Johann Gottlieb Fichte was born in Ramenau, Oberlausitz, May 19, 1762,
the son of a poor weaver. Through the generosity of a nobleman,
the gifted lad was enabled to follow his intellectual bent; after
attending the schools at Meissen and Schulpforta he studied theology
at the universities of Jena, Leipzig, and Wittenberg with the purpose
of entering the ministry. His poverty frequently compelled him to
interrupt his studies by accepting private tutorships in families, so
that he never succeeded in preparing him self for the examinations. In
1790 he became acquainted with Kant's philosophy, which two students
had asked him to expound to them, and to which he now devoted himself
with feverish zeal. It revolutionized his entire mode of thought and
determined the course of his life. The anonymous publication of his
book, _Attempt at a Critique of all Revelation_, in 1792, written
from the Kantian point of view and mistaken at first for a work of
the great criticist, won him fame and a professorship at Jena (1794).
Here, in the intellectual centre of Germany, Fichte became the
eloquent exponent of the new idealism, which aimed at the reform of
life as well as of _Wissenschaft_; he not only taught philosophy, but
_preached_ it, as Kuno Fischer has aptly said. During the Jena
period he laid the foundations for his "Science of Knowledge"
(_Wissenschaftslehre_) which he presented in numerous works: _The
Conception of the Science of Knowledge_, 1794; _The Foundation of
the Entire Science of Knowledge_, 1794; _The Foundation of Natural
Rights_, 1796; _The System of Ethics_, 1798--(all these translated by
Kroeger); the two _Introductions to the Science of Knowledge_, 1797
(trans.
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