‘The Nameless One’ is
an unlikely title for Napolean. This title was given by the German philosopher Johann
Gottlieb Fichte. It was borne out of dashed hopes from the French revolution. Fichte
(fikh-tuh) as he is called admired the revolution and clung to his hopes in
France for much longer than many of his compatriots. As late as 1799, he
writes: ‘It is clear that from now on only the French Republic can be the
fatherland of the man of integrity, that only to it can he devote his energies;
for from now on not only the dearest hopes of humanity but even its existence
depend upon its victory’. Napolean’s crowning
as emperor was the last nail in the coffin of his hopes.
Germany was at the
centre of Europe and also at the heart of humanity. It was also in an impotent
state then. Under Napolean’s rule, it was often called ‘poor in deeds but rich
in thought’. The extraordinary blossoming of German literature, philosophy and
poetry at the close of 18th century bears testimony to this
statement. Germany did not want to triumph with sword, but with the light of
knowledge and understanding. If the goal of humanity were to be reached by advancement
of science, Germans had just begun to possess science and therefore one could
serve the cause of humanity as a whole by serving just the German cause.
Fichte though was not
the first to espouse Germany’s destiny, he was surely the most articulate,
systematic and eloquent. His argument of German being a unique race, rested first
on its language. German language alone, in his view, represented a preserved
history. All other European languages lost their original identity when they
came in contact with Latin and assumed a superficial though glamorous form. Little
wonder then that French, Spanish and Italian are called Romance languages
whereas German like Greek, developed uninterrupted and contained within itself
a natural force that conferred upon it a remarkable ability to handle
profundity and to exercise national imagination.
Fichte’s believed that
the love of fatherland was peculiar to Germans required an entirely different
order of emotional investment. Only a love of fatherland can prompt people to behold
the nation as terrestrial and divine, universal and particular at the same
time. It made nation as manifestation of the divine and made it exist also in
the pure realm of thought thus giving it an originality of life. Germany as a
country answered basic needs of people that are normally answered by religion,
the desire for eternity, the impulse to leave behind a trace of oneself in this
world, the need for transcendence.
Fichte was born to a lowly
though literate weaver in 1762 in Saxony and was soon patronized by a local
aristocrat for his precociously gifted nature. The turning point of his life
was when he stumbled upon Immanuel Kant in 1791 which in his words
revolutionized his thinking. He became a leading interpreter of Kant and was
invited to University of Jena. He published the masterpiece of his life, wissenschaftslehre (The Science of
Knowledge) in 1794. It dealt with source, limits and objects of human
knowledge. In 1810, University of Berlin is established and Fichte becomes its
first Rector.
Fichte died in 1814
of typhoid fever at the age of 51. In 51 years of his life, he gave a purpose
to nations of the world that the eternal and the divine may flourish in this
world and never cease to become ever more pure, perfect and excellent. More
significantly, he prepared Germany to play the role of the pivot on which the
world will balance itself. Little wonder then that he exhorted to the germans, “If
you sink, all humanity sinks with you”.
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