Hymns to the Night: On H. S. Harris's “The Cows in the Dark Night”
Document Type
Article
Language
eng
Format of Original
9 p.
Publication Date
Winter 1987
Publisher
Cambridge University Press
Source Publication
Dialogue: Canadian Philosophical Review
Source ISSN
0012-2173
Original Item ID
doi: 10.1017/S0012217300018229
Abstract
As one of the bare handful of scholars working on Schelling, I should heartily like to accept Professor Harris's argument, for all these black cows hang around one's neck more heavily than did the albatross on the ancient mariner's. I find myself obliged, however, to closely test his argument. I regret that, viewed in the context of the whole of the Phenomenology's Preface, Harris's argument is not fully convincing. I shall argue that, since the Preface's plain intent is to contrast the vitalism of a method of thought that is spirit's coming into its own with all styles of fixated propositional thinking, the “formalism” Hegel attacks is a loose aggregate of the philosophical styles of Fichte, Schelling, Reinhold and Bardili. Hegel is content to leave the label loose and unspecified and not to name names. It is not strictly fair to let the scope of the term resonate upon Schelling's “first scientific grasp of the idea”, at least not for an author who knew Schelling's work so well. But as Harris points out, it is not fair to Hegel for his public to read him with the sole, simplistic question of what positions he supports and what positions he rejects.
Recommended Citation
Vater, Michael, "Hymns to the Night: On H. S. Harris's “The Cows in the Dark Night”" (1987). Philosophy Faculty Research and Publications. 462.
https://epublications.marquette.edu/phil_fac/462
Comments
Dialogue: Canadian Philosophical Review, Vol. 26, No. 4 (Winter 1987): 645-652. DOI.