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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 10 February 2009
I should like to begin by recalling my own occasional points of contact with Robert Kann. When his first book, the great two-volume work on the nationality problem in the Habsburg Empire, was published, I was a student about to embark on research on eighteenth-century Austria, and took little notice of any large works not on my research period. Later, teaching nineteenth-century European history, I came to appreciate its wide range and deep insights. By the time his highly original Study in Austrian Intellectual History was published in 1960, my career as a historian had prospered sufficiently for me to be offered this book for review by a leading British historical periodical. I commented very positively on his analysis of Abraham a Sancta Clara. Turning to the chapters on Joseph von Sonnenfels, however, I took the opportunity of presenting some results of my own research on Sonnenfels, which had only just been published and which I thought called some of his judgments into question. Unlike many Central European academics of his generation, Robert Kann did not resent criticism by a younger colleague; hence I have memories of some pleasant and stimulating meetings with him in Vienna during the time he held an honorary professorship there.
1 For a fuller development of these points, see Jacob, Margaret C., The Newtonians and the English Revolution,1689–1720 (Ithaca, N.Y., 1976, chap. 5.Google Scholar
2 William, Derham, Physico-Theology; or, a Demonstration of the Being and Attributes of God from the Works of Creation (London, 1713, and many later editions).Google Scholar
3 The title page of this work is worth citing in full in the original German: Friedrich Christian Lessers, In der Kayserl. Freyen Reichsstadt Nordhausen an der Kirche am Frauenberge Pastoris, und des Waysenhauses Administratoris, wie auch der Kayserl. Leop. Carol. Acad. Nat. Curiosor. Mitgliedes, Insecto- Theologia, Oder: Vernunft- und Schriftmäsiger Versuch, wie ein Mensch durch aufmerksame Betrachtung derer sonst wenig geachteten Insecten zu lebendiger Erkenntnis und Bewunderung der Allmacht, Weisheit, der Güte und Gerechtigkeit des grosen Gottes gelangen könne. Dritte vermehrte Auflage. Leipzig, in der Großischen Handlung, 1758.Google Scholar
4 For the “Puritan” revolutionary roots of the orientation toward happiness in this world, See Christopher, Hill, Some Intellectual Consequences of the English Revolution (Madison, Wis., 1980), 88.Google Scholar
5 Grimminger's, Cf. Rolf subheading “Die Utopie der vernünftigen Praxis” in his otherwise good introduction to Hansers Sozialgeschichte der deutschen Literatur, 2nd ed., vol.3, ed.Rolf, Grimminger (Munich, 1980), 16.Google Scholar
6 Roy, Porter summarizes this position well, though he stresses self-interest rather too much, in “The Enlightenment in England,” in The Enlightenment in National Context, ed. Roy, Porter and Mikulás, Teich (Cambridge, 1981), 8–11.Google Scholar
7 The literature on the third earl of Shaftesbury is growing rapidly. For the notion of a moral sense inherent in human nature in conformity with universal harmony, see Basil, Willey, The English Moralists (London, 1964), 223ff.Google Scholar, and Sheriff, John K., The Good-natured Man: The Evolution of a Moral Ideal, 1660–1800 (University, Ala., 1982), 6–10.Google Scholar
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16 A notable example is the reaction of the poet Johann Heinrich Voss to the Hamburg performance of the Messiah in Klopstock's German translation: Johann Heinrich Voss to Ernestine Boie, Jan. 5, 1776Google Scholar, in Briefe von J. H. Voss nebst erläuternden Beilagen, ed. Alexander, Voss, vol. 1 (Halberstadt, 1829), 295ff.Google Scholar
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32 I have quoted the most important passagesGoogle Scholar in ibid., 105ff.
33 Cf. his observations on van Swietens Vortrag of Aug. 15, 1791, in Studienhofkommission (bis 1791), Fasz. 25, Konv. Prag in genere, 143 ex 1791: “… am wenigsten aber möchte ich mir schmeicheln, durch Ästhetik die Menschen zur Erfüllung ihrer Pflicht geneigter zu machen. Ich dächte hierzu wären Religion und Sittenlehre weit zuverlassigere Mittel.”Google Scholar
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44 Quoted from Schillers Werke. Bibliothek Deutscher Klassiker (Berlin and Weimar, 1974), vol. 1, 244.Google Scholar
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46 Quoted in Anton, Schindler, Biographie von Ludwig van Beethoven (Münster, 1860), vol. 1, 152. On Sturm's influence on Beethoven's religious ideas and the latter's conformity to the main tenets of Reform Catholicism,Google Scholarsee Arnold, Schmitz, “Beethovens Religiosität,” in Bericht über den I. musikwissenschaftlichen Kongreβ der deutschen Musikgesellschaft in Leipzig (Leipzig, 1926), 274–79.Google Scholar
47 Solomon, , “Beethoven and Schiller,” 214–215;Google ScholarMaynard, Solomon, “The Ninth Symphony,” in Beethoven Essays, 30.Google Scholar
