SOURCE: “Religion Within the Limits of Human Perception: Schleiermacher,” in A Romantic Triangle: Schleiermacher and Early German Romanticism, Scholars Press, 1977, pp. 65-79.

In the following excerpt, Forstman critiques Schleiermacher's Speeches as evidence of his evolving religious philosophy, which makes a clear distinction between religion and morality.

In the early romantic circle in Berlin, at a time when polemics, not least against religion, had not yet given way to rebuilding, Friedrich Schleiermacher was something of an enigma to the others. He had won his rights to membership by solid performance on the salon circuit. An engaging conversationalist, sensitive to the new mood and attuned to it, his friendship was valued and his views honored. But he was also in the camp of the enemy. An ordained clergyman, he had been appointed by the superintendent of churches, Sack, to be the Reformed chaplain to the Charity Hospital in Berlin, a...