Topics of the lecture:

1. Summary of Kant and Fichte.

2. The arbitrary Element in Fichte's Doctrine, and the Relation of this Arbitrariness to the Romantic School.

3. The place of the Romantic School in German Literature. Wider and narrower use of the term Romantic School. Characteristics of the principal members of the Romantic School proper.

4. Further distinction between the Romantic Philosophy and that of Fichte.

5. Illustrations of the Romantic View of Life: Friedrich Schlegel; Novalis; Schelling and Caroline.

6. Sketch of some of Schelling's Views.

[Concerning the Romantic School, on the literary side, the reader must be referred to the bibliographies of German literature. The well-known early essays of Carlyle form here an introduction which has not yet wholly lost its value for English readers; and his translations are of permanent worth. Heine's sketches of the history of German Thought and Literature are as suggestive as they are charming and untrustworthy. Schelling's voluminous writings are still for the most part accessible only in the original. The best recent technical and critical exposition of a portion of his doctrine is that by Professor John Watson, "Schelling's Transcendental Idealism" (Chicago, 1882).]

For comparison are added a number of biographical dates, in both German and English Liberature:

Born: Herder, 1744; Goethe, 1749; Schiller, 1759; Fichte, 1762; A. W. Schlegel, 1767; Schleiermacher, 1768; Hegel, 1770; Friedrich Schlegel, 1772; Novalis, 1772; Tieck, 1773; Schelling, 1775; Schopenbauer, 1788; Woldsworth, 1770; Scott, 1771; Coleridge, 1772; Southey, 1774; Byron, 1788; Shelley, 1792.