Dr. Bruce Matthews, BHSEC's resident historian of religion and philosophy, has a lot going on beyond his BHSEC teaching career. In his own words, Matthews is currently “in the midst of writing an intellectual biography of Fredrick W. J. Schelling,” entitled Schelling: Heretic of Modernity. Fredrick Schelling was a German philosopher who lived from 1775 to 1854. He had a significant influence on German Idealism, the Romantic Movement, psychology, Philosophy of Nature, and Existentialism. According to Dr. Matthews, Søren Kierkegaard (who is credited with the spread of existentialism) heard Schelling's lectures in Berlin in 1841 and "took the ball and ran with it.”

According to Dr. Matthews, Schelling's greatest intellectual achievement is his “Philosophy of Nature,” which essentially warns humankind against the wanton exploitation of our Earth. Schelling held that the central tenet of modernity, that man can be infallibly reasonable and in control, fosters the false belief that humans are more important than nature.

Schelling was aware of humankind's dependence on nature when other thinkers were not, which is why Matthews has deemed him the “Heretic of Modernity.” As Dr. Matthews put it, Schelling held that “we only see nature for its economic value.” This mindset must be discarded if humans are to survive.

Though a labor of love, this book cannot be completed without considerable effort. After school, Dr. Matthews heads to the library on 42nd Street, where he has access to the Wertheim study, a room where scholars can leave their reference books for an extended period of time.

This coming October, Dr. Matthews will speak at a conference in Belgium on Schelling and German Idealism.