Abstract
This chapter focuses on the concept of Life in Friedrich Schlegel’s first writings, which combine aesthetics, politics, and the theory of knowledge. The author pursues Schlegel’s idea that the creativity of life that led to the emergence of man and his rational faculties results in further processes and phenomena that do not necessarily respect the norms of rationality. On this approach, the sphere of the unknowable is not simply treated as negative, though. On the contrary, in Schlegel’s philosophy, what escapes the kingdom of reason is intrinsically productive. Furthermore, reason needs to cope with the continuous formation of meaning in art works and to sustain its analysis and critique of political institutions. However, it must renounce the imposition of a universal norm and a sovereign criterion.
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Notes
- 1.
Friedrich Schlegel, Philosophie des Lebens, Kritische Friedrich-Schlegel-Ausgabe, vol. 10. All references to Schlegel’s works are to Kritische Friedrich-Schlegel-Ausgabe and are designated with KFSA, followed by volume number, page number, and (if applicable) fragment number.
- 2.
For an overview of the debate, see R.J. Richards, The Romantic Conception of Life.
- 3.
Considering the iteration of Schlegel’s quotes in his personal notes (Philosophische Lehrjahre, KFSA 18–19), more probable is Schlegel’s direct knowledge of the works of John Brown, a Scottish doctor who lived during the second half of the eighteenth century.
- 4.
Schlegel traces the first research on “life” to physics (KFSA 2:323).
- 5.
It is not possible here to summarize the argument in its entirety. See the fifth book of Entwicklung der Philosophie in zwölf Büchern. Theorie der Natur (KFSA 12:409–80).
- 6.
For the history of this debate, I refer to the works of François Duchesneau (Les modèles du vivant de Descartes à Leibniz and La Physiologie des Lumières. Empirisme, modèles et théories) and Thomas S. Hall, The Ideas of Life and Matter.
- 7.
Since the second half of the nineteenth century, this expression refers to theories according to which it is not possible to fully explain life only through physical and chemical principles, but it is necessary to postulate a vital force. For the origin of this concept, see “Vitalismus,” in Georg Toepfer, Historisches Wörterbuch der Biologie, vol. 3, esp. 695.
- 8.
This conception is also repeated later. In those years, there was no conceptual difference between an organism and organization (see “Organ, Organismus, Organisation politischer Körper,” in Geschichtliche Grundbegriffe, vol. 4, ed. O. Brunner, W. Conze, and R. Koselleck, 561–622). Consider this example: “Organisation ist nichts anders, als an den Körper gebundenes Leben in der mannigfaltigsten Entwicklung” (KFSA 12:462).
- 9.
KFSA 12:142 and 118. “Es ist klar, obwohl wir freilich noch nicht an die Ableitung und Entstehung der Einzelheiten gekommen sind, daß zwar auch in ihnen kein Sein ist, ihr Leben und Werden aber doch ein anderes sein muß als das Leben und Werden des Ganzen” (KFSA 12:416).
- 10.
See what Schlegel says about the physical (neither mystical or moral) process that involves life when one of its products dissolves: KFSA 13:17.
- 11.
Schlegel is referring to Volta, according to whom air is composed of nitrogen and oxygen. See Behler, Einleitung, KFSA 18:XXXI.
- 12.
On this point, see David R. Oldroyd, Thinking about the Earth. A History of Ideas in Geology.
- 13.
Take as an example the following passage from Faust : “Wo fass’ ich dich, unendliche Natur?/Euch Brüste, wo? Ihr Quellen alles Lebens,/An denen Himmel und Erde hängt,/Dahin die welke Brust sich drängt” (J.W. Goethe, “Faust. Der Tragödie erster Teil,” in Goethes Werke: Hamburger Ausgabe, vol. 3, 455–8). See also B. Witte, T. Buck, H.-D. Dahnke, R. Otto, and P. Schmidt, Goethe-Handbuch, 647–8.
- 14.
KFSA 18:136, 166, and 176. We are not sure of the source of this expression used by Schlegel. It could be the Iphigenie auf Tauris (1787), written by Goethe: “Bald ist der Krampf des Lebens” (“Iphigenie auf Tauris,” in Goethes Werke: Hamburger Ausgabe, vol. V, 41, l. 1260).
- 15.
See also KFSA 18:419, no. 1181.
- 16.
Friedrich Nietzsche, “Die Geburt der Tragödie,” in Werke: Kritische Gesamtausgabe, III, I, 3–154.
- 17.
Remarkable is the fact that Schlegel, on other pages, compares the parabasis to irony. See KFSA 18:85, no. 668.
- 18.
Friedrich Nietzsche, “Götzen-Dämmerung,” in Werke: Kritische Ausgabe, VI, III, 51.
- 19.
In the Dialogue on Poesy, Schlegel describes even Roman poetry as an (even if barren) flower (KFSA 2:294).
- 20.
