The German idealist philosopher Rudolf Hermann Lotze (1817-1881) founded his metaphysics upon science and attempted to reconcile the mechanistic laws of nature with divine purpose.

Rudolf Hermann Lotze the son of a doctor, was born on May 21, 1817, in Bautzen. He entered the University of Leipzig in 1834 and 4 years later earned doctoral degrees in medicine and philosophy. He was also adept at physics, mathematics, psychology, art, and literature. From 1841 to 1844 he taught medicine and philosophy at Leipzig. He first became known through his medical work Allgemeine Pathologie and Therapie als mechanische Naturwissenschaften (1842, 2nd ed. 1848; General Pathology and Therapy as Mechanical Science), in which he explained physiological processes in mechanistic terms. This mechanistic explanation of living and nonliving things was further developed in Allgemeine Physiologie des körperlichen Lebens (1851; General Physiology of Bodily Life) and in Medizinische Psychologie oder Physiologie der Seele (1852; Medical Psychology or Physiology of the Soul...