The Elegant Magister 119where he experienced nothing but failure, squandering even more money
and living a most undisciplined life. He also came into close contact with
members of the London homosexual community. Finally, overcome with
guilt, he lost all his previous moral and religious convictions. He had been
deeply influenced by Enlightenment ideals, but now Hamann slowly fought
his way back to the belief that Christ and the church were the only salva¬
tion not just for himself, but for everyone. This "conversion" has often been
described as a Pietistic Durchbruch, and it does share certain features with
it. In many ways, however, it was more a return to an orthodox Lutheran
faith, in which scripture is accepted as the sole authority and in which hope
for salvation comes from faith alone (sola scriptura and sola fide). When
Hamann returned to Königsberg in March of 1759, after having been re¬
ceived "surprisingly well" by the Berenses in Riga (and after a failed propo¬
sition of marriage to their daughter), he was a changed man. Having given
up the Enlightenment ideals he had shared with Berens, Lindner, and oth¬
ers — including Kant — and having embraced a fundamentalism of the most
uncompromising sort, he was almost unrecognizable to his old friends.
When Berens came for a visit to Königsberg in the summer of 1759, he
enlisted Kant in trying to convince Hamann that he should give up what
could only appear to the world as foolishness. On July 12, 1759, Hamann
wrote to his brother: "At the beginning of the week I was in the company
of Mr. B. and Magister Kant at the Windmill where we ate a country din¬
ner together in the tavern there.... Confidentially, our association does not
have the former intimacy, and we impose on ourselves the greatest restraint
to avoid any appearance of it."^90 Later that month Berens and Kant vis¬
ited Hamann and tried to persuade him to translate some articles from the
French Encyclopedie, but to no avail. Instead, Hamann fired off a letter to
Kant, which began:
Most honored Magister: I do not blame you for being my rival (Nebenbuhler) and that
you have enjoyed your new friend for whole weeks, while I only see him for a few scat¬
tered hours, like a phantom or a clever informant... I shall, however, bear a grudge
because your friend insulted me in introducing you into my solitude. ... If you are
Socrates, and your friend wants to be Alcibiades, then you need for your own educa¬
tion a genius.... Allow me therefore to be called your genius as long as it takes me to
write this letter.^91
Hamann went on to try to convince Berens and Kant that a Christian faith
should be the result of consistent philosophizing, appealing to Hume for
support. Philosophy can only lead to skepticism, and skepticism leads to
belief. Reason was not given to us to make us "wise," but to make us aware