Authors and Books.
Arthor Schopenhauer, of Berlin, has recently published Parerga und Paralipomena, or little Philosophical Writings, in which, according to a Leipsic reviewer, "the author asserts that his philosophy is not merely the only advance in that department since the days of Kant, but that his system bears the same relation to all earlier philosophy, that the New Testament bears to the Old. In addition to this, he attempts to solve the problem, how can it be possible that he has ever been as unknown to the literary and scientific world as the Man in the Moon, while the absurdest and most ridiculous theories, such, for example, as those of Fichte, Schelling, and Hegel, have been so generally accepted. But as he, in spite of the most earnest endeavors, can find no internal ground for this unaccountable blindness of the public, he seeks it in another direction. These impudent sophists, it seems, have had no other ground than simply that of making money! With the hocus-pocus of common charlatans they have carried their wares to market, and as candidates and teachers of philosophy generally spring up from the same effort, there resulted an alliance of charlatans whose object it was on the one side to raise themselves to heaven, and on the other to suppress all true thinking, so that the public might be prevented, by a just consideration of their own worthlessness." "Such accusations as those," continues our reviewer, "awaken an unfavorable impression, which is not in the least diminished by continued boasting and grandiloquence, and a clumsy roughness of style, which not unfrequently falls into downright burlesque. The work itself is an odd mixture of actual recollections and arbitrary fancies, of explanations and superstitions, which force us to regret that many really admirable thoughts which occasionally surprise the reader in an assembly of trivialities and paradoxes, must inevitably be lost. Those philosophers certainly provoke sharp criticism when we separate their truly scientific contents from their visions and dispositions, and it would perhaps be more in accordance with the spirit of the age to return more earnestly to Kant than most of the more recent philosophers are accustomed to do. Still nothing is in the least gained for the negative aim of criticism, when the critic makes it such an easy matter to cast away, without further consideration, all of the latest advances in philosophy, because he believes that he has detected errors in their pretended fundamental thoughts, without first ascertaining whether these fundamental thoughts are really the leading principle of the system, and when he on his own side falls into suppositions which have certainly received long since a satisfactory refutation from the later philosophy; as, for example, in the Kantean opposition of things in themselves, and their appearances. The positive, with which Herr Schopenhauer believes that he has enriched science, the derivation of united spiritual functions from the will, and the correction of the course of the world, by the idea that the true aim of life is to scorn it, might with greater propriety be classed in the sphere of 'visions and dispositions,' which he so fiercely attacks, than in that of science. The discussions which fill these two volumes, and are spread out over every imaginable subject, even to ghosts, the possibility of whose existence is admitted, have naturally a very varied character, and can only, by a continued polemic, and a fragmentary system of examination harmonizing therewith, be brought into unity."
The second part of Wachsmuth's Allgemeine Culturgeschichte (History of Civilization, for so we venture to translate the word Cultur), which indicates more strictly all referring to those social influences which refine, form, and educate society, has recently appeared. The volume referred to contains The Middle Ages, and is highly spoken of for the skilful manner in which the author has treated the influence exerted by the Byzantine and Mohammedan races. Another historical work of importance is the fourth and concluding volume containing the tenth and twelfth books of Hammer Purgstall's Life of Cardinal Khlesl, compiled from contemporary documents. In it we have the last diplomatic acts of the Cardinal, of the intrigues of the Grand Dukes Ferdinand and Maximilian relative to him, and of his consequent arrest and abduction. The eleventh book details his imprisonment in Innspruck and in the Abbey St. Georgenberg, the negotiations with the Pope relative to him, and his delivery to the latter on the 24th October, 1622. In the twelfth we have the details of his residence in Rome, of the part he took in instituting the Propaganda, his return home after an absence of ten years, his subsequent clerical exertions, and his testament. The conclusion gives a parallel drawn between Khlesl, Wolsey, and Ximenes—a description of his personal appearance and an explanation of the exertions of power brought to bear against him, with the final judgment that those truly to blame were the grand dukes and not Khlesl, and that the Cardinal, if not entirely devoid of blame, was still a great character, and one of the most illustrious statesmen of Austria. Another new historical work is the Laben des Herzogs von Sachsen-Gotha und Altenburg, Freiderich II. Ein Bei trazzur Geschichte Gotha's beim Wechsel d. 17, und 18, Jahrh. Herausgegeben nach dessen Tode von Dr. Ad. Moritz Schulze, Director d. Burgerschule zu Gotha (or Life of the Duke of Saxe Gotha and Altenburg, Frederic the II.) A contribution to the history of Gotha during the changes of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Published after the death of the author by Dr. Ad. Moritz Schulze, director of the Citizen School of Gotha, this work appears to be well and warmly, though impartially written.
In theology, we observe the publication, by Albert Wessel von Hengel, of Commentarius Perpetuus in Prioris Pauli ad Corinthios Epistolæ Caput Quintum Decimum cum Epistola ad Winerum, Theol. Lips. Haag. (Bœdeker in Rotterdam). In this book we perceive that the important fifteenth chapter of the Letter to the Corinthians is philologically treated with true Dutch thoroughness and remarkable erudition, but that the results to which he comes are often untenable, and that a satisfactory decision as to the proposed dogmatic questions, such as advanced theological science requires, is not given. The peculiar views of the author as to the aim or object of the chapter have also had an effect on the explanation of many passages. It is asserted, for instance, a la Bush, that Paul does not speak of the resurrection of the body, but that he means by this resurrection the return of all men into life, or immortality; and regarding this, has in view only those who admit Christ, and their future happiness; and that even verse forty-nine contains only a comparison of the moral condition of Christians in this and a better life. Yet notwithstanding this he finds himself compelled to admit, by the fifty-second verse, that the same bodies which we have here on earth, again return to life. By the παρουσια of Christ (v. 23) he understands earthly life, and by οι του Χριστου εν τη παρουσια αυτου, those Christians who already believed on him while yet on earth, and by the τειος, not the end of the world with its universal resurrection and judgment, but the resurrection of the later Christians. The oft-repeated σπειρεται (v. 43) he translates by it is begotten or generated, and understands it as referring to an entry into earthly life, and that the χοικοσ of the forty-seventh verse refers to the earthly disposition or inclination, and the εξ ουρνου and επουρανιοσ to that of the heavenly.
Among recent books of travel we have A Journey to Persia and the country of the Koords, and the preceding sketch, Souvenirs of the Danube and Bosphorus, by Moritz Wagner. The Journey to Persia contains much curious information and observation of a country but little known to the outer world, while in the Souvenirs we have bitter complaints and merciless revelations relative to the Metternich policy in the East, and the conduct and character of the Austrian diplomatic representative by the Porte. Many curious facts are also given relative to the present condition of Turkey, the personal appearance of the Sultan and divers Constantinopolitan dignitaries and foreign ambassadors. The commendatory characteristic of this work appears to consist in the fact, that the author, unlike the great majority of those who are elevated to constant familiarity with men of high standing and influence, is remarkably independent and unselfish in his views, and invariably speaks bold plain truth, even of individuals in whose power it actually lies to do him very decided injury. No person desirous of being au courant as to the great political world of the present day, should be ignorant of this work.