Christian Garve
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Christian Garve (7 January 1742 – 1 December 1798) was one of the best-known philosophers of the late
Enlightenment Enlightenment or enlighten may refer to: Age of Enlightenment * Age of Enlightenment, period in Western intellectual history from the late 17th to late 18th century, centered in France but also encompassing (alphabetically by country or culture): ...
along with Immanuel Kant and Moses Mendelssohn.


Life

Christian Garve was born into a family of manual workers and died aged 56 in his parental home. He studied in Frankfurt an der Oder and
Halle (Saale) Halle (Saale), or simply Halle (; from the 15th to the 17th century: ''Hall in Sachsen''; until the beginning of the 20th century: ''Halle an der Saale'' ; from 1965 to 1995: ''Halle/Saale'') is the largest city of the Germany, German States of ...
. In 1766 he gained his master's degree in philosophy. From 1770 until 1772 he was extraordinary professor of
mathematics Mathematics is an area of knowledge that includes the topics of numbers, formulas and related structures, shapes and the spaces in which they are contained, and quantities and their changes. These topics are represented in modern mathematics ...
and logic in Leipzig. From 1772 he was in Breslau, where he was active as a bookseller. The greatest part of his life was however spent staying with his mother in Breslau. In this city he also became a member of the Masonic Lodge "Friedrich zum goldenen Zepter" ("Frederick of the Golden Scepter"). Garve became well-known particularly for his intensive activity as a translator (producing versions of, e.g., Cicero's ''
De Officiis ''De Officiis'' (''On Duties'' or ''On Obligations'') is a political and ethical treatise by the Roman orator, philosopher, and statesman Marcus Tullius Cicero written in 44 BC. The treatise is divided into three books, in which Cicero expounds h ...
'' (1783) and
Adam Smith Adam Smith (baptized 1723 – 17 July 1790) was a Scottish economist and philosopher who was a pioneer in the thinking of political economy and key figure during the Scottish Enlightenment. Seen by some as "The Father of Economics"——— ...
's '' Wealth of Nations''). His translation of Cicero's work was done at the request of Frederick II, who bestowed upon him a pension of 200 thalers. Garve eulogized Frederick in the ''Fragmente zur Schilderung des Geistes, Charakters and der Regierung Friedrichs II.'' (1798). He composed psychological, moral and economic texts and reviews for the ''Neue Bibliothek der schönen Wissenschaften und der freyen Künste'' ("New Library of the Beautiful Sciences and Free Arts"). He was strongly marked by the influence of the English and
Scottish Enlightenment The Scottish Enlightenment ( sco, Scots Enlichtenment, gd, Soillseachadh na h-Alba) was the period in 18th- and early-19th-century Scotland characterised by an outpouring of intellectual and scientific accomplishments. By the eighteenth century ...
as well as Stoic ethics. He never formulated his essentially empirical philosophy in terms of a system, publishing his thought in the form of remarks and essays. As a result, he was reproached for being merely a shallow ''Popularphilosoph'' (popular philosopher), a reputation he has retained, and his writings did much toward the popularization of philosophy in Germany. Of interest is his engagement with Immanuel Kant, which was initiated by a review of Kant's ''Critique of Pure Reason'' in the ''Göttinger Gelehrten Anzeigen'' ("Göttingen Learned Advertiser") which had been shortened by the Göttingen philosopher
Johann Georg Heinrich Feder Johann Georg Heinrich Feder (; 15 May 1740 – 22 May 1821) was a German philosopher. Life Feder was born on 15 May 1740 in the village of Schornweisach (now a part of Uehlfeld, Bavaria) in the Principality of Bayreuth, the son of Martin Heinr ...
. Kant felt himself to have been misunderstood, and complained bitterly about the review in the Appendix to his Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysics that Will Henceforth Come Forward as a Science. When the original, longer review was published by Garve in the ''Allgemeine Deutsche Bibliothek'' ("General German Library"), it still attracted Kant's censure. Kant consequently wrote his own ''Anti-Garve''. This program in time expanded into Kant's '' Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals''. The intellectual engagement between Kant and Garve extended up to Garve's death of cancer"In his letter to Kant, September 1798 19 Garve movingly depicts his agonizing illness, a malignant tumor of the face, and expresses his astonishment that he is still living and thinking." ''Kant: Philosophical Correspondence 1759-99'', Edited and translated by Arnulf Zweig, University of Chicago Press, 1967, p. 250, note 2. in 1798.


Edition of Garve's works

* ''Gesammelte Werke'', ed. K. Wölfel, 15 vols. completed, 1985-


Works translated by Garve

*
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, ''Über den Ursprung unserer Begriffe vom Erhabenen und Schönen'' 'A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of Our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful''">A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of Our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful">'A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of Our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful'' Riga, 1773 * Adam Ferguson, ''Grundsätze der Moralphilosophie'' [''Institutes of Moral Philosophy''], Leipzig 1772 * Aristotle, Ἠθικά [Ethics] (1798-1801) * Aristotle, Πολιτικά [Politics] (1799-1802)


Notes


References

*


External links

*
Profilansicht Garves


* '' ttps://web.archive.org/web/20050116161156/http://dlib.stanford.edu:6520/text1/dd-ill/bauern.pdf Über den Charakter der Bauern und ihr Verhältniss gegen die Gutsherrn und gegen die Regierung', Frankfurt 1790 (PDF) {{DEFAULTSORT:Garve, Christian 1742 births 1798 deaths German philosophers Businesspeople from Wrocław People from the Province of Silesia University of Halle alumni European University Viadrina alumni Academic staff of Leipzig University German male writers Writers from Wrocław