Heinrich Schaeider, professor of German intellectual history from the Reformation through the Enlightenment, will retire from teaching at Harvard June 30.

Schneider has accepted an appointment as a visiting professor to teach graduate-level courses at Johns Hopkins University beginning next fall. He will also continue work on several research projects, the major one on German poet E. E. Lessing.

Schneider is an authority on Lessing (1729-81), whose works are thought to be at the root of modern European literary criticism. His book "Lessing: 12 Biographical Studies," published in 1951, is considered a major contribution to the understanding of this poet's life.

Born in 1889 in Offenbach, near Frankfurt on Main, Schneider studied literature, history, philosophy and Protestant theology in the universities of Tuebingen, Leipzig, and Giessen.