201f. Goethe to Schelling in Leipzig: Weimar, 5 July 1798 [*]
Honorable Sir,
Especially highly esteemed Herr Professor!
Your honorable sir will be receiving herewith in copy the gracious rescript that Serenissimus has issued on your behalf to the academy in Jena. [1]
In beholding the fulfillment not only of the wishes of your friends in Jena, but of my own as well, little remains for me but to hope that in your new circumstances you will find the same advantages for yourself that we anticipate deriving on our own behalf from your collegial participation among us.
Commending myself to your kind regard and wishing you well,
Your honorable Sir’s
most devoted servant
J. W. v. Goethe
Weimar, 5 July 1798
Notes
[*] Sources: Plitt 1:231; Goethe und die Romantik 204; Fuhrmans 2:148–49. Back.
[1] A rescript, that is, concerning Schelling’s appointment as a non-salaried professor.
A long and tedious process preceded Schelling’s appointment in Jena, one involving not only his father’s attempts to secure him an appointment in Tübingen and Schelling’s lukewarm reception and half-hearted cooperation, but also Friedrich Immanuel Niethammer’s and, especially, Schiller’s attempts to secure him one in Jena, attempts initially leaving Goethe rather cold to the idea until his having met Schelling during the latter’s visit to Jena in late May 1798 and then having read, during June 1798, Schelling’s recently published Von der Weltseele. Eine Hypothese der höhern Physik zur Erklärung des allgemeinen Organismus (Hamburg 1798) (Christian Gotthilf Salzmann, Carl von Carlsberg oder über das menschliche Elend, vol. 5 [Carlsruhe 1787]):
Based on Schelling’s initial piece, Von den Ideen zu einer Philosophie der Natur (Leipzig 1797), Goethe had initially suspected Schelling of being excessively given to the philosophy of Johann Gottlieb Fichte, which was decidedly disinclined, in Goethe’s opinion, to accord to nature the independent, organic status Goethe thought it merited. Schelling’s Weltseele convinced Goethe otherwise.
Schelling was appointed an unsalaried professor extraordinarius rather than a salaried ordinarius because of shifts going on in the departments of philosophy and theology at this time involving Karl Christian Erhard Schmid, whose position in philosophy, which had been a possibility for Schelling, did not come open even after Schmidt became a full professor (ordinarius) in theology. Minister Christian Gottlob Voigt, unable to influence the theological faculty, instead opted to have Duke Karl August appoint Schelling as an unsalaried extraordinarius, thinking perhaps Schelling would eventually become ordinarius on his own initiative when the Schmidt affair was settled.
As it was, even Schelling’s request for a salary in 1802 (or 1803) was denied, whereupon he remained an unsalaried professor for his entire tenure in Jena, that is, until he (and Caroline) left for Würzburg in May 1803. Back.
Translation © 2012 Doug Stott