HARTMANN, hareman, Karl Robert Edouard von: b. Berlin. 23 Feb. 1842; d. 6 June 1906, He was educated for the army, but an injury to his knee compelled him to leave the service in 1865. He then began the study of philosophy, and for many years lived the retired life of a student. His most important publica tions are 'The Philosophy of the Unconscious' (1869) ; 'The Phenomenology of the Moral Consciousness' (1879) ; 'The Religious Con sciousness of Mankind in the Stages of Its De velopment' (1881); and 'The Religion of the Spirit' (1882). Among his other works are 'Critical Grounds of Transcendental Realism' ; 'The Crisis of Christianity in Modern Theol ogy' (1880) ; 'Judaism in the Present and the Future' (1885); 'Lotze's Philosophy' (1888) ; 'The Ghost Theory in Spiritism> (1891) ; 'The Fundamental Social Questions' (1894); and many other works on society, religion, etc.
Von Hartmann's philosophy is called by its author a transcendental realism, because in it he professes to reach by means of induction from the broadest possible basis of experience a knowledge of that which lies beyond experi ence. A certain portion of consciousness, namely, sense-perception, begins, changes and ends without our consent and often in direct opposition to our desires. Sense-perception, then, cannot he adequately explained from the ego alone, and the existence of things outside experience must be posited. Moreover, since they act upon consciousness and do so in dif ferent ways at different times, they must have those qualities assigned to them which would make such action possible. Casuality is thus made the link that connects the subjective world of ideas with the objective world of things. An examination of the rest of experi ence, especially such phenomena as instinct, voluntary motion, sexual love, artistic produc tion and the like, makes it evident that will and idea, unconscious but teleological, are everywhere operative, and that the underlying force is one and not many. This thing-in-it self may be called the Unconscious. It has two
equally original attributes, namely, will and idea. Hegel and Schopenhauer (qq.v.) were both wrong in making one of these subordinate to the other; on the contrary, neither can act alone, and neither is the result of the other. The will is illogical and causes the existence, the Das of the world; the idea, though not con scious, is logical, and determines the essence, the Was. The endless and vain striving of the will necessitates the great preponderance of suf fering in the universe, which could not well be more wretched than it is. Nevertheless, it must be characterized as the best possible world, for both nature and history are con stantly developing in the manner best adapted to the world-end; and by means of increasing consciousness the idea, instead of prolonging suffering to eternity, provides a refuge from the evils of existence in non-existence.
The original state of the Unconscious is one of potentiality, in which by pure chance the will begins to strive. In the transition state, called that of the empty will, there is no definite end; and to avoid the unhappiness of aimless desire the will realizes the ideas already potentially present and the Unconscious becomes actual. The existence of the universe is the result, then, of the illogical will, but its characteristics and laws are all due to the idea and are, there fore, logical. The history of the world is that given by natural science, and particular em phasis is laid upon the Darwinian theory of evolution (q.v.). Man is developed from the animal, and with the appearance of the first human being the deliverance of the world is in sight, for only in man does consciousness reach such height and complexity as to act in dependently of the will. As consciousness de velops, there is a constantly growing recogni tion of the fact that deliverance must lie in a return to the original state of non-willing, which means the non-existence of all individuals and the potentiality of the Unconscious.