3 FEBRUARY 1872, Page 3

Professor Trendelenburg, of Berlin, is no more. He was quite

one of the first of the living philosophers of Germany, and united a most exact and scholarlike spirit with great power of thought and a thoroughly religious mind. His lectures on Plato were among the most fascinating of German philosophical studies, so thoroughly did Professor Trendelenburg reproduce the great imaginative charm of the Greek thinker. His own teaching was cast in the mould of the soberer German theorists, for he emulated not the high a priori flights of Schelling and Hegel, but rather the steady and careful psychology of Kant. His" Logical Investigations" (" Logische Untersuchungen ") have passed through many editions, and though we do not think the fundamental conception of that excellent book will ultimately be recognized as sound, it is full of careful and thoughtful criticism. There are few metaphysicians in Germany whose grasp of ethics was so solid, and in some sense we might say English, as Trende- lenburg. He had been attacked by paralysis some time ago, but had recovered, and had resumed his lectures for some time with characteristic energy and few symptoms of failing power. The seizure which caused his death was also on the brain and very sudden, occurring while he was in class, but it was not a lingering illness, for he died the next day. Germany has gained much from the philosophy of Trendelenburg, and has gained especially what she most needed, a great example of intellectual simplicity, humility, and fidelity of method.