System of Transcendental Idealism is probably Schelling's most important philosophical work. A central text in the history of German idealism, its original German publication in 1800 came seven years after Fichte's Wissenschaftslehre and seven years before Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit.

The disputes of philosophers provide a place to view their positions and arguments in a tightly focused way, and also in a manner that is infused with human temperaments and passions. Fichte and Schelling had been perceived as "partners" in the cause of Criticism or transcendental idealism since 1794, but upon Fichte's departure from Jena in 1799, each began to perceive a drift in their fundamental interests and allegiances. Schelling's philosophy of nature seemed to move him toward a realistic philosophy, while Fichte's interests in the origin of personal consciousness, intersubjectivity, and the ultimate determination of the agent's moral will moved him to explore what he called "faith" in one popular text, or a theory of an intelligible world. This volume brings together the letters the two philosophers exchanged between 1800 and 1802 and the texts that each penned with the other in mind.

This is an English translation of Schelling's Ideas for a Philosophy of Nature (first published in 1797 and revised in 1803), one of the most significant works in the German tradition of philosophy of nature and early nineteenth-century philosophy of science. It stands in opposition to the Newtonian picture of matter as constituted by inert, impenetrable particles, and argues instead for matter as an equilibrium of active forces that engage in dynamic polar opposition to one another. In the revisions of 1803 Schelling incorporated this dialectical view into a neo-Platonic conception of an original unity divided upon itself. The text is of more than simply historical interest: its daring and original vision of nature, philosophy, and empirical science will prove absorbing reading for all philosophers concerned with post-Kantian German idealism, for scholars of German Romanticism, and for historians of science.

F. W. J. Schelling's On the History of Modern Philosophy surveys philosophy from Descartes to German Idealism and shows why the Idealist project is ultimately doomed to failure.

The absolute was one of the most significant philosophical concepts in the early nineteenth century, particularly for the German romantics. Its exact meaning and its role within philosophical romanticism remain, however, a highly contested topic among contemporary scholars. In The Romantic Absolute, Dalia Nassar offers an illuminating new assessment of the romantics and their understanding of the absolute. In doing so, she fills an important gap in the history of philosophy, especially with respect to the crucial period between Kant and Hegel. Scholars today interpret philosophical romanticism along two competing lines: one emphasizes the romantics’ concern with epistemology, the other their concern with metaphysics. Through careful textual analysis and systematic reconstruction of the work of three major romantics—Novalis, Friedrich Schlegel, and Friedrich Schelling—Nassar shows that neither interpretation is fully satisfying. Rather, she argues, one needs to approach the absolute from both perspectives. Rescuing these philosophers from frequent misunderstanding, and even dismissal, she articulates not only a new angle on the philosophical foundations of romanticism but on the meaning and significance of the notion of the absolute itself.

Comprehensive and incisive, with three new chapters, this updated edition sees world-renowned scholars explore a rich and complex philosophical movement.