The most important of the many works written during his Jena professorate are the Handbuch der praktischen Philosophie (1817-1832), the Handbuch der psychischen Anthropologie (1820-1821, 2nd ed. 1837-1839), Die mathematische Naturphilosophie (1822), System der Metaphysik (1824), Die Geschichte der Philosophie (1837-1840). Fries’s point of view in philosophy may be described as a modified Kantianism, an attempt to reconcile the criticism of Kant and Jacobi’s philosophy of belief. With Kant he regarded Kritik, or the critical investigation of the faculty of knowledge, as the essential preliminary to philosophy. But he differed from Kant both as regards the foundation for this criticism and as regards the metaphysical results yielded by it. Kant’s analysis of knowledge had disclosed the a priori element as the necessary complement of the isolated a posteriori facts of experience. But it did not seem to Fries that Kant had with sufficient accuracy examined the mode in which we arrive at knowledge of this a priori element. According to him we only know these a priori principles through inner or psychical experience; they are not then to be regarded as transcendental factors of all experience, but as the necessary, constant elements discovered by us in our inner experience. Accordingly Fries, like the Scotch school, places psychology or analysis of consciousness at the foundation of philosophy, and called his criticism of knowledge an anthropological critique. A second point in which Fries differed from Kant is the view taken as to the relation between immediate and mediate cognitions. According to Fries, the understanding is purely the faculty of proof; it is in itself void; immediate certitude is the only source of knowledge. Reason contains principles which we cannot demonstrate, but which can be deduced, and are the proper objects of belief. In this view of reason Fries approximates to Jacobi rather than to Kant. His most original idea is the graduation of knowledge into knowing, belief and presentiment. We know phenomena, how the existence of things appears to us in nature; we believe in the true nature, the eternal essence of things (the good, the true, the beautiful); by means of presentiment (Ahnung) the intermediary between knowledge and belief, we recognize the supra-sensible in the sensible, the being in the phenomenon.
See E. L. Henke, J. F. Fries (1867); C. Grapengiesser, J. F. Fries, ein Gedenkblatt and Kant’s “Kritik der Vernunft” und deren Fortbildung durch J. F. Fries (1882); H. Strasosky, J. F. Fries als Kritiker der Kantischen Erkenntnistheorie (1891); articles in Ersch and Gruber’s Allgemeine Encyklopädie and Allgemeine deutsche Biographie; J. E. Erdmann, Hist. of Philos. (Eng. trans., London, 1890), vol. ii. § 305.
FRIES, JOHN (c. 1764-1825), American insurgent leader, was born in Pennsylvania of “Dutch” (German) descent about 1764. As an itinerant auctioneer he became well acquainted with the Germans in the S.E. part of Pennsylvania. In July 1798, during the troubles between the United States and France, Congress levied a direct tax (on dwelling-houses, lands and slaves) of $2,000,000, of which Pennsylvania was called upon to contribute $237,000. There were very few slaves in the state, and the tax was accordingly assessed upon dwelling-houses and land, the value of the houses being determined by the number and size of the windows. The inquisitorial nature of the proceedings aroused strong opposition among the Germans, and many of them refused to pay. Fries, assuming leadership, organized an armed band of about sixty men, who marched about the country intimidating the assessors and encouraging the people to resist. At last the governor called out the militia (March 1799) and the leaders were arrested. Fries and two others were twice tried for treason (the second time before Samuel Chase) and were sentenced to be hanged, but they were pardoned by President Adams in April 1800, and a general amnesty was issued on 21st May. The affair is variously known as the “Fries Rebellion,” the “Hot-Water Rebellion”—because hot water was used to drive assessors from houses—, and the “Home Tax Rebellion.” Fries died in Philadelphia in 1825.
See T. Carpenter, Two Trials of John Fries ... Taken in Shorthand (Philadelphia, 1800); the second volume of McMaster’s History of the United States (New York, 1883); and W. W. H. Davis, The Fries Rebellion (Doylestown, Pa., 1899).
FRIESLAND, or Vriesland, a province of Holland, bounded S.W., W. and N. by the Zuider Zee and the North Sea, E. by Groningen and Drente, and S.E. by Overysel. It also includes the islands of Ameland and Schiermonnikoog (see [Frisian Islands]). Area, 1281 sq. m.; pop. (1900) 340,262. The soil of Friesland falls naturally into three divisions consisting of sea-clay in the north and north-west, of low-fen between the south-west and north-east, and of a comparatively small area of high-fen in the south-east. The clay and low-fen furnish a luxuriant meadow-land for the principal industries of the province—cattle-rearing and cheese- and butter-making. Horse-breeding has also been practised for centuries, and the breed of black Frisian horse is well known. On the clay lands agriculture is also extensively practised. In the high-fen district peat-digging is the chief occupation. The effect of this industry, however, is to lay bare a subsoil of diluvial sand which offers little inducement for subsequent cultivation. Despite the general productiveness of the soil, however, the social condition of Friesland has remained in a backward state and poverty is rife in many districts. The ownership of property being largely in the hands of absentee landlords, the peasantry have little interest in the land, the profits from which go to enrich other provinces. Moreover, the nature of the fertility of the meadow-lands is such as to require little manual labour, and other industrial means of subsistence have hardly yet come into existence. This state of affairs has given rise to a social-democratic outcry on account of which Friesland is sometimes regarded as the “Ireland of Holland.” The water system of the province comprises a few small rivers (now largely canalized) in the high lands in the east, and the vast network of canals, waterways and lakes of the whole north and west. The principal lakes are Tjeuke Meer, Sloter Meer, De Fluessen and Sneeker Meer. The tides being lowest on the north coast of the province, the scheme of the Waterstaat, the government department (dating from 1879), provides for the largest removal of superfluous surface water into the Lauwerszee. But owing to the long distance which the water must travel from certain parts of the province, and the continual recession of the Lauwerszee, the drainage problem is a peculiarly difficult one, and floods are sometimes inevitable.
The population of the province is evenly distributed in small villages. The principal market centres are Leeuwarden, the chief towns, Sneek, Bolsward, Franeker (qq.v.), Dokkum (4053) and Heerenveen (5011). With the exception of Franeker and Heerenveen all these towns originally arose on the inlet of the Middle Sea. The seaport towns are more or less decayed; they include Stavoren (820), Hindeloopen (1030), Workum (3428), Harlingen (q.v.) and Makkum (2456).
For history see [Frisians].