ESCHENMAYER, ADAM KARL AUGUST VON (1768-1852), German philosopher and physicist, was born at Neuenburg, Wurttemberg, in July 1768. He took his M.D. at Tubingen, and practised at Sulz, and then at Kirchheim. In 1811 he became professor of philosophy and medicine at Tubingen and in 1818 professor of practical philosophy, but in 1836 he retired to Kirchheim, where he devoted himself to philosophical studies. Eschenmayer's views resemble those of Schelling, except in re gard to the knowledge of the absolute. He believed that philoso phy must be supplemented by "non-philosophy," a kind of mysti cal illumination by which we arrive at God, the absolute unity, and see Him as the originator of the finite world with its opposing factors. Eschenmayer's mystical tendency led to an interest in the phenomena of animal magnetism. He became a believer in demo niacal and spiritual possession ; and his later writings are impreg nated with the lower supernaturalism.
His principal works are—Die Philosophie in ihrem tibergange zur Nichtpliilosophie (1803) ; Versuch die scheinbare Magie des thierischen Magnetismus aus physiol. and psychischen Gesetzen zu erkliiren (1816) ; System der Moralphilosophie (1818) ; Psy chologie in drei Theilen, als em pirisclie, refine, angewandte (1817) ; Religionsphilosophie (3 vols., 1818-24) ; Grundriss der Natur philosophie (183 2) ; Die Hegel'sche Religions phil oso phie ver glichen mit dem cliristl. Princip (1834) ; Der Ischariotismus un serer Tage (1835) (against Strauss's Life of Jesus) ; Konflikt zwis schen Himmel and Holle (183 7) ; Grundzuge der christl. Philos opliie (1840) ; and Betrachtungen uber den physischen Weltbau (1852).