families, being unable to keep any post for long owing, it is said, to his proud temper and his original ideas on education. In 1788 he was a tutor at Zurich, where he met distinguished men like Lavater, and had the good fortune to fall in love with Johanna Rahn, the daughter of the Inspector of weights and measures.
In March 1790, on the termination of his teaching engagement at Zurich, Fichte went to Leipzig and, while waiting for a suitable post, began to study Kant’s philosophy for the first time, in order to give some lessons on it to a pupil who had asked for them. This study revolutionized his ideas and converted him from determinism to a belief in moral freedom and the inherent moral worth of man. As a result of this he took the opportunity of visiting Kant at Königsberg in 1791, after an abortive journey to Warsaw where he had been engaged to act as private tutor to a Polish family. He was warmly received by the old philosopher, who approved of an essay entitled Critique of all Revelation, which Fichte had written and sent to him. This essay was published in 1792, after Fichte had gone, on Kant’s recommendation, to Danzig to act as tutor to the family of the Count of Krockow. Owing to the publisher accidentally omitting the author’s name, the essay was taken for a work of Kant, and Fichte’s reputation was made. As a direct result of this he was able to marry Johanna Rahn on October 22, 1793.
The tracts which the French Revolution inspired Fichte to write at this time, and which established the rights of the people on the basis of the inherent moral freedom of man, increased his fame; but at the same time they caused moderate and conservative men to regard him as a radical and dangerous teacher. In spite of this, however, he was called to succeed Reinhold as
