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Schiller, Scots and Germans: Freedom and Diversity in The Aesthetic Education of Man ∗

2008; Taylor & Francis; Volume: 51; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1080/00201740701858894

1502-3923

Douglas Moggach,

Philosophy and Historical Thought

Click to increase image sizeClick to decrease image size Acknowledgements The author acknowledges the support of the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, and of a Visiting Fellowship at Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge. Earlier versions of the paper were presented at the American Philosophical Association, San Francisco, and at the Seminar in Political Thought and Intellectual History, Faculty of History, University of Cambridge. Thanks are due to the interlocutors at these presentations, and in particular to Frederick Beiser, Raymond Geuss, and Istvan Hont. Notes 1. Schiller, F. [1795] (1967) On the Aesthetic Education of Man in a Series of Letters, bilingual edition, trans. and ed. Wilkinson, E. & Willoughby, L.A. (Oxford: Clarendon Press). 2. Hegel, G.W.F. (1896/1955) Lectures on the History of Philosophy, vol. 3, trans. Haldane, E.S.& Simson, F.H. (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul), p. 425. 3. Engels, F. [1847] (1972) “Deutscher Sozialismus in Versen und Prosa”, in: Marx, K. & Engels, F. Werke, Band 4 (Berlin: Dietz), p. 232. 4. Pugh, D. (2005) “Schiller as Citizen of his Time”, in: J.V. Curran, & C. Fricker (Eds.), Schiller's “On Grace and Dignity” in its Cultural Context. Essays and a New Translation, pp. 37–54 (Rochester NY: Boydell & Brewer). 5. Oz‐Salzberger, F. (2002) “Scots, Germans, Republic and Commerce”, in: M. van Gelderen, & Q. Skinner (Eds.) Republicanism. A Shared European Heritage, vol. 2, pp. 197–226 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press). 6. Jaeschke, W. (1990) “Ästhetische Revolution: Stichworte zur Einführung”, in: W. Jaeschke & H. Holzhey (Eds.) Früher Idealismus und Frühromantik. Der Streit um die Grundlagen der Ästhetik (1795–1805) (Hamburg: Meiner), p. 2. 7. Wilkinson, E. & Willoughby, L.A. “Introduction” in: Schiller, Aesthetic Education, pp. lxxxii–lxxxiii. 8. Beiser, F. (2005) Schiller as Philosopher: A Re‐Examination (Oxford: Clarendon Press), pp. 130–31. 9. Foremost among the voluminous literature: Skinner, Q. (1978) The Foundations of Modern Political Thought, 2 vols. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press); Pocock, J. G. A. (1975) The Machiavellian Moment (Princeton: Princeton University Press). For a recent review of Skinner's work and its impact, see Brett, A. & Tully, J. (Eds.) (2006) Rethinking the Foundations of Modern Political Thought (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press). 10. Beiser, Schiller, pp. 124–25, 163–64. 11. Beiser, Schiller, p. 126. 12. Beiser, Schiller, p. 209; cf. Pugh, “Schiller as Citizen”, p. 43, 49–50; Kain, P.J. (1982) Schiller, Hegel, and Marx: State, Society, and the Aesthetic Ideal of Ancient Greece (Kingston and Montreal: McGill‐Queen's University Press), pp. 19–25, 29–30, 32–33; Hammermeister, K. (2002) The German Aesthetic Tradition (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), pp. 59–60. 13. Beiser, Schiller, pp. 132–34; cf. Pugh, “Schiller as Citizen,” pp. 43–44. 14. Beiser, F. (24 Sept. 2004) “Hegel's Republican”, Review of Moggach, D. (2003) The Philosophy and Politics of Bruno Bauer (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press) in Times Literary Supplement. 15. In this section I reformulate arguments developed at greater length in my article, (2007) “Schiller's aesthetic republicanism”, History of Political Thought, 28(3), pp. 520–541. 