Die letzte Streitphase zwischen Fichte und Schmid um 1796

Abstract This paper deals with the dispute between Johann Gottlieb Fichte and Carl Chr. Erhard Schmid around 1796 in the context of Fichte’s rejection of Schmid’s philosophical position and with a special focus on a ‘methodological’ primacy of the Wissenschaftslehre over Schmid’s philosophy. I argue that, in line with the ,spirit‘ of Kant, Fichte bravely tried to examine the foundations of a fact of consciousness and to develop his Wissenschaftslehre as a transcendental philosophy, whereas Schmid, who focused on the ‘letter’ of Kant’s philosophy, forbade going beyond a fact of consciousness. In addition, in his work A Comparison between Prof. Schmid’s System and the Wissenschaftslehre, Fichte presented his new method of the future Wissenschaftslehe to the public. Hence, I argue that we should attribute the work to the ambit of Fichte’s later Jena Wissenschaftslehre (1796–1799) and we can even regard it as a ‘Pre-First’ Introduction to the Wissenschaftslehre nova methodo.