Christian Garve
Encyclopedia
Age of Enlightenment
The Age of Enlightenment was an elite cultural movement of intellectuals in 18th century Europe that sought to mobilize the power of reason in order to reform society and advance knowledge. It promoted intellectual interchange and opposed intolerance and abuses in church and state...
along with Immanuel Kant
Immanuel Kant
Immanuel Kant was a German philosopher from Königsberg , researching, lecturing and writing on philosophy and anthropology at the end of the 18th Century Enlightenment....
and Moses Mendelssohn
Moses Mendelssohn
Moses Mendelssohn was a German Jewish philosopher to whose ideas the renaissance of European Jews, Haskalah is indebted...
.
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). In 1766 he gained his Master's degree in philosophy. From 1770 until 1772 he was Extraordinary professor of mathematicsMathematics
Mathematics is the study of quantity, space, structure, and change. Mathematicians seek out patterns and formulate new conjectures. Mathematicians resolve the truth or falsity of conjectures by mathematical proofs, which are arguments sufficient to convince other mathematicians of their validity...
and logic
Logic
In philosophy, Logic is the formal systematic study of the principles of valid inference and correct reasoning. Logic is used in most intellectual activities, but is studied primarily in the disciplines of philosophy, mathematics, semantics, and computer science...
in Leipzig
Leipzig
Leipzig Leipzig has always been a trade city, situated during the time of the Holy Roman Empire at the intersection of the Via Regia and Via Imperii, two important trade routes. At one time, Leipzig was one of the major European centres of learning and culture in fields such as music and publishing...
. 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
Masonic Lodge
This article is about the Masonic term for a membership group. For buildings named Masonic Lodge, see Masonic Lodge A Masonic Lodge, often termed a Private Lodge or Constituent Lodge, is the basic organisation of Freemasonry...
"Friedrich zum goldenen Zepter" ("Frederick with the Golden Scepter").
Garve became well-known particularly for his intensive activity as a translator (producing versions of, e.g., Cicero
Cicero
Marcus Tullius Cicero , was a Roman philosopher, statesman, lawyer, political theorist, and Roman constitutionalist. He came from a wealthy municipal family of the equestrian order, and is widely considered one of Rome's greatest orators and prose stylists.He introduced the Romans to the chief...
's De Officiis
De Officiis
De Officiis is an essay by Marcus Tullius Cicero divided into three books, in which Cicero expounds his conception of the best way to live, behave, and observe moral obligations.- Origin :...
and Adam Smith
Adam Smith
Adam Smith was a Scottish social philosopher and a pioneer of political economy. One of the key figures of the Scottish Enlightenment, Smith is the author of The Theory of Moral Sentiments and An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations...
's Wealth of Nations). 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
Scottish Enlightenment
The Scottish Enlightenment was the period in 18th century Scotland characterised by an outpouring of intellectual and scientific accomplishments. By 1750, Scots were among the most literate citizens of Europe, with an estimated 75% level of literacy...
as well as Stoic
Stoicism
Stoicism is a school of Hellenistic philosophy founded in Athens by Zeno of Citium in the early . The Stoics taught that destructive emotions resulted from errors in judgment, and that a sage, or person of "moral and intellectual perfection," would not suffer such emotions.Stoics were concerned...
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.
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
Johann Georg Heinrich Feder was a German philosopher.- Life :Feder was born on 15 May 1740 in the village of Schornweisach in the Principality of Bayreuth, the son of Martin Heinrich Feder , the village pastor. Feder studied theology and pedagogy at Erlangen...
. Kant felt himself to have been misunderstood. 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 Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysics That Will Be Able to Present Itself as a Science. The intellectual engagement between Kant and Garve extended up to Garve's death in 1798.
Garve's translations
- Edmund BurkeEdmund BurkeEdmund Burke PC was an Irish statesman, author, orator, political theorist and philosopher who, after moving to England, served for many years in the House of Commons of Great Britain as a member of the Whig party....
, Über den Ursprung unserer Begriffe vom Erhabenen und Schönen [A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of Our Ideas of the Sublime and BeautifulA Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of Our Ideas of the Sublime and BeautifulA Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of Our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful is a 1757 treatise on aesthetics written by Edmund Burke. It attracted the attention of prominent Continental thinkers such as Denis Diderot and Immanuel Kant....
], Riga, 1773 - Adam FergusonAdam FergusonAdam Ferguson FRSE, also known as Ferguson of Raith was a Scottish philosopher, social scientist and historian of the Scottish Enlightenment...
: Grundsätze der Moralphilosophie [Institutes of Moral Philosophy], Leipzig 1772