tion of this absolute identity, Schelling seems to in- volve himself in a shadow of self-contradiction. He makes it, on the one hand, an absolute indifference ; as such it is purelj' negative, and hence cannot be made the basis of a positive imiverse. On the other hand, he makes it the identity of everything — that is, he makes it the most positive of all things. In this absolute iden- tity, Schelling distinguishes essence and form. In re- spect to form, it is an infinite self-knowing ; it can know itself, however, only as subject and object. But as this subject and object spring from identity, their only dif- ference must be quantitative, not qualitative; that is, the absolute identity can differentiate and posit itself under a preponderance of the subjective or of the ob- jective, but not under a form from which one of the elements is entirely al)sent. Any equation that can be contrasted with A = A must be simply equivalent to A = B. The whole conception may therefore be ex- pressed under the form of an imending magnetic line with one indifference-point and two poles, at the one of which A preponderates, and at the other B, thus:
+ A=B
A=B
A=A
At every point in this line all three elements are present. Every single object is therefore one of the forms of the essence of the absolute, and in each of these forms the ab- solute identity is entire, seeing that it \sper se indivisi- ble. The preponderance of the objective or real is nature. The first relative totality in nature is matter; and the ideal antithesis of matter is liff/it ; and from the combi- nation of matter and light springs organic life. But it is only in an infinite self-knowing that the absolute identity is actu real, and hence only in the sphere of the subjective and ideal. This sphere Schelling identi- fies with the f?-ue, the good (religion), and the beautiful (art). The absolute identity is therefore the essence of nature simply in that it is the ground of its actual existence. Everything is nature which falls outside of absolute being. This differentiation of essence as, on the one hand, the actuality of things, and as, on the other, simply the ^roMHf/ of their actuality, was justly regarded by Schelling as one of the most important connecting links between his earlier and his later system.
The filling-up of the outlines of his sj'stem of iden- tity Schelling left incomplete; he gave chiefly the ob- jective phase. Of the sul)jective or spiritual phase we have only fragmentary sketches. As filled out in his oral lectures, this phase contained the gerras of his later and more theistic system. Religion is presented, not as a product of development from a state of barbarism, but as a product of instruction from higher beings. But Christianity is regarded as inferior to the great religions of the Orient ; and yet Schelling insists, as against illuminism and the subjective moralism of Kant, on the necessity of the chief theological ideas of the Bible. His thoughts are these: As the universe differ- entiates itself, as real and ideal, into nature and history, so history itself is likewise divided. The Oriental and pagan world is the nature side of history ; Christianity, on the contrary, is the ideal or moral side. The pagan religions are religions of nature; the gods are but forces of nature; the infinite is subordinated to the finite; hence the multitudinousness of deities. But in Chris- tianity the finite is subordinated to the one infinite; hence the unity of the divine nature. In Christianity mylhologv can onlj' rise from deterioration and pop- ular ignorance. In paganism mythology is primitive, and religion can rise only from an intellectual advance Ix'vond the primitive elements. The stream of his- tory rises through three stages. The stage of nature came to its climax in the religion and poesy of the Creeks : it was a time of unconscious identity with nat- ure, and nature was regarded as a manifestation of eternal necessity. The pei-iod of catastrophe, or of con- flict between natural necessity and moral freedom was
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SCHELLING
the tragic age of the decline of ancient civilization. The period of harmonization, or of providence, was in- augurated by Christianit}'. (This division corresponds in part with the one made in the author's Transcen- dental Ide(dism.) It is only in Christ that God be- comes truh' objective. But this is an eternal process, and the incarnation is not a merely temporal, empirical act; Christ offers up in his own person the finite, and thereby renders possible the coming of the Spirit as the light of the new world; this spirit brings, conducts, the finite back to God. From philosophic speculation Schelling looked for the new birth of essential, or eso- teric, Christianity, and the proclamation of the absolute Gospel.
Connected with these views is Schelling's next spec- ulative work, Philosophij and Relifjion (1804). It is a self-defence against Eschenmaj'er. In it religion is pre- sented as the '• conciliation of the finite with God ;" but the finite is regarded as jier se fallen. " God is not the positively creative cause of the finite ; the finite cannot directly spring of the absolute, and it sustains to the absolute no direct relation." The finite is regarded simply as not real, as delusive. The general back- ground of this work is an idealistic mysticism, derived in part from Plato and Plotinus, but also much resem- bling the transmigration systems of the Orient; it fails to do justice to the ideas of morality and freedom.