Thought
The great aim of his speculations was to find a philosophic basis for the personality of God, and for his theory on this subject he proposed the term “concrete theism.” His philosophy attempts to reconcile monism (Hegel) and individualism (Herbart) by means of monadism (Leibniz). He attacks Hegelianism for its pantheism, lowering of human personality, and imperfect recognition of demands of the moral consciousness. God, he says, is to be regarded not as an absolute but as an Infinite Person, whose desire it is that he should realize himself in finite persons. These persons are objects of God's love, and he arranges the world for their good. The direct connecting link between God man is the genius, a higher spiritual individuality existing fan by the side of his lower, earthly individuality. Fichte advocates an ethical theism, and his arguments might be turned to account by the apologist of Christianity. In conception of finite personality he recurs to something like monadism of Leibniz. His insistence on moral experience connected with his insistence on personality.
One of the tests which Fichte discriminates the value of previous systems is adequateness with which they interpret moral experience. The same reason that made him depreciate Hegel made him praise Krause (panentheism) and Schleiermacher, and speak respectfully of English philosophy. It is characteristic of Fichte's most excessive receptiveness that in his latest published work, Der neuere Spiritualismus (1878), he supports his position by arguments of a somewhat occult or theosophical cast, not unlike that adopted by F.W.H. Myers.
The regeneration of Christianity, according to Fichte, would consist in its becoming the vital and organizing power in the state, instead of being occupied solely, as heretofore, with the salvation of individuals.
Read more about this topic: Immanuel Hermann Fichte
Famous quotes containing the word thought:
“For I thought Epicurus and Lucretius
By Nature meant the Whole Goddam Machinery.”
—Robert Frost (1874–1963)
“... there are two types of happiness and I have chosen that of the murderers. For I am happy. There was a time when I thought I had reached the limit of distress. Beyond that limit, there is a sterile and magnificent happiness.”
—Albert Camus (1913–1960)
“Modesty and taste are questions of latitude and education; the more people know,—the more their ideas are expanded by travel, experience, and observation,—the less easily they are shocked. The narrowness and bigotry of women are the result of their circumscribed sphere of thought and action.”
—Elizabeth Cady Stanton (1815–1902)