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Preaching, a Ponytail, and an Enthusiast: Rethinking the Public Sphere's Subversiveness in Eighteenth-century Prussia

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 December 2008

Michael J. Sauter
Affiliation:
Centro De Investigación Y Docencia Económicas, A.C., Mexico City

Extract

Recent work on the eighteenth-century public sphere has recast the debate about the Enlightenment's responsibility for the French Revolution. Historians have argued that the print public sphere and its concomitant forms of sociability, such as salons, reading clubs, and coffee houses created social spaces from which criticism of the state emerged. This elite criticism corroded the Old Regime's foundations and the revolutionary crash of 1789, if it was not directly the intellectuals' fault, was sufficiently related to their mental labors to show that enlightened publicness had consequences.

Type
Articles
Copyright
Copyright © Conference Group for Central European History of the American Historical Association 2004

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References

1. This literature began with the translation into English of Habermas's, JürgenThe Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere: An Inquiry into a Category of Bourgeois Society, trans. McCarthy, Thomas (Cambridge, 1989)Google Scholar. For introductions to the debate, see Nathans, Benjamin, “Habermas' Public-Sphere in the Era of the French-Revolution,” French Historical Studies 16, no. 3 (1990): 620–44CrossRefGoogle Scholar, Jacob, Margaret C., “The Enlightenment Redefined: The Formation of Modern Civil Society,” Social Research 58, no. 2 (1991): 475–95Google Scholar; Calhoun, Craig J., ed., Habermas and the Public Sphere (Cambridge, 1992)Google Scholar; Goodman, Dena, “Public Sphere and Private Life — Toward a Synthesis of Current Historiographical Approaches to the Old Regime,” History and Theory 31, no. 1 (1992): 120CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and LaVopa, Anthony J., “Conceiving a Public: Ideas and Society in Eighteenth-Century Europe,” Journal of Modern History 64 (03 1992): 98115Google Scholar. For applications of Habermas's ideas, see Baker, Keith Michael, Inventing the French Revolution: Essays on French Political Culture in the Eighteenth Century (Cambridge, 1990)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Bell, Daniel A., “The Public-Sphere, the State, and the World of Law in 18th-Century France,” French Historical Studies 17, no. 4 (1992): 912–34CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Goodman, Dena, Criticism in Action: Enlightenment Experiments in Political Writing (Ithaca, 1989)Google Scholar; Jacob, Margaret C., Living the Enlightenment: Freemasonry and Politics in Eighteenth-Century Europe (New York, 1991).Google Scholar

2. Baker's, Inventing the French RevolutionGoogle Scholar, and Jacobs, Living the EnlightenmentGoogle Scholar are the finest examples of this kind of work for France. For work on Germany, see van Dülmen, Richard, The Society of the Enlightenment: The Rise of the Middle Class and Enlightenment Culture in Germany (New York, 1992)Google Scholar, and Hof, Ulrich Im, Das gesellige Jahrhundert: Gesellschaft und Gesellschaften im Zeitalter der Aufklärung (Munich, 1982)Google Scholar. Another key text in the debate about sociability is Kosellecks, ReinhartCritique and Crisis: Enlightenment and the Pathogenesis of Modern Society (Oxford, 1988)Google Scholar, originally published as Kritik und Krise: Eine Studie zur Pathogenese der bürgerlichen Welt (Freiburg, 1959)Google Scholar. This text, unfortunately, has been overshadowed by Habermas's work. Koselleck takes a much less sanguine view of public reasoning than Habermas, arguing that sociability was not only corrosive of the Old Regime but also politically irresponsible, since it offered no alternative to state authority. Koselleck's influence on my work will be apparent throughout.

