Produced by Adam Buchbinder and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This book was produced from scanned images of public domain material from the Google Print project.) THE PHILOSOPHY OF HISTORY; IN A COURSE OF LECTURES, DELIVERED AT VIENNA, BY FREDERICK VON SCHLEGEL. TRANSLATED FROM THE GERMAN, WITH A MEMOIR OF THE AUTHOR, BY JAMES BURTON ROBERTSON, ESQ. IN TWO VOLUMES. VOL. I. LONDON SAUNDERS AND OTLEY, CONDUIT STREET. MDCCCXXXV. B. BENSLEY, PRINTER. MEMOIR OF THE LITERARY LIFE of FREDERICK VON SCHLEGEL. In the following sketch of the literary life of the late Frederick Von Schlegel, it is the intention of the writer to take a rapid review of that author's principal productions, noticing the circumstances out of which they grew, and the influence they exerted on his age; giving at the same time a fuller analysis of his political and metaphysical systems:--an analysis which is useful, nay almost necessary to the elucidation of very many passages in the work, to which this memoir is prefixed. Of the inadequacy of his powers to the due execution of such a task, none can be more fully sensible than the writer himself; but he trusts that he will experience from the kindness of the reader, an indulgence proportionate to the difficulty of the undertaking. In offering to the British public a translation of one of the last works of one among the most illustrious of German writers, the Translator is aware, that after the excellent translation which appeared in 1818 of this author's "History of Literature," and also after the admirable translation of his brother's "Lectures on Dramatic Literature," by Mr. Black, his own performance must appear in a very disadvantageous point of view. But this is a circumstance which only gives it additional claims to indulgent consideration.