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Fichte regards Schelling’s work so highly that he calls him the sec¬
ond founder of the Study of Science (Wissenschaftslehre). Fichte was
already a well-known philosopher at this time. He belongs to the
geniuses among whom Kant can be classified. Fichte (1762-1814)
was the child of a poor ribbon weaver, just as Kant (1724-1804) was
a child of leatherworker—or, as he is more commonly described,
he was one of the nine children of a saddler. The age was very rich
in such volcanic geniuses who appeared out of nowhere. Fichte
admired Kant but also wanted to develop the latter’s philosophy
further. Kant was, of course, not necessarily happy about this.
The most important principle, which is vital to our study, is
that “the same” will be, according to Fichte (and Schelling), the
starting point of philosophy, because all serious thinking needs
a first principle (Grundsatz). They both refer back to the critical
comments of Carl Leonhard Rheinhold’, the worthy Viennese former
Jesuit and professor at the University of Jena, who was the first to
write of Kant that Kantian philosophy lacks a first principle. All
post-Kantian thinkers after this, especially Fichte, Schelling and
of course Hegel, agree on this. Their thinking is so similar that
when in 1794 Fichte writes Uber den Begriff der Wissenschaftslehre
(Concerning the Conception of the Science of Knowledge Generally),
Schelling also publishes in the same year a very important work
entitled Uber die Méglichkeit einer Form der Philosophie tiberhaupt (On
the Possibility of a Form of Philosophy in General), which, following
Fichte, develops the idea of an “identity-doctrine”, almost as if it
were a continuation of Fichte’s own work. For Schelling, philoso¬
phy is nothing but the study of identity and unity (Identitäts- und
7 Carl Leonhard Reinhold (1757-1823). The explainer of Kantian philosophy,
without whom some say Kant s influence would have been far less universal.
His Briefe über die Kantische Philosophie (Letters on the Kantian Philosophy)
appeared between 1786-87. Before Fichte, he was a professor at the Univers¬
ity of Jena. Fichte followed him in this, and Schelling followed Fichte. See
Gyenge 2005.