3. Porter, Roy and Teich, Mikulas, The Enlightenment in National Context (Cambridge, 1981).CrossRefGoogle Scholar

4. I limit this discussion to Germany's northern Protestant regions. Catholic Germany had its own Enlightenment, but it functioned according to different rules. See Porter, and Teich, , Enlightenment.Google Scholar Württemberg, though a Protestant kingdom, recruited its preachers and ministers much differently than Prussia did. (See note 8 below.) For that reason, it is also excluded here. For a discussion of Württembergs political system, see Vann, James Allen, The Making of a State: Württemberg, 1593–1793 (Ithaca, 1984).Google Scholar

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7. Zöllner, Johann Friedrich, whom I discuss further below, defended publicity in a legal case against him by citing the elite debates about the new Allgemeines Landrecht (1794)Google Scholar: “And these [discussions] were in no way forbidden as contrary to the laws, but were accepted gratefully as a contribution for illuminating an important issue from all sides.” (Unger, Johann Friedrich, ed., Prozess des Buchdruckers Unger gegen den Oberkonsistorialrath Zöllner in Censurangelegenheiten wegen eines verbotenen Buches: Aus den bei Einem Hochpreissl. Kammergericht verhandelten Akten vollständig abgedruckt [Berlin, 1791], 70).Google Scholar

8. For the importance of the shift from the merely learned (Gelehrten) to the truly educated (Gebildeten), see Turner, R. Steven, “The Bildungsbürgertum and the Learned Professions in Prussia, 1770–1830: The Origins of a Class,” Histoire Sociale — Social History 13, no. 25 (1980): 105–35Google Scholar. On Bildung more generally, see Sorkin, David, “Wilhelm Von Humboldt: The Theory and Practice of Self-Formation (Bildung), 1791–1810,” Journal of the History of Ideas 44, no. 1 (1983): 5573.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

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11. As Anthony LaVopa has argued, preachers in Germany were of superior social rank. See LaVopa, , “The Revelatory Moment: Fichte and the French Revolution,” Central European History 22, no. 2 (1989): 149.Google Scholar

12. The dualities that this atmosphere encouraged are clearly displayed in Immanuel Kant and Moses Mendelssohn's contributions to the “What is Enlightenment?” debate. See Kant, Immanuel, “Beantwortung der Frage: Was ist Aufklärung?Berlinische Monatsschrift, no. 2 (1784): 481–94Google Scholar, and Mendelssohn, Moses, “Ueber die Frage: was heisst aufklären?Berlinische Monatsschrift, no. 2 (1784): 193200Google Scholar. Both texts are reprinted in Bahr, Erhard, ed., Was ist Aufklärung?: Thesen und Definitionen (Stuttgart, 1974)Google Scholar, and Schmidt, James, What is Enlightenment?: Eighteenth-Century Answers and Twentieth-Century Questions (Berkeley, 1996)Google Scholar. Wolfgang Albrecht has emphasized the social limitations of the Enlightenment in eighteenth-century Germany, though he views the Aufklärer more positively than I do. See Albrecht, Wolfgang, “Aufklärung, Reform, Revolution, oder ‘Bewirkt Aufklärung Revolutionen?’ über Ein Zentralproblem der Aufklärungsdebatte in Deutschland,” Lessing Yearbook 22 (1990): 3.Google Scholar

13. See, for example, Zande, Johan van der, “Prussia and the Enlightenment,” in The Rise of Prussia, 1700–1830, ed. Dwyer, Philip K. (Harlow, UK, 2000): 89107.Google Scholar

14. On Woellner, see Liliencron, Rochus Wilhelm, ed., Allgemeine deutsche Biographie (Leipzig, 1898), 24: 148–58Google Scholar (cited hereafter as ADE), and Preuss, J. D. E., “Zur Beurtheilung des Staatsministers von Woellner,” Zeitschrift für Preussische Geschichte und Landeskunde 2–3 (1865, 1866): 577–604, 6595Google Scholar. On the Edict on Religion see Schwartz, Paul, Der erste Kulturkampf in Preussen um Kirche und Schule (1788–1798) (Berlin, 1925)Google Scholar and Valjavec, Fritz, “Das Woellnersche Religionsedikt und seine geschichtliche Bedeutung,” in Ausgewählte Aufsätze (Munich, 1963), 294322.Google Scholar

15. Bahrdt, Carl Friedrich, Das Religions-Edikt. Ein Lustspiel in fünf Aufzügen. Eine Skizze. Von Nicolai dem Jüngern (Thenakel [Vienna], 1789)Google Scholar. This text has been reprinted in Bahrdt, Carl Friedrich, The Edict of Religion: A Comedy and The Story and Diary of my imprisonment, trans. Laursen, John Christian and Zande, Johan van der (Lanham, 2000)Google Scholar; Büsching, Anton Friedrich, D. Anton Friedrich Büsching, königl. preuss. Oberconsistorialraths, Untersuchung, wenn und durch wen der freyen evangelisch-lutherischen Kirche die symbolischen Bücher zuerst aufgelegt worden? (Berlin, 1789)Google Scholar; Trapp, Ernst Christian, Freymüthige Betrachtungen und ehrerbietige Vorstellungen über die neuen Preussischen Anordnungen in geistlichen Sachen (Braunschweig, 1791)Google Scholar. For a work that sees the Counter-Enlightenment as ending the Enlightenment, see Lestition, Steven, “Kant and the End of Enlightenment in Prussia,” Journal of Modern History 65 (1993): 57112.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

