The Popular Works of Johann Gottlieb Fichte Volume 2 (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1889 edition. Excerpt: ...subservient to the arbitrary will of an individual, but to the Community as a Whole; and even this only in so far as that Whole needs their services; and that all their Fellow-Citizens, without exception, to whatever Class they belong, stand in the same position: --but, in order that they may arrive at this conviction, it is necessary that this should actually be the case; for it is in vain to indulge the hope of deceiving the Lower Classes in matters which affect their interests. Hence either Equality of Rights must be actually introduced; or else the Privileged Classes must constantly, publicly, and before the eyes of all men, act as if this Equality were introduced. This condition of things must be brought distinctly under the notice of the Lower Classes, and be made evident to them by their Teachers, who are the mediators between them and the Higher Classes, and who ought to be well acquainted with their language and ways of thinking;--in one word, the People ought to receive instruction, and indeed fundamental, solid, and convincing instruction, not in Religion only, but also regarding the State, its purposes and its laws. To make my views clear by a distinct example: The great proprietor must be able thus to speak to his dependants, or to enable their Teachers thus to speak for him, and that with truth, calling to witness the daily testimony of their own eyes: --'Although I possess as much as hundreds or perhaps thousands of you do together, yet I cannot, on that account, either eat, drink, or sleep, for a hundred or a thousand. The undertakings in which you see me daily engage; the experiments on a great scale with new methods of husbandry; the introduction, from distant lands, of new and nobler races of animals, new plants, new...