remains indubitable. To heighten this value, and to bring Bacon more immediately before the reader than he is in the original German, I have given extracts in the margin, where Dr. Fischer has only given references; and wherever it has been possible, I have introduced the Baconian words into the text.

In performing the work of translation, I have endeavoured, as much as possible, to make my version readable. Dr. Fischer does not, it is true, indulge in those technicalities which have been introduced into the German language by the successors of Kant; indeed, with the exception of a few Kantisms, generally explained by the context, his book is free from technicalities altogether. Nevertheless, the German language, independently of the influence of philosophical schools, contains expressions which cannot be verbally rendered without producing a result totally unintelligible to any one but a German scholar. I have, therefore, endeavoured to render sentence for sentence rather than word for word, certain that I should thus render a greater service to the

TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE.

vii

generality of readers than by encumbering the text with a number of strange compounds, utterly at variance with the genius of the English language. Some readers, perhaps, will think I might have gone farther in this respect, and adopted more familiar expressions than (for instance) “realistic" and "naturalistic." To these I reply, that the abolition of all apparently pedantic expressions would produce ambiguity. To ordinary ears, "real philosophy" would sound as the antithesis to sham philosophy, rather than to any form of idealism.

Where Dr. Fischer's marginal references have obviously been made for a German public only, I have taken the liberty to omit them, and in some cases, where I thought further elucidation necessary, I have added a note, signed with my own initials. With the same view, I have inserted two appendices.

London: September, 1857.

J. O.

AUTHOR'S PREFACE.

THE theatre of modern philosophy is a field of battle, wherein two opposite and hostile tendencies-Realism and Idealism-contend with each other in asserting claims to truth. These tendencies are not merely systems, but kinds of philosophy that in no age but a modern one could become so conscious of their mutual difference, or so definitely and clearly express it. If we were to compare scientific with dramatic opposition, the realists and idealists would be the two adverse choruses in the drama of modern philosophy. The opposite parties will not be silent until their union is effected, until the modes of thought, now strained against each other, become so interpenetrated, that both are saturated alike. For each lives only in the weaknesses and defects of its adversary. The boundaries between them will be passed when they are clearly understood; that is to say, when each party recognises the strength of its adversary, and appropriates it to

itself. Many attempts to produce this result have been made during the first period of our philosophy. If we accurately consider the matter, we shall find that realism and idealism, from the time of their modern origin, have described not parallel but convergent paths, which, at the same time, have met at one common point. This point at which the idealistic and realistic tendencies crossed, as at a common vertex, was the Kantian philosophy, which has taken account of them both and united them in their elements. In this, as indeed in every respect, it has set up a standard, which must serve as a polar star to all subsequent philosophy. If, at the present day, we are asked, how we shall follow the right track in philosophy, we must answer, by a most accurate study of Kant. Since his time there has not been a philosopher of importance, who has not desired to be at once a realist and an idealist. If the name had been sufficient, the great and all-pervading problem that occupies the mind of modern philosophy would have already been solved more than once. All these selfcalled ideal-realistic, or real-idealistic, attempts do not, indeed, prove that they have solved the problem, but they prove that it is recognised and admitted. It is sufficient for us to establish the fact that the problem exists, and, without opposition worthy of note, is everywhere regarded as all