16. See, for example, Albrecht, Wolfgang, “Religionsedikt und Riemsche Fragmente,” Weimarer Beiträge 36, no. 5 (1990): 793804Google Scholar, and especially Dilthey's, Wilhelm classic “Der Streit Kants mit der Zensur über das Recht freier Religionsforschung,”Google Scholar in Dilthey, , Gesammelte Schriften (Leipzig, 1921), 4: 285309.Google Scholar

17. Hellmuth, Eckhart, “Aufklärung und Pressefreiheit: Zur Debatte der Berliner Mittwochsgesellschaft während der Jahre 1783 und 1784,” Zeitschrift für Historische Forschung 9, no. 2 (1982): 315–45Google Scholar. Hellmuth makes clear that even some of Prussia's most enlightened minds, such as Friedrich Gedike and Carl Gottlieb Svarez took censorship for granted.

18. See Hermann Conrad's discussion of state practices in religious edicts in Conrad, , “Staat und Kirche im aufgeklärten Absolutismus,” Der Staat 12, no. 1 (1973): 4563.Google Scholar

19. On the the edict's moderation, see Hintze, Otto, Die Hohenzollern und ihr Werk: Fünfhundert Jahre vaterländischer Geschichte (Berlin, 1915), 411Google Scholar. He called the Edict on Religion an edict of tolerance (Toleranzedikt), because it made limited religious toleration a matter of law. Ian Hunter has also argued that the edict was an extension of traditional Prussian, ReligionspolitikGoogle Scholar. Hunter, , “Kant and the Prussian Religious Edict: Metaphysics within the Bounds of Political Reason Alone,” Modern Intellectual History (forthcoming)Google Scholar. My argument here is also informed by James van Horn Melton's argument that the eighteenth century saw a crisis of seigneurial authority in Prussia. See Melton, , Absolutism and the Eighteenth-Century Origins of Compulsory Schooling in Pntssia and Austria (Cambridge, 1988), 145–68.Google Scholar

20. On Semler, see Aner, Karl, Die Theologie der Lessingzeit (Halle an der Saale, 1929)Google Scholar; Hornig, Gottfried, “Die Freiheit der christlichen Privatreligion: Semlers Begründung des religiösen Individualismus in der Protestantischen Aufklärungstheologie,” Neue Zeitschrift für systematische Theologie und Religionsphilosophie 21, no. 2 (1979): 198211CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and Hornig, , Johann Salomo Semler: Studien zu Leben und Werk des hallenser Aufklärungstheologen (Tübingen, 1996)CrossRefGoogle Scholar. (I am grateful to one of CEH's anonymous reviewers for pointing out the last text to me.)

21. Semler, , Abhandlung von freier Untersuchung des Canons; nebst Antwort auf die tübingische Vertheidigung der Apocalypsis. Theil I. (Halle, 1788), 168Google Scholar. (All translations are my own.)

22. Anthony LaVopa emphasizes the Lutheran Church's role as mediator between God and the people in LaVopa, Anthony J., “The Philosopher and the Schwärmer. On the Career of a German Epithet from Luther to Kant,” Huntington Library Quarterly 60, no. 1 and 2 (1999): 85115.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

23. See Werner Schneider's discussion of German debates about the Enlightenment's, “true” nature in Die wahre Aufklärung: Zum Selbstverständnis der deutschen Aufklärung (Freiburg im Breisgau, 1974).Google Scholar