16. Oz‐Salzberger, pp. 197–226. See also Oz‐Salzberger, F. (1995) Translating the Enlightenment: Scottish Civic Discourse in Eighteenth‐Century Germany (Oxford: Clarendon Press). 17. Cf. Hont, I. & Ignatieff, M. (Eds.) (1983) Wealth and Virtue (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press). 18. See, for example, Geuna, M. “Skinner, Pre‐Humanist Rhetorical Culture, and Machiavelli,” in: Brett & Tully (Eds.), Rethinking the Foundations, pp. 50–72. 19. Nelson, E. (2004) The Greek Tradition in Republican Thought (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press); Pocock, J.G.A. (1995) “The Ideal of Citizenship Since Classical Times,” in: R. Beiner (Ed.) Theorizing Citizenship, pp. 29–52 (Albany: State University of New York Press). 20. Hankins, J. (Ed.) (2000) Renaissance Civic Humanism: Reappraisals and Reflections (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press). 21. Hont, I. (2005) Jealousy of Trade. International Competition and the Nation‐State in Historical Perspective (Cambridge MA: Harvard University Press). 22. Oz‐Salzberger, “Scots, Germans”, p. 211. 23. Oz‐Salzberger, “Scots, Germans”, p. 198. 24. See note 15, above. 25. Waszek, N. (2006) “The Scottish Enlightenment in Germany, and its Translator, Christian Garve (1742–98)”, in: T. Hubbard & R.D.S. Jack (Eds.) Scotland in Europe, pp. 55–71 (Amsterdam: Rodopi). 26. Wilkinson and Willoughby, “Introduction”, p. lxxxviii. 27. Schiller, Aesthetic Education, Letter IV. 3 [my translation]. 28. Schiller, Aesthetic Education, Letter IV. 3 [my translation]. 29. Schiller, Aesthetic Education, Letter IV. 7. 30. Schiller, F. [1795] (1962) “Über naive und sentimentalische Dichtung” in: Sämtliche Werke, Bd. V, pp. 694–780 (Munich: Carl Hanser), esp. p. 716. Schiller's views of the Greeks are not always consistent. Cf. Schiller, F. [1788] (1962) “Die Götter Griechenlands”, in: Sämtliche Werke, Bd. I, pp. 163–169 (Munich: Carl Hanser); for a discussion, Chytry, J. (1989) The Aesthetic State. A Quest in Modern German Thought (Berkeley: University of California Press) p. 92, 96, 103. 31. Schiller, Aesthetic Education, Letter IV.7. See also Mondot, J. (2004) “Schiller et la Révolution française. D'un silence, l'autre”, in: R. Krebs (Ed.) Friedrich Schiller: La modernité d'un classique. Revue germanique internationale, 22, pp. 87–102. 32. Schiller's dramatic works, from Die Räuber to Wilhelm Tell, unmask the workings of tyranny. See also Friedrich Schiller, F. [1787] (1962) “Briefe über Don Carlos”, in: Sämtliche Werke, Bd. II (Munich: Carl Hanser), pp. 228–29, 244–67. Confirming Beiser's reading, Schiller here explicitly defines republican virtue as self‐sacrifice (p. 229). 33. On the “market revolution” and its impact especially on later German republicanism, see Nolte, P. (2002) “Republicanism, Liberalism, and Market Society: Party Formation and Party Ideology in Germany and the United States, c. 1825–1850”, in: J. Heideking & J.A. Henretta (Eds.) Republicanism and Liberalism in America and the German States, 1750–1850 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press). 34. e.g. Schiller, Aesthetic Education, Letter VI. 8. 35. Schiller, Aesthetic Education, Letter VI.7. 36. Consistent with Schiller's own diagnosis, this is the view set out by Hegel in his Elements of the Philosophy of Right [1821] (1991) Wood, A. (Ed.), trans. Nisbet, H.B. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press) § 260. 37. Beiser, Schiller, p. 127. 38. The term “heautonomy” occurs in Kant, I. [1790] (1987) Critique of Judgement, trans. Pluhar, W.S. (Indianapolis: Hackett) p. 25, as a subjective principle of judgement. As Paul Cartledge reminded me, the word is formed from the Greek reflexive pronoun. 39. Beiser, Schiller, pp. 140–41, n. 40, citing Meinecke, F. (1937) Schiller und der Individualitätsgedanke (Leipzig: Meiner). 