Introduction

Abstract

Max Scheler’s Wesen und Formen der SympathiE, which appeared in 1923, is an essentially altered and extended second edition of a book published in 1913 entitled Zur Phänomenologie und Theorie der Sympathiegefühle und von Liebe und Hass. Wesen und Formen der Sympathie was the first volume of a proposed several volumes to be concerned with clarifying the nature and mode of specific emotional functions and acts. Other titles in the proposed collection, although not completed, included Wesen und Formen Des Schamgefühls , Wesen und Formen des Angst und Furcht, Wesen und Formen des Ehrgefühls. Scheler’s clarification was to indicate important derivatives of the concerned emotional functions and acts along with the order of their development in individual and communal life. The entire collection was to show the truth and relevance of Pascal’s thought respecting an “ordre du Coeur”, “logique du Coeur”, “raison du Coeur”, and to furnish strict proof for it. Pascal’s thought was also the fundamental inspiration of Scheler’s ethics found in his book entitled, Der Formalismus in der Ethik und die materiale Wertethik, as well as a shorter work published during this same period of writing, Ordo Amoris. Vom Ewigen im Menschen should also be mentioned as an important work of this period.