24. Lestition, , “Kant,” 57.Google Scholar

25. Schwartz, Paul, “Die beiden Opfer des preussischen Religionsediktes vom 9. Juli 1788:J. H. Schulz in Gielsdorf und K.W. Brumbey in Berlin,” Jahrbuch für Brandenburgische Kirchengeschichte 27, 28 (1932, 1933): 102–55; 96122Google Scholar. For a reading of the Schulz affair that differs sharply from mine, see Saine, Thomas P., The Problem of Being Modern, or the German Pursuit of Enlightenment font Leibniz to the French Revolution (Detroit, 1997), 294309.Google Scholar

26. All the books and pamphlets written in response to the Edict on Religion are now available in a single microfiche collection: Kemper, Dirk, Missbrauchte Aufklärung? Schriften zum preussischen Religionsedikt vom 9. Juli 1788 (Hildesheim, 1996).Google Scholar

27. Schwartz's Kulturkampf is the classic work in this tradition. It is often cited as support for negative views of Woellner. See also Tradt, Johannes, Der Religionsprozess gegen den Zopfschulzen (1791–1799): Ein Beitrag zur protestantischen Lehrpflicht und Lehrzucht in Brandenburg-Preussen gegen Ende des 18. Jahrhunderts (Frankfurt am Main, 1997)Google Scholar. Fritz Valjavec's “Das Woellnersche Religionsedikt und seine geschichthche Bedeutung” takes a different approach, avoiding the entire Enlightenment/Counter-Enlightenment question by putting Woellner and the edict into a broader historical framework. See Valjavec, , Ausgewählte Aufsätze (Munich, 1963), 294322Google Scholar. For a different view of Woellner and the edict, see Saine, , Problem, 286–94.Google Scholar

28. The historical background is based on Tradt, , Religionsprozess, 521.Google Scholar

29. This section is based partially on documents published during the controversy. Amelang, Karl Ludwig, Religions-Process des P. Seh. zu G. nebst dessen eigener gerichtlich übergebener Vertheidigungsschrift seiner Lehren (1792)Google Scholar; Amelang, , Vertheidigung des Prediger Schulz in der zweiten Instanz (Hamburg, 1798)Google Scholar; Amelang, , Zur Vertheidigung des Prediger Herrn Schulz zu Gielsdorf Wilkendorf und Hirschfelde (Berlin, 1792)Google Scholar; Volkmar, Leopold, Religions-Prozess des Predigers Schulz zu Gielsdorf genannt Zopfschulz, eines Lichtfreundes des achtzehnten Jahrhunderts (Leipzig, 1846)Google Scholar. Schulz and Bussmann had quite a history. Bussmann had married Schulz's sister, despite the preacher's disapproval, and the two had already come to blows over the content of his sermons. (Tradt, , Religionsprozess, 14.)Google Scholar

30. Amelang, , Vertheidigung, 20.Google Scholar

31. For more on these practices, see Sabean, David Warren, Power in the Blood: Popular Culture and Village Discourse in Early-Modern Germany (Cambridge, 1984)Google Scholar and Roper, Lyndal, Oedipus and the Devil: Witchcraft, Sexuality, and Religion in Early-Modern Europe (London, 1994)CrossRefGoogle Scholar. The investigation actually began with Schulz's immediate superior, Friedrich August Hanses, Inspector and Chief Preacher in Strausberg. Schulz successfully defended himself against this investigation, but Bussmann forced the man from whom he had originally leased the land, Johann Christian von Bismarck, to send another letter of complaint to the Superior Consistory in Berlin, which then began its own investigation. (Tradt, , Religionsprozess, 1316.)Google Scholar

32. In keeping with its Protestant origins, the consistory was divided into two halves — one lay, the other clerical. When Frederick William II ascended the throne in 1786, the consistory had the following members. Clerical: Anton Friedrich Büsching, Johann Samuel Diterich, Friedrich Samuel Sack (who had recently succeeded his father August Friedrich Sack), Johann Esias Silberschlag (the consistory's lone pietist; he also died in 1786), Johann Joachim Spalding, and Wilhelm Abraham Teller. Lay: Friedrich Gedike, Thomas Philip von der Hagen, Karl Friedrich von Irwing, Johann Friedrich Lamprecht, Johann Christian Nagel. In 1788, Johann Friedrich Zöllner would join the clerical side. See Schwartz, , Kulturkampf, 1834Google Scholar, for a thorough, though opinionated, discussion of the membership.