40. On the concept of determinability, and Schiller's relation to Fichte, who utilises this concept extensively, see Pott, H.‐G. (1980) Die schöne Freiheit (Munich: Fink). 41. e.g. Schiller, Aesthetic Education, Letters XIV. 1, and XVI. 1. The aesthetic condition as an ideal for the individual is described in Letter IX. 42. The Scots are far from unanimous on this point, either. See Hont, Jealousy of Trade; and Waszek, N. (2003) L'Ecosse des Lumières (Paris: Presses universitaires de France). 43. Hunter, I. (2001) Rival Enlightenments (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press). While Hunter contributes to the study of civil traditions of jurisprudence, and of neo‐Epicurean political thought (based in self‐restraint, not Platonic self‐realisation), he conflates the contrasting philosophical traditions into a single approach, thus failing to distinguish adequately the positions of Wolff and of the Kantian school as inheritors of Leibniz. What characterises this entire philosophical approach for Hunter is the metaphysics of homo duplex, the duality of our empirical and noumenal nature, and the attempted resacralisation of politics by the philosophical school, to express a transcendental community of spirits. But Hunter misses politically significant breaks in this tradition, including Kant's innovations in the idea of right, and his critique of Leibnizian‐Wolffian perfection as a form of rational heteronomy. While there are indeed deep affinities between Leibniz and Kant, Hunter's schematic distinction of philosophical and juridical schools also fails to identify where, conceptually, these important continuities lie. They can be found not in a putative religious mission to recapture the political realm from secularism, but in Leibniz's idea of spontaneity, which, as Kant reworks it, gives rise to subsequent theoretical development. 44. Bodéus, R. (Ed.) (1993) Leibniz‐Thomasius: Correspondance (1663–1672) (Paris: Vrin), pp. 55–117. This early discovery remains constant through Leibniz's later work. The (compatibilist) link between freedom and inner necessity is characteristic of Leibniz, and supports subsequent positions like Herder's expressivism. 45. This definition is offered, in my translation, by Rohls, M. (2004) Kantisches Naturrecht und historisches Zivilrecht. Wissenschaft und bürgerliche Freiheit bei Gottlieb Hufeland (1760–1817) (Baden‐Baden: Nomos), p. 146 n. 146, who differentiates it from the current idea of spontaneous as meaning unreflective. 46. Leibniz, G.W. [1714] (1997) Monadologie, Horn, J.C. (Ed.) (Würzburg: Königshausen und Neumann). On the purpose of the state as promoting perfection, see Leibniz, “Meditation on the Common Concept of Justice,” pp. 45–64; “On Natural Law,” pp. 77–80; “Felicity,” pp. 82–84; “Memoir for Enlightened Persons,” pp. 103–110, in: Leibniz, G.W. (1988) Political Writings, second edition, Riley, P. (Ed.) (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press). 47. Kant, I. [1788] (1956) Critique of Practical Reason, trans. Beck, L.W. (New York: Macmillan), pp. 33–42; [1785] (1964) Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, trans. H.J. Paton (New York: Harper and Row), pp. 10–11. 48. The position taken here does not imply that for Leibniz, no perfection is possible for the individual or monad except as imported from outside, but rather that despite the entelechy of monads toward their own perfection, the order of greatest perfection within which they exist derives from a source other than their own activities (the divine will). Secondly, as we will see, the idea of spontaneity has a different meaning in Kant than in Leibniz, owing to Kantian incompatibilism and his recognition of reciprocal causation among substances. For a more robust Leibniz, see Basso, L. (2005) Individo e comunità nella filosofia politica di G.W. Leibniz (Soveria Manelli: Rubbettino); Horn, J. C. “Die nachkantische Wende als Vollendung der Transzendentalphilosophie”, in: M. Buhr (Ed.) (1994) Das geistige Erbe Europas, pp. 250–71 (Naples: Vivarium). 