Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph von Schelling, the German idealist philosopher, was born at Leonberg in Württemberg, the son of a learned Lutheran pastor, Joseph Friedrich Schelling. From his earliest years, he was destined by his family for the ministry. He was educated at the cloister school of Bebenhausen and, from 1790 to 1792, at the theological seminary at Tübingen. There he became friendly with two older students who were to play significant roles in his own life, as well as in cultural history: G. W. F. Hegel and J. C. F. Hölderlin, the great romantic poet. The three young men were keen partisans of the French Revolution, and they also enthusiastically discussed the ideas of the philosophers, especially Benedict de Spinoza, Immanuel Kant, and Johann Gottlieb Fichte.

For several years Schelling held a position as tutor of the...