KFSA 2:416, v. 27. This little poem appeared for the first time in 1809 under the title Abschluß des Lessing-Aufsatzes in the Sämtliche Werke; see H. Eichner, “Einleitung,” in KFSA, vol. 1. It was written by Schlegel himself.
- 21.
“Eine unversiegbare Quelle allbildsamer Dichtung war es [Homeros Dichtung und die alte Schule der Homeriden], ein mächtiger Strom der Darstellung, wo eine Woge des Lebens auf die andre rauscht, ein ruhiges Meer, wo sich die Fülle der Erde und der Glanz des Himmels freundlich spiegeln” (KFSA 2:290–1).
- 22.
“Die Kunst und das Leben griffen überall in einander ein” (KFSA 1:556).
- 23.
“Classisch ist alles was cyclisch studirt werden muß” (KFSA 16:139, no. 640; cf. KFSA 2:241–2, no. 404; 16:141, no. 671; 2:149, no. 20; 2:150; 16:67, no. 73). Cf. M. Buschmeier, “Friedrich Schlegels Klassizismus,” in Antike-Philologie-Romantik. Friedrich Schlegels altertumswissenschaftliche Manuskripte, 227–50.
- 24.
“Weil jedes vortreffliche Werk, von welcher Art es auch sei, mehr weiß als es sagt, und mehr will als es weiß” (KFSA 2:140).
- 25.
Michael Forster has demonstrated the presence in Schlegel’s hermeneutics of a reflection about unconscious meanings to which the interpreter of a work of art must turn. See M.N. Forster, German Philosophy of Language: From Schlegel to Hegel and Beyond, esp. 16–17 and 57–9. See also J. Zovko, Verstehen und Nichtverstehen bei Friedrich Schlegel, 144, 151, and 155.
- 26.
“Jedes Werk des Genies sei zwar dem Auge klar, dem Verstande aber ewig geheim” (KFSA 2:322).
- 27.
“Daher mußte jene große politische Revolution … eine ähnliche, eben so wichtige Revolution in der Kunst zur Begleiterin haben” (KFSA 1:555). Schlegel does not indicate which one of the two “revolutions” should be the cause or the effect of the other.
- 28.
On the importance of this concept during these years, see R. Vierhaus, “Bildung,” in Geschichtliche Grundbegriffe, ed. O. Brunner, W. Conze, and R. Koselleck (Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta, 1972), vol. 1, 508ff., and ibid., E. Lichtenstein, “Bildung,” 7–29.
- 29.
On the relation between energy and life in Schlegel’s thought, see KFSA 12:35.
- 30.
It should be noted that Schlegel does not limit politics to the simple art of government or to the activity of the state. On the contrary, in connection with the ancients, politics also concerns customs, myth, art, and religion. I refer here to the footnote added by Schlegel in the second edition of the text Über das Studium der Griechischen Poesie in KFSA 1:352.
- 31.
“Aus der Liebe Leben … entstehe” (KFSA 12:142). See also KFSA 12:218.
- 32.
For the connection of this passage to the German Historical School of Jurisprudence, see A. Stanguennec, La philosophie romantique allemande, esp. 186.
- 33.
“Aus dem Sittengesetz allein würde kein sittliches Leben hervorgehen. Der Stoff des sittlichen Lebens kann nur von dem sittlichen Triebe kommen. Dieser ist ja Liebe, welche auf Verbindung, Vereinigung geht” (KFSA 13:111).
- 34.
The following fragment confirms the closeness between the state and works of art: “Das höchste Kunstwerk d[es] Menschen ist d[er] Staat” (KFSA 12:369, no. 580).
- 35.
For a deeper reflection on this passage and on its consequences, see G. Valpione, “Poesie der Staatlichkeit in Fr. Schlegels Philosophie,” in Staat, Nation und Europa in der politischen Romantik.
- 36.
Schlegel may be included in a tradition that considers the state as an organism and that refuses to think of the state as a machine. On this, see Manfred Frank, Der kommende Gott. On the state as a mechanism, see C. Schmitt, “Der Staat als Mechanismus bei Hobbes und Descartes.”
- 37.
“In dem sittlichen Zustande würde jeder Mensch seine Kraft auf alles anwenden können, worauf er wollte, ohne jedoch der Freiheit anderer zu nahe zu treten. [In the ethical condition every human being would be able to apply his power to anything he liked to without, though, infringing on the freedom of others.]” (KFSA 13:118).
- 38.
It is not possible to discuss here the relationship between the ethical community and the state in Schlegel’s works. It is important to remember that even if they do not always coincide, for Schlegel the state should always have the community as its own end and should get closer and closer to the realization of the ethical community. We should consider Schlegel’s lectures on Transzendentalphilosophie: here, the political law should coincide with the (organic ) law that regulates the Bildung (see KFSA 12:57).
- 39.