49. On perfection, Wolff, Ch. [1754] (1969) Institutiones juris naturae et gentium. Gesammelte Werke, Bd. 26, Thomann, M. (Ed.) (Hildesheim: Olms), § 43, § 106–108; Wolff, C. [1758] (1988) Principes du droit de la nature et des gens, extrait du grand ouvrage latin, par M. Formey, tome premier (Caen: Université de Caen), p. 16, 41. The broader question of Wolff's relation to Leibniz in metaphysics is not at issue here; only his use of a Leibnizian notion of perfection. 50. Wolff, Institutiones, § 186–189; Principes, pp. 88–89. 51. Wolff, Institutiones, § 112–116; Principes, pp. 32, 36–39. See also Wolff, C. (1721) Vernünftige Gedancken von dem gesellschaftlichen Leben der Menschen und insonderheit dem gemeinen Wesen (Halle: Renger), § 224. 52. Wolff, Institutiones, § 972. 53. On the patriarchal character of political power, Wolff, Vernünftige Gedancken, § 264. 54. Wolff, Vernünftige Gedancken, § 187; on the differences between slaves and free Knechte, § 190. 55. But Klippel, D. (1976) Politische Freiheit und Freiheitsrechte im deutschen Naturrecht des 18. Jahrhunderts (Paderborn: Schöningh), p. 37, 41, 198, treats servants as effectively enserfed. The status of serfdom and other adventitious relations cannot be addressed here. Further reflections are offered in Haakonssen, K. (2006) “German Natural Law”, in: M. Goldie & R. Wokler (Eds.) The Cambridge History of Eighteenth‐Century Political Thought, pp. 274–76 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press). 56. Wolff, Vernünftige Gedancken, § 168, § 170, § 179, § 182; on the limits of masters' authority, § 173. 57. Tribe, K. (1995) Strategies of Economic Order: German Economic Discourse, 1750–1950 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press); and his (1988) Governing Economy: The Reformation of German Economic Discourse, 1750–1840 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press). Tribe does not discuss Wolff, however. 58. Backhaus, J. (Ed.) (1998) Christian Wolff and Law and Economics (Hildesheim: Olms). 59. Backhaus, J. (n.d.) “Subsidiarity as a Constitutional Principle in Environmental Policy”, at http://arno.unimaas.nl/show.cgi?fid = 599. 60. This dimension of the Westphalian settlement is overlooked in Hunter, Rival Enlightenments, because of his restrictive focus on religious pacification. The emphasis on happiness and perfection implies the development of capacities: the natural law rights to perfect the body, the spirit, and the conditions of labour can be understood in this context, and not merely as the outcroppings of religious enthusiasm. 61. Tribe, Governing Economy, pp. 28–29, 63–65, 161–75. 62. Dreitzel, H. (1992) Absolutismus und ständische Verfassung in Deutschland (Mainz: Ph. von Zabern), p. 113. 63. Tribe, Governing Economy, p. 63. 64. Tribe, Governing Economy, pp. 24–25. 65. In contrast to the position represented here, Klippel, D. “Der liberale Interventionsstaat. Staatszweck und Staatstätigkeit in der deutschen politischen Theorie des 18. und der ersten Hälfte des 19. Jahrhunderts”, in: H. Lück (Ed.) (1998) Recht und Rechtswissenschaft im mitteldeutschen Raum. Symposion für Rolf Lieberwirth anläßlich seines 75. Geburtstags (Köln: Böhlau) p. 81, views Wolffian natural law as authorising a complete renunciation of right. 66. Wolff, Vernünftige Gedanken, § 383– § 385. 67. On Wolff's consequentialism, see Guyer, P. (forthcoming) “Perfection, Autonomy, and Heautonomy: The Path of Reason from Wolff to Kant”, in: J. Stolzenberg (Ed.), Wolff und die europäische Aufklärung: Akten des 1. Internationalen Wolff‐Kongresses (Hildesheim: Olms). I am grateful to Paul Guyer for providing me with a copy of this paper. See also Schneewind, J.B. (1998) The Invention of Autonomy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), pp. 432–44. 