FRIEDRICH

See also:

• FRIEDRICH BOUTERWEK (1766-1828)

BOUTERWEK (1766-1828)  , German philosopher and critic, was born at Oker, near Goslar in Lower Saxony, and studied law at Gottingen . From 1790, however, he became a disciple of Kant, published Aphorismen nach Kants Lehre vorgelegt (1793), and became professor of philosophy at Gottingen (1802), where he died on the 9th of August 1828 . As a philosopher, he is interesting for his criticism of the theory of the " thing-in-itself " (Ding-an-sick) . For the pure reason, as described in the Kritik,• the " thing-in-itself " can be only an inconceivable " something-in-general "; any statement about it involves the predication of Reality, Unity and Plurality, which belong not to the absolute thing but to phenomena . On the other hand, the subject is known by the fact of will, and the object by that of resistance; the cognizance of willing is the assertion of absolute reality in the domain of relative knowledge . This doctrine has since been described as absolute Virtualism . Following this train of thought, Bouterwek left the Kantian position through his opposition to its formalism . In later life he inclined to the views of F . H . Jacobi, whose letters to him (published at Gottingen, 1868) shed much light on the development of his thought . His chief philosophical works are Ideen zu einer all gemeinen Apodiktik (Gottingen and Halle, 1799) ; Aesthetik (Leipzig, 18o6; Gottingen, 1815 and 1824); Lehrbuch der philos . Vorkenntnisse (Gottin.gen, 1810 and 1820); Lehrbuch der philos .

Wissenschaften (Gottingen, 1813 and 1820) . In these works he dissociated himself from the Kantian school . His chief

critical work was the Geschichte der neuern Poesie and Beredsamkeit (Gottingen, 12 vols., 1801-1819), of which the history of Spanish literature has been published separately in French, Spanish and English . The Geschichte is a work of wide learning and generally sound criticism, but it is not of equal merit throughout . He also wrote three novels, Paulus Septimus (Halle, 1795), Graf Donamar (Gottingen, 1791) and Ramiro (Leipzig, 1804), and published a collection of poems (Gottingen, 1802) .