Kant: A Biography

(WallPaper) #1
Notes to Pages 334-342 495


  1. A certain J. L. Schwarz reports that there were daily about twelve scholars or
    "other interesting people," who had a perpetual invitation, "and I was lucky enough
    to sit four times right across from Kant during my five day stay there" (Malter,
    Kant in Rede und Gespräch, p. 314). This was in February or March 1787.

  2. Schwarz in Maker, Kant in Rede und Gespräch, p. 314, and Elise von der Recke in
    Maker, Kant in Rede und Gespräch, p. 248. She also claims that she saw Kant al¬
    most daily at the Keyserlingks (around 1784).

  3. Maker, Kant in Rede und Gespräch, p. 248.

  4. For a discussion of Kant's conception of wit and his wit, see Wolfgang Ritzel, "Kant
    über den Witz und Kants Witz," Kant-Studien (1991), pp. 102-109. Though
    Ritzel is inclined to overstate the difference between "wit" in the eighteenth cen¬
    tury and today, it is a good introduction to the topic.

  5. Schwarz in Maker, Kant in Rede und Gespräch, p. 314.

  6. This is a translation of the entire scene. Though Kant plays a relatively minor
    role in it and exhibits none of his wit or command of conversation, it does throw
    an interesting light on this part of his environment.

  7. Hippel, Werke, I, pp. 294—297 (Maker, Kant in Rede und Gespräch, p. 340).

  8. Epstein, The Origin of German Conservatism, p. 352.

  9. See P. Bailleu, "Woellner, Johann Christof," in Allgemeine deutsche Biographie,
    pp. 148-159, pp. I5if. See also Christopher Mclntosh, The Rose Cross and the Age
    of Reason: Eighteenth-Century Rosicrucianism in Central Europe and Its Relationship
    to the Enlightenment (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1992), and Hans Möller, "Die Bruderschaft
    der Gold- und Rosenkreuzer," in Freimaurer und Geheimbünde im 18. Jahrhundert
    in Mitteleuropa, ed. Helmut Reinalter (Frankfurt: Suhrkamp, 1983), pp. 199-239,
    especially pp. 218-222; and Michael W. Fischer, Die Aufklärung und ihr Gegenteil.
    Die Rolle der Geheimbünde in Wissenschaft und Politik (Berlin: Duncker & Hum-
    blot, 1982), pp. 144-169, 242-255. Manfred Agethen, Geheimbund und Utopie.
    Illuminaten, Freimaurer und deutsche Spätaufklärung (München: R. Oldenbourg
    Verlag, 1987), deals with a group of Freemasons, on the whole opposed to the
    Rosicrucians. But when it was disbanded, many of its members ended up as
    Rosicrucians.

  10. Quoted after Epstein, The Genesis of German Conservatism, p. 143

  11. The sister of Stark's wife was Kraus's aunt. For this reason Kraus would not take
    a public position against him. But he did not think highly of him, saying in confi¬
    dence: "der Mann taugt nichts" (Voigt, Kraus, p. 245).

  12. See pp. 224-226 of this volume. Lady von Recke did publish a book against him
    in 1788.
    3 5. Francois Furet, The French Revolution, 1770-1814, tr. Antonia Nevill (Oxford: Black-
    well, 1988), p. 68.

  13. Furet, The French Revolution, p. 74.

  14. Maker, Kant in Rede und Gespräch, p. 348.

  15. Quoted after Epstein, The Genesis of German Conservatism, p. 436.

  16. Michael Hughes, Early Modern Germany, 1477-1806 (Philadelphia: University
    of Philadelphia Press, 1992), p. 173. But see especially Epstein, The Genesis of
    German Conservatism, pp. 434-538, "The Challenge of the French Revolution"
    and "The Conspiracy Theory of the Revolution." These two chapters are a must

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