68. Moggach, D. “The Construction of Juridical Space: Kant's Analogy of Relation in The Metaphysics of Morals”, in: M. Gedney (Ed.) (2000) Proceedings of the Twentieth World Congress of Philosophy, Vol. 7, Modern Philosophy (Bowling Green, OH: Philosophy Documentation Center), pp. 201‐09. 69. Tribe, Governing Economy, pp. 168–69. 70. Kant, I. [1788] (1956) Critique of Practical Reason, trans. Beck, L. W. (New York: Macmillan), §8. 71. Pippin, R. (1997) “On the Moral Foundations of Kant's Rechtslehre”, in: Idealism as Modernism: Hegelian Variations (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), p. 59 note 6. 72. Hufeland, G. (1785) Versuch über den Grundsatz des Naturrechts (Leipzig: Göschen); and (1790) Lehrsätze des Naturrechts (Jena), (second edition 1795: Frankfurt and Leipzig). 73. Rohls, M. (2004) Kantisches Naturrecht, p. 41, n. 121; p. 49; Cesa, C. (2000) “Introduzione. Diritto Naturale e filosofia classica tedesca“, in: L. Fonnesu & B. Henry (Eds.) Diritto Naturale e Filosofia classica tedesca (Pisa: Pacini), esp. pp. 16–28. 74. Kant, I. [1797] (1991) Metaphysics of Morals, trans. Gregor, M. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press). 75. Humboldt, W. von [1792] (1903) Ideen zu einem Versuch die Grenzen der Wirksamkeit des Staates zu bestimmen, Gesammelte Schriften (Berlin: Reimer), Bd. I. 76. Dreitzel, Absolutismus, p. 113. 77. Leroux, R. (1932) Guillaume de Humboldt. La formation de sa pensée jusqu’en 1794 (Paris: Belles Lettres), pp. 234–40. 78. Fichte, J.G. [1800] (1988) Der geschloßne Handelsstaat, Gesamtausgabe, Bd. I/7 (Stuttgart: Fromann), pp. 37–141. 79. Fichte, J.G. [1792–93] (1967) Schriften zur Revolution, Bernard Willms (Ed.) (Frankfurt/M.: Ullstein). 80. Dalberg, C. Th. (1791) Grundsätze der Ästhetik, deren Anwendung und künftige Entwickelung (Erfurt: Keyser). 81. Leroux, R. (1932) La théorie du despotisme éclairé chez Karl Theodor Dalberg (Paris: Belles Lettres). On Dalberg and his writings, see also Beaulieu‐Marconnay, K. von (1879) Karl von Dalberg und seine Zeit. Zur Biographie und Charakteristik des Fürsten Primas (Weimar: Böhlau), vol. 1, pp. 168–200; and Boyle, N. (2000) Goethe: The Poet and the Age (Oxford: Clarendon Press), vol. 2, pp. 32–33. 82. Dalberg, C. Th. [1793] “Von den wahren Grenzen der Wirksamkeit des Staats in Beziehung auf seine Mitglieder”, in: Leroux, Dalberg, p. 46, 48. 83. Dalberg, Grenzen, p. 46. 84. Dalberg, Grenzen, p. 47. 85. Schiller, F. [1793] “Brief an Gottfried Körner” at http://www.wissen‐im‐netz.info/literatur/schiller/briefe/vSchiller/1793/179302231.htm [my translation] 86. Fichte, J.G. [1796–97] (1966 and 1970) Grundlage des Naturrechts, Gesamtausgabe, Bd. I/3 and I/4 (Stuttgart: Fromann). 87. See Kern, M. (1986) “Zur Geschichtsphilosophie Friedrich Schillers”, in: M. Buhr & W. Förster (Eds.), Aufklärung‐Geschichte‐Revolution. Studien zur Philosophie der Aufklärung, Bd. 2 (Berlin: Akademie Verlag), esp. pp. 271–298. 88. This distinction emerges in the discussion of the aesthetic state. Schiller, Aesthetic Education, Letter XVI. 89. Beiser, Schiller, p. 134. 90. Schiller, F. Sämtliche Werke, Bd. V: “Über Anmut und Würde”, (1793) pp. 433–88; “Vom Erhabenen” (1793), pp. 489–512; and “Über das Erhabene” (1801), pp. 792–808. 91. Moggach, D. (2003) The Philosophy and Politics of Bruno Bauer (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), p. 85, 149. 92. Schiller, Aesthetic Education, Letter XXIII. 8 [Wilkinson/Willoughby translation]. 93. Schiller, Aesthetic Education, Letter IV. 2. 94. Stedman Jones, G. (2004) An End to Poverty? A Historical Debate (London: Profile), pp. 16–63.