Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- Chronology
- Further reading
- Note on texts and translations
- Introduction
- Philosophical and theological writings
- 1 The Christianity of reason (c. 1753)
- 2 On the reality of things outside God (1763)
- 3 Spinoza only put Leibniz on the track of [his theory of] pre-established harmony (1763)
- 4 On the origin of revealed religion (1763 or 1764)
- 5 Leibniz on eternal punishment (1773)
- 6 [Editorial commentary on the ‘Fragments’ of Reimarus, 1777]
- 7 On the proof of the spirit and of power (1777)
- 8 The Testament of St John (1777)
- 9 A rejoinder (1778)
- 10 A parable (1778)
- 11 Axioms (1778)
- 12 New hypothesis on the evangelists as merely human historians (1778)
- 13 Necessary answer to a very unnecessary question of Herr Hauptpastor Goeze of Hamburg (1778)
- 14 The religion of Christ (1780)
- 15 That more than five senses are possible for human beings (c. 1780)
- 16 Ernst and Falk: dialogues for Freemasons (1778–80)
- 17 The education of the human race (1777–80)
- 18 [Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi, Recollections of conversations with Lessing in July and August 1780 (1785)]
- Index
- Cambridge texts in the history of philosophy
7 - On the proof of the spirit and of power (1777)
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 June 2012
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- Chronology
- Further reading
- Note on texts and translations
- Introduction
- Philosophical and theological writings
- 1 The Christianity of reason (c. 1753)
- 2 On the reality of things outside God (1763)
- 3 Spinoza only put Leibniz on the track of [his theory of] pre-established harmony (1763)
- 4 On the origin of revealed religion (1763 or 1764)
- 5 Leibniz on eternal punishment (1773)
- 6 [Editorial commentary on the ‘Fragments’ of Reimarus, 1777]
- 7 On the proof of the spirit and of power (1777)
- 8 The Testament of St John (1777)
- 9 A rejoinder (1778)
- 10 A parable (1778)
- 11 Axioms (1778)
- 12 New hypothesis on the evangelists as merely human historians (1778)
- 13 Necessary answer to a very unnecessary question of Herr Hauptpastor Goeze of Hamburg (1778)
- 14 The religion of Christ (1780)
- 15 That more than five senses are possible for human beings (c. 1780)
- 16 Ernst and Falk: dialogues for Freemasons (1778–80)
- 17 The education of the human race (1777–80)
- 18 [Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi, Recollections of conversations with Lessing in July and August 1780 (1785)]
- Index
- Cambridge texts in the history of philosophy
Summary
… because of the prodigious miracles which may be proved by this argument among many others, that traces of them still remain among those who live according to the will of the Word.
Origen, Against CelsusTo Director Schumann of Hanover Brunswick, 1777
Sir,
Who could be more eager than I to read your new work at once? – I hunger so greatly for conviction that, like Erysichthon, I devour anything that looks remotely like food. – If you do the same with this pamphlet, we are two of a kind. I am, with the respect with which seekers after truth never fail to regard each other,
Yours etc.
Fulfilled prophecies which I myself experience are one thing; fulfilled prophecies of which I have only historical knowledge that others claim to have experienced them are another.
Miracles which I see with my own eyes, and have an opportunity to assess, are one thing; miracles of which I know only from history that others claim to have seen and assessed them are another.
This is surely incontrovertible? Surely there can be no objections to this?
If I had lived at the time of Christ, the prophecies fulfilled in his person would certainly have made me pay great attention to him.
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- Lessing: Philosophical and Theological Writings , pp. 83 - 88Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2005
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