33. Amelang, , Vertheidigung, 20.Google Scholar

34. In 1723, Frederick William I expelled Christian Wolff from Prussia because his philosophical determinism supposedly legitimized military desertion. The idea was that if everything was determined, then deserters could not be held responsible for their actions. In 1740, Frederick II invited Wolff back. See Beck, Lewis White, Early German Philosophy: Kant and his Predecessors (Cambridge, 1969), 256–75.Google Scholar

35. Johann Esias Silberschlag was a committed Pietist and the only member of the consistory that could not be called a rationalist. See Schwartz, , Kulturkampf, 2629.Google Scholar

36. Amelang, , Vertheidigung, 27.Google Scholar

37. On this point, see Tradt, , Religionsprozess, 1718Google Scholar. Tradt's narration of the legal events is excellent, and I have relied on it heavily for the next few paragraphs. For the entire exchange between Schulz and the consistory, see Amelang, , Vertheidigung, 2036.Google Scholar

38. Ibid., 27.

39. Ibid., 36.

40. Schulz, Johann Heinrich, Versuch einer Anleitung zur Sittenlehre für Menschen, ohne Unterschied der Religionen: Nebst ein Anhange von den Todesstrafen, 4 vols. (Berlin, 1783).Google Scholar

41. ADB, 37: 556–58.Google Scholar

42. See Teller, Wilhelm Abraham, Wohlgemeinte Erínnerungen an ausgemachte aber doch leicht zu vergessende Wahrheiten auf Veranlassung des Königl. Edicts die Religionsverfassung in den Preussischen Staaten betreffend und bey Gelegenheit einer introductionspredigt von D. Wilhelm Abraham Teller (Berlin, 1788), (see also page 33).Google Scholar

43. On Büsching's background, see ADB, 3: 644–45Google Scholar. For a recent apotheosis of his enlightened virtue, see Hoffmann, Peter, Anton Friedrich Buesching (1724–1793): Ein Leben im Zeitalter der Aufklärung (Berlin, 2000)Google Scholar. On his role in denouncing Schulz, see Amelang, , Vertheidigung, 37Google Scholar, and Schwartz, , “Opfer,” 116.Google Scholar

44. Amelang, , Vertheidigung, 36.Google Scholar

45. Kant, Immanuel, Kants Werke (Berlin, 1923), 8: 1014.Google Scholar

46. On Kant's reasons for keeping reason stable, see O'Neill, Onora, Constructions of Reason: Explorations of Kant's Practical Philosophy (Cambridge, 1989)Google Scholar, and Laursen, , “Kantian Politics 3“: 584603.Google Scholar

47. See the following for discussions of Enthusiasm: Kreimendahl, Lothar and Hinske, Norbert, Die Aufklärung und die Schwärmer (Hamburg, 1988)Google Scholar; LaVopa, Anthony J., “The Philosopher and the Schwärmer,” 85115Google Scholar; and Pocock, J. G. A., “Enthusiasm: The Antiself of Enlightenment,” Huntington Library Quarterly 60, nos. 1 and 2 (1999): 728.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

48. Kant, , Werke, 8: 13.Google Scholar

49. LaVopa, , “Philosopher,” 87.Google Scholar

50. Amelang, , Vertheidigung, 44Google Scholar. See also Tradt, , Religionsprozess, 19.Google Scholar

51. Amelang, , Vertheidigung, 46.Google Scholar

52. On Zedlitz in general, see Mainka, Peter, Karl Abraham von Zedlitz und Leipe (1731–1793): Ein schlesischer Adliger in Diensten Friedrichs II. und Friedrich Wilhelms II. von Preussen (Berlin, 1995).Google Scholar

53. Amelang, , Verteidigung, 47.Google Scholar

54. For historical discussions, see Nisbet, H. B., “‘Was ist Aufklärung?’: The Concept of Enlightenment in Eighteenth-Century Germany,” Journal of European Ideas 12 (1982): 7795Google Scholar, and Schmidt, James, “The Question of Enlightenment: Kant, Mendelssohn, and the Mittwochsgesellschaft,” Journal of the History of Ideas (1989): 269–91CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Collections of documents are available in Bahr, , ed. Was ist Aufklärung?Google Scholar; Schmidt, , What Is Enlightenment?.Google Scholar

