Schelling has given a farther justification of this his idea of God, in his controversial pamphlet against Jacobi, (1812). The charge of naturalism which Jacobi made against him, he sought to refute by showing how the true idea of God was a union of naturalism and theism. Naturalism seeks to conceive of God as ground of the world (immanent), while theism would view him as the world’s cause (transcendent): the true course is to unite both determinations. God is at the same time ground and cause. It no way contradicts the conception of God to affirm that, so far as he reveals himself, he developes himself from himself, advancing from the imperfect to the perfect: the imperfect is in fact the perfect itself, only in a state of becoming. It is necessary that this becoming should be by stages, in order that the fulness of the perfect may appear on all sides. If there were no obscure ground, no nature, no negative principle in God, we could not speak of a consciousness of God. So long as the God of modern theism remains the simple essence which ought to be purely essential, but which in fact is without essence, so long as an actual twofoldness is not recognized in God, and a limiting and denying energy (a nature, a negative principle) is not placed in opposition to the extending and affirming energy in God, so long will science be entitled to make its denial of a personal God. It is universally and essentially impossible to conceive of a being with consciousness, which has not been brought into limit by some denying energy within himself—as universally and essentially impossible as to conceive of a circle without a centre.
VI. Since the essay against Jacobi, which in its philosophical content accords mainly with his theory of freedom, Schelling has not made public any thing of importance. He has often announced a work entitled “_Die Weltalter_,” which should contain a complete and elaborate exposition of his philosophy, but has always withdrawn it before its appearance. _Paulus_ has surreptitiously brought his later Berlin lectures before the public in a manner for which he has been greatly blamed: but since this publication is not recognized by Schelling himself, it cannot be used as an authentic source of knowledge of his philosophy. During this long period, Schelling has published only two articles of a philosophical content: “_On the Deities of Samothracos_,” 1815, and a “_Critical Preface_” to _Becker’s_ translation of a preface of _Cousin_, 1834. Both articles are very characteristic of the present standpoint of Schelling’s philosophizing—he himself calls his present philosophy _Positive Philosophy, or the Philosophy of Mythology and Revelation_,—but as they give only intimations of this, and do not reach a complete exposition, they do not admit of being used for our purpose.