Jacob Nicolai Møller, also known as Jacques-Nicolas Moeller (1777–1862) was a Norwegian scientist and philosopher of the Romantic period.
Life
Møller was born in
Porsgrund on 6 February 1777, the son of a doctor.
[ T.-J. Lamy, "Moeller (Jacques-Nicolas)", '']Biographie Nationale de Belgique
The ''Biographie nationale de Belgique'' (French; "National Biography of Belgium") is a biographical dictionary of Belgium. It was published by the Royal Academy of Belgium in 44 volumes between 1866 and 1986. A continuation series, entitled the ' ...
''
vol. 14
(Brussels, 1897), 935-938. After studying at
Copenhagen University
The University of Copenhagen ( da, Københavns Universitet, KU) is a prestigious public research university in Copenhagen, Denmark. Founded in 1479, the University of Copenhagen is the second-oldest university in Scandinavia after Uppsala Unive ...
and gaining a reputation for brilliance, he passed the Danish civil service exam and was awarded a travel bursary to pursue further studies abroad in geology and mineralogy.
[ Arild Stubhaug, ''Niels Henrik Abel and his Times'', translated by Richard H. Daly (Springer Verlag, Berlin and Heidelberg, 2000), p. 372.] For two years he and his friend
Henrik Steffens
Henrik Steffens (2 May 1773 – 13 February 1845), was a Norwegian philosopher, scientist, and poet.
Early life, education, and lectures
He was born at Stavanger. At the age of fourteen he went with his parents to Copenhagen, where he studie ...
studied together in Berlin and later in
Freiberg
Freiberg is a university and former mining town in Saxony, Germany. It is a so-called ''Große Kreisstadt'' (large county town) and the administrative centre of Mittelsachsen district.
Its historic town centre has been placed under heritage c ...
, under the mineralogist
Abraham Gottlob Werner
Abraham Gottlob Werner (; 25 September 174930 June 1817) was a German geologist who set out an early theory about the stratification of the Earth's crust and propounded a history of the Earth that came to be known as Neptunism. While most tenet ...
. Møller then travelled to Paris, to study under
René Just Haüy
René Just Haüy () FRS MWS FRSE (28 February 1743 – 1 June 1822) was a French priest and mineralogist, commonly styled the Abbé Haüy after he was made an honorary canon of Notre Dame. Due to his innovative work on crystal structure and hi ...
and
Georges Cuvier, before rejoining Steffens at the
University of Jena
The University of Jena, officially the Friedrich Schiller University Jena (german: Friedrich-Schiller-Universität Jena, abbreviated FSU, shortened form ''Uni Jena''), is a public research university located in Jena, Thuringia, Germany.
The un ...
to sit at the feet of
Friedrich Schelling
Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling (; 27 January 1775 – 20 August 1854), later (after 1812) von Schelling, was a German philosopher. Standard histories of philosophy make him the midpoint in the development of German idealism, situating him be ...
.
After a conversion experience during an illness, he was received into the Catholic Church in Hamburg, on 27 January 1804,
[ the day of his marriage to Elisabeth Charlotte Alberti. His wife's sister was married to ]Ludwig Tieck
Johann Ludwig Tieck (; ; 31 May 177328 April 1853) was a German poet, fiction writer, translator, and critic. He was one of the founding fathers of the Romantic movement in the late 18th and early 19th centuries.
Early life
Tieck was born in B ...
. Becoming a Catholic disqualified him from public service in Denmark–Norway, so he sought academic employment in Germany.[ After some time in Munster, where he was supported by ]Friedrich Leopold zu Stolberg-Stolberg
Friedrich Leopold Graf zu Stolberg-Stolberg (7 November 1750 – 5 December 1819), was a German lawyer, and translator born at Bramstedt in Holstein (then a part of Denmark). He was also a poet of the ''Sturm und Drang'' and early Romantic ...
, he taught at a Gymnasium in Nuremberg before becoming tutor to the young Prince Kinsky. He went on to hold a number of short-lived teaching positions in Dresden, Vienna, Bonn and Dusseldorf, before being appointed "honorary professor" at the Catholic University of Leuven, in Belgium, where his son Jean Moeller was professor of history. He taught philosophy there from 1837 to 1842. He died in Leuven on 30 November 1862.[
]
Writings
Møller published in the ''Zeitschrift für speculative Physik'' (edited by Schelling) and the ''Kritische Journal der Philosophie'' (co-edited by Schelling and Hegel), as well as in several other reviews, both in France and Germany. Between 1839 and 1842 he published a series of articles on German philosophy in the '' Revue de Bruxelles''.
His books include:
*''Speculative Darstellung der Christenthums'' (Leipzig, 1819)
*''Das absolute Princip der Ethik'' (Leipzig, 1819)
* ''Johannes Scotus Erigena und seine Irrthümer'' (Mainz, 1844)
* ''De l'état de la philosophie moderne en Allemagne'' (Louvain, 1843)On Google Books
/ref>
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Moeller, Jacob
1777 births
1862 deaths