55. In this Zedlitz anticipated the arguments von Humboldt, Wilhelm made in “Ueber die Religion.”Google Scholarvon Humboldt, Wilhelm, Wilhelm von Humboldt: Werke in Fünf Bänden, ed. Flitner, Andreas and Giel, Klaus (Stuttgart, 1960), 1: 132.Google Scholar

56. Lessing's thought was crucial to this critical approach's development. See Aner, , TheologieGoogle Scholar, and Barth, Karl, Die protestantische Theologie im 19. Jahrhundert: Ihre Vorgeschichte und ihre Geschichte (Zurich, 1960).Google Scholar

57. Schulz, Johann Heinrich, Predigt über die falsche Lehre von ewigen Höllenstrafen (Berlin, 1784)Google Scholar; Schulz, Johann Heinrich, Antwort der weltlichen Stände auf die Supplik, welche der Protest. Geistliche Fried. Germ. Lüdke über die Nichtabschaffung des geistlichen Standes bei ihnen eingerichtet hat (Amsterdam, 1784)Google Scholar; Schulz, Johann Heinrich, Philosophische Betrachtungen ueber Theologie und Religion überhaupt, und die jüdische Insonderheit (Frankfurt, 1784)Google Scholar; Schulz, Johann Heinrich, Beurtheilung der vertrauten Briefe, die Religion betreffend: Vom Verfasser der Antwort der weltlichen Stände (Amsterdam, 1786)Google Scholar; Schulz, Johann Heinrich, Der entlarvte Moses Mendelssohn oder völlige Aufklärung des rätselhaften Todeverdrusses des M.M. (Amsterdam, 1786)Google Scholar; Schulz, Johann Heinrich, Erweis des himmelweiten Unterschieds der Moral von der Religion (Frankfurt, 1786).Google Scholar

58. Amelang, , Vertheidigung, 53.Google Scholar

59. I have used a later edition of this work: Schulz, Johann Heinrich, Erwis des himmelweiten Unterschieds der Moral von der Religion, nebst genauer bestimmung der Begriffe von Theologie, Religion, Kirche und (protestantischer) Hierarchie, und des Verhältnisses dieser Dinge zur Moral und zutn Staate (Frankfurt, 1788)Google Scholar; Amelang, , Vertheidigung, 78.Google Scholar

60. Schulz, , Erweis, 87.Google Scholar

61. Amelang, , Vertheidigung, 36Google Scholar; Schwartz, , “Opfer,” 126–28.Google Scholar

62. Schwartz, , Kulturkampf, 11.Google Scholar

63. Tradt, , Religionsprozess, 21.Google Scholar

64. Amelang, , Vertheidigung, 64.Google Scholar

65. Ibid., 77.

66. Ibid., 82.

67. Volkmar, , Religions-Prozess, 167.Google Scholar

68. ADB, 32: 747.Google Scholar

69. Carl Friedrich Bahrdt's anonymously published Das Religions-Edikt is the harshest example of the response.

70. Eisenberg, to Woellner, , 10 05 1796, Brumbey, Prediger in Berlin 1796–97, Geheimes Staatsarchiv Preussischer Kulturbesitz (hereafter GSta PK). I. HA Rep. 96, Nr 222D.Google Scholar

71. Eisenberg, to Woellner, , 10 05 1796, Brumbey, Prediger in Berlin 1796–97, GSta PK. I. HA Rep. 96, Nr 222D.Google Scholar

72. Among the 118 published texts that are available in Dirk Kemper's microfilm collection Missbrauchte Aufklärung? eight cover Schulz's dismissal, while not one covers Brumbey. (One text on Brumbey did appear, but it was published in Amsterdam. See Aktenmässige Darstellung Der Ideen, Handlungen Und Endlichen Schicksale Des Dimittirten Predigers Brumbey Und Seines Anhangs Zu Berlin: Nebst Einer Kurzen Geschichte Von Der Entstehung Seiner Konventikel (Amsterdam, 1797).Google Scholar) A similar situation obtains for the journal literature on the edict. Although Schulz's tribulations appear three times, Brumbey's dismissal merited no comment. This is the case for all of Germany, and not just the increasingly conservative Prussia. (I have relied on the Akademie der Wissenschaften zu Göttingen's indispensable Index deutschsprachiger Zeitschriften: 1750–1815 to verify this fact. The text version of the index is Schmidt, Klaus, ed., Index deutschsprachiger Zeitschriften: 1750–1815 (Hildesheim, 1996.)Google Scholar The online version is available at www.gbv.de.)