“Der Mensch ist in der irdischen Geschichte die letzte Stufe einer langen Reihe von Produktionen, deren Ziel die Organisation des vollkommnen Körpers ist. [In the history of the earth, the human being is the final level of a long series of productions whose goal is the organization of the perfect body.]” (KFSA 13:3).
- 40.
“Eine jede menschliche Gesellschaft, deren Zweck Gemeinschaft der Menschheit ist (die Zweck an sich, oder deren Zweck menschliche Gesellschaft ist) heißt Staat. [Every human society whose end is community of humankind (that is end in itself, or whose end is human society) is a state.]” (KFSA 7:15).
- 41.
“Ein anderer Punkt wo die Theorie des Mechanismus das Bedürfniß des Menschen nicht befriedigen kann, ist, daß sie nicht vor der Prädestination schützt. [Another respect in which the theory of mechanism cannot satisfy humankind’s need is that it does not protect against predestination.]” (KFSA 12:73).
- 42.
Cf. “Nur wenn die Welt als werdend gedacht wird, als in steigender Entwicklung sich ihrer Vollendung nähernd, ist die Freiheit möglich. Wäre die Welt vollendet, so könnte auch in ihr nichts mehr verändert, gewirkt und hervorgebracht werden, und die Freiheit wäre unmöglich. [Only when the world is thought of as becoming, as approaching its completion in a progressive development, is freedom possible. If the world were complete, by the same token nothing further could be changed, effected, and produced in it, and freedom would be impossible.]” (KFSA 13:10).
- 43.
See the first paragraph of this article for Schlegel’s critique of the purely mystical view of the concept of Life.
- 44.
By the way, it would be an error to point out the importance of the concept of Life in Schlegel’s philosophy in order to repurpose an irrational interpretation of his thought already put aside years ago. On this, see, for example, Beiser, The Romantic Imperative, 63; M. Cometa, Iduna, 178.
- 45.
Note that Schlegel seems to not differentiate here between life and nature.
- 46.
The relationship between the concepts of man and life in Schlegel’s works parallels the broader relationship between subject and absolute developed in German Romanticism. Dalia Nassar has shown that in German Romanticism the absolute is not external to the subject because the subject himself participates in its “development.” See Dalia Nassar, The Romantic Absolute.
- 47.
I suggest here recalling the conceptual imprecision that brought Schlegel to overlap nature and life.
- 48.
This consideration brings us back to a peculiarity proper to the concept of Life that I analyzed in the first paragraph of this chapter.
- 49.
“Unsere Mängel … entspringen eben aus der Herrschaft des Verstandes” (KFSA 1:35).
- 50.
Note that Schlegel does not always strictly separate these two faculties.
- 51.
“Der Mechanismus des Bewußtseins ist die Vernunft. Sie ist das Prinzip des Mechanismus im Denken” (KFSA 12:58).
- 52.
On the relation between mechanical and organic laws in Romantic philosophy, see Beiser, The Romantic Imperative, 150f.
- 53.
“Den Naturgeist kann man durch die Vernunft wohl erkennen, aber nicht den lebendigen Gott selbst” (KFSA 13:33).
- 54.
“Vernunft ist an die Erde gebundener, irdisch gewordener Geist” (KFSA 13:30).
- 55.
Cf. “Wer keine Vernunft hat, hört auf Mensch zu sein … Aber Vernunft ist auch eben darum nicht das Höchste … im Menschen” (KFSA 13:30–1).
- 56.
“Und ist sie selbst diese unendliche Welt nicht durch den Verstand aus der Unverständlichkeit oder dem Chaos gebildet?” (KFSA 2:370).
- 57.
In Über die Unverständlichkeit Schlegel states that the reduction of nature, life, and reality to reason is not possible anyway because even if reason could illuminate everything, something incomprehensible would re-emerge all of a sudden (see KFSA 2:371).
- 58.
Schlegel will develop this point in his later works: there, faith does not exclude but rather completes reason and renders it an instrument to achieve knowledge and the “living God.” See KFSA 8:585–96.
- 59.
The refusal in politics of the foundational role of reason goes together with the progressive Schlegel’s refusal to think of a principle as a foundation to a systematic philosophy. See E. Behler, “Friedrich Schlegel’s Theory of an Alternating Principle prior to his Arrival in Jena”; Manfred Frank, “‘Wechselgrundsatz.’ Friedrich Schlegels philosophischer Ausgangspunkt”; also by Manfred Frank, “‘Alle Wahrheit ist relativ, alles Wissen symbolisch.’ Motive der Grundsatz-Skepsis in der frühen Jenaer Romantik (1796)”; and E. Millán-Zaibert, Friedrich Schlegel and the Emergence of Romantic Philosophy.
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Valpione, G. (2020). Schlegel’s Incomprehensibility and Life: From Literature to Politics. In: Forster, M., Steiner, L. (eds) Romanticism, Philosophy, and Literature. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-40874-9_8
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