, 101–3, 11–13, 114–15 (GA I/6:215, 247, 260–61, 287–89, 297–99, 300).

  41. 41.

    See also AD 257–58, 279 (GA I/6:377–78, 414–15); EPW 428–37 (GA III/3, no. 440).

  42. 42.

    Fichte also addresses the accusation of nihilism in VM 81–93, 110, 117 (GA I/6:267–78, 295–96, and 303); AD 257–58 (GA I/6:377).

  43. 43.

    I follow Ives Radrizzani’s approach to the Vocation of Man. Radrizzanni says:

    No conversion to Jacobi, no romantic mysticism, no recourse to a ‘transubjective basis,’ no turning from idealism to realism can be found in the Vocation of Man; we discover there instead a living an graphic presentation of the main results of the Wissenschaftslehre, as they are exposed particularly in the Wissenschaftslehre nova methodo.

    Ives Radrizzani, “The Place of the Vocation of Man in Fichte’s Work,” in Breazeale and Rockmore, New Essays on Fichte’s Later Jena Wissenschaftslehre, 337. For another discussion of the place of the Vocation of Man in Fichte’s work, see Alexis Philonenko, L’Oeuvre de Fichte (Paris: Vrin, 1984), 87. See also AD 253–54 (GA I/6:371).

  44. 44.

    Note Fichte’s assertion that the development of the principles presumed by “Divine World-Governance” is “most fully carried out” in Vocation of Man. See AD 264 (GA I/6:387–89).

  45. 45.

    Radrizzani, “Place of the Vocation,” 337.

  46. 46.

    The Religionslehre also includes an empirical guide to beatitude, because it teaches how to live a blessed life. Fichte claims that life consists in the original duality of a self-conscious I, which strives to unite its divided, finite consciousness with the eternal—Sein, or God. See RL 32–33, 83; cf. VM 1–2, 99 (GA I/6:189–90, 284–85).

  47. 47.

    Ueber die Tatsachen des Bewußtseyns. Fichte’s Vorlesungen über das Studium der Philosophie; aus dem Gedächtniß nach dem Kollegio niedergeschrieben, and Ueber die Tatsachen des Bewußtseyn und die Wissenschaftslehre bey Fichte, in Arthur Schopenhauer: Der handschriftliche Nachlaß in fünf Bänden, vol. 2, Kritische Auseinandersetzungen (1809–1818), ed. Arthur Hübscher (Munich: Deutscher Taschenbuch, 1985), 16–216. Schopenhauer’s transcripts of Fichte’s lectures can also be found in GA IV/4:59–67, 195–237.

  48. 48.

    Schopenhauer, Handschriftliche Nachlaß, 2:45.

  49. 49.

    Ibid., 2:56–7.

  50. 50.

    Ibid., 2:59, 61.

  51. 51.

    Ibid., 2:82–83.

  52. 52.

    Ibid., 2:28, 149, 156.

  53. 53.

    Ibid., 2:185–186, 218, 232.

  54. 54.

    Ibid., 2:188.

  55. 55.

    Ibid., 2:228–229.

  56. 56.

    I. H. Fichte remained convinced of the overall unity of his father’s philosophy. For a very early argument for this position, see Anna Boynten Thompson, The Unity of Fichte’s Doctrine of Knowledge (Boston: Ginn, 1895).

  57. 57.

    Cf. NM 293 (GA IV/2:135); VM 71 (GA I/6:257); AD 29n, 23 (GA I/5:350n, 351).

  58. 58.

    On the moral world order as the absolute starting point of all objective cognition, see AD 25–26 (GA I/5:354–55). On Sein, the pure will, and the moral world order, see VM 99 (GA I/6:284–285). On God, as the pure will, or the divine will, and its connection to the Aufforderung, see VM 107–11 (GA I/6:292–297).

  59. 59.

    On the law of reflective opposition, see VM 70 (GA I/6:256); NM 125 (GA IV/2:35).

  60. 60.

    Compare: “This is impossible” (NM 413–14 [GA IV/2:223]).

  61. 61.

    See also NM 427–28, 434 ([GA IV/2:216, 219]); Schopenhauer, Handschriftliche Nachlaß, 2:185–186, 218, 232.

  62. 62.

    On the difference between a “necessary belief” and a “pious wish,” see AD 21–22 (GA I/5:348). On the necessity of an intelligible world, see IWL 38n (GA I/4:210n).

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  1. Mississippi State University (Retired), Mississippi State, MS, USA

    Yolanda Estes

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  1. Department of Philosophy and Religion, James Madison University, Harrisonburg, VA, USA

    Steven Hoeltzel

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Estes, Y. (2019). Fichte’s Life and Philosophical Trajectory. In: Hoeltzel, S. (eds) The Palgrave Fichte Handbook. Palgrave Handbooks in German Idealism. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-26508-3_2

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