73. See LaVopa, , “Philosopher,” 8591Google Scholar, for a discussion of the philosophical relationship between Schwärmerei and Enthusiasmus in the German Enlightenment.

74. Eisenberg, to Woellner, , 10 05 1796, Brumbey, Prediger in Berlin 1796–97, GSta PK. I. HA Rep. 96, Nr 222D.Google Scholar

75. See Schwartz, Paul, “Die beiden Opfer,” 102–55, 96122.Google Scholar

76. Woellner, to William, Frederick II, 16 02 1796, Brumbey, Prediger in Berlin 1796–97, GSta PK. I. HA Rep. 96, Nr 222D.Google Scholar

77. Ibid., 22 February 1796.

78. Memorandum, 18 February 1796, Brumbey, Prediger in Berlin 1796–97, GSta PK. I. HA Rep. 96, Nr 222D.

79. In this context, Zöllner is especially notable for having sparked the “What is Enlightenment?” debate of the 1780s and 1790s. His “What is Enlightenment?” query first appeared in a footnote in an article on religion and marriage. Zöllner, , “Ist es rathsam, das Ehebündniss nicht ferner durch die Religion zu sanciren?,” Berlinische Monatsschrift 4 (1783): 508–17.Google Scholar

80. Zöllner, Johann Friedrich, “Vergleichung der Aktion des Predigers mit der des Schauspielers,” Berlinische Monatsschrift 1 (1783): 168177.Google Scholar

81. Ibid., 171.

82. Ibid., 174.

83. The Marienkirche survived the Second World War relatively unharmed, and the pulpit from which Zöllner preached can still be seen.

84. “Ueber Prediger-Kleidung,” Journal von und für Deutschland 7, no. 10 (1790): 321–23Google Scholar. Leopold Friedrich von Göckingk, a member of the enlightened Mittwochsgesellschaft, published this journal.

85. Ibid., 322.

86. Ibid., 323.

87. “Nachtrag zur Abhandlung von der Predigerkleidung im XI. Stück dieses Jahrgangs “Journal von und für Deutschland 7, no. 12 (1790): 556.Google Scholar

88. “Ist es wahr, dass der Redner auf der Bühne stärker rührt, als der Redner auf der Kanzel?” Magazin der Sächsischen Geschichte, no. 7 (1790): 613.Google Scholar

89. Kant, , “Beantwortung,” 481.Google Scholar

90. See, for example, Nisbet, , “Aufklärung,”Google Scholar and O'Neill, , Constructions.Google Scholar

91. Habermas' Structural Transformation is one of the most famous examples of too strong a reliance on Kant's vision of enlightenment. See also Nisbet, , “Aufklärung;”Google ScholarSchmidt, , “Enlightenment;”Google Scholar and the introductions to Bahr, , AufklärungGoogle Scholar; and Schmidt, , Enlightenment.Google Scholar

92. Kant, , “Beantwortung,” 485.Google Scholar

93. Rathgeber, Christina, “The Reception of Brandenburg-Prussia's New Lutheran Hymnal of 1781,” Historical Journal 36, no. 1 (1993): 115–36.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

94. On this issue, see also LaVopa, Anthony J., “The Politics of Enlightenment: Friedrich Gedike and German Professional Ideology,” The Journal of Modern History 62, no. 1 (1990): 3456.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

95. Kant's article originally appeared in the Berlinische Monatsschrift. The article is reprinted in English in Reiss, Hans, ed., Kant's Political Writings (Cambridge, 1991)Google Scholar. Quote taken from Reiss, , Writings, 248–49.Google Scholar

96. Teller, , Wohlgemeinte Erinnerungen, 3.Google Scholar

97. John Laursen has argued that Kant's approach to politics made room for subversion over the long term. See Laursen, , “The Subversive Kant.”Google Scholar This may have been Kant's dream, but I do not think it was realistic, nor do I think that historians are justified in reading the late eighteenth century through it. Too many things united Kant with conservatives like Woellner for us to get a complete picture in this way.

98. On Kant's problems with the Prussian censor, see Beck, , Philosophy, 434–35Google Scholar, and Dilthey, “Streit.’Google Scholar

99. Lestition, , “Kant.”Google Scholar