Frederick William II was King of Prussia from 1786 until his death in 1797. He was in personal union the Prince-elector of Brandenburg and sovereign prince of the Canton of Neuchâtel. Pleasure-loving and indolent, he is seen as the antithesis to his predecessor, Frederick the Great.. Under his reign, Prussia was weakened internally and externally, and he failed to deal adequately with the challenges to the existing order posed by the French Revolution. His religious policies were directed against the Enlightenment and aimed at restoring a traditional Protestantism. However, he was a patron of the arts and responsible for the construction of some notable buildings, among them the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin.
Why I Am Not a Christian is an essay by the British philosopher Bertrand Russell. Originally a talk given 6 March 1927 at Battersea Town Hall, under the auspices of the South London Branch of the National Secular Society, it was published that year as a pamphlet and has been republished several times in English and in translation.
"Answering the Question: What Is Enlightenment?", often referred to simply as "What Is Enlightenment?", is a 1784 essay by the philosopher Immanuel Kant. In the December 1784 publication of the Berlinische Monatsschrift, edited by Friedrich Gedike and Johann Erich Biester, Kant replied to the question posed a year earlier by the Reverend Johann Friedrich Zöllner, who was also an official in the Prussian government. Zöllner's question was addressed to a broad intellectual public community, in reply to Biester's essay entitled: "Proposal, not to engage the clergy any longer when marriages are conducted" and a number of leading intellectuals replied with essays, of which Kant's is the most famous and has had the most impact. Kant's opening paragraph of the essay is a much-cited definition of a lack of enlightenment as people's inability to think for themselves due not to their lack of intellect, but lack of courage.
Christoph Friedrich Nicolai was a German writer and bookseller.
The Vossische Zeitung was a nationally known Berlin newspaper that represented the interests of the liberal middle class. It was also generally regarded as Germany's national newspaper of record. In the Berlin press it held a special role due to the fact that by way of its direct predecessors it was the oldest newspaper in the city. The name went back to Christian Friedrich Voss, who was its owner from 1751 to 1795, but Vossische Zeitung became its official name only after 1911. It ceased publication in 1934 under pressure from the Nazi state.
Johann Crüger was a German composer of well-known hymns. He was also the editor of the most widely used Lutheran hymnal of the 17th century, Praxis pietatis melica.
Ludwig Darmstaedter was a German chemist and historian of science.
Heinrich Menuvon Minutoli was a Prussian Generalmajor, explorer and archaeologist.
The Evangelisches Gymnasium zum Grauen Kloster, located in suburban Schmargendorf, Berlin, is an independent school with a humanistic profile, known as one of the most prestigious schools in Germany. Founded by the Evangelical Church in West Berlin in 1949 as the Evangelisches Gymnasium, it continues the traditions of the ancient Berlinisches Gymnasium zum Grauen Kloster, the oldest Gymnasium in Berlin, which for hundreds of years was situated in former monastery buildings in the city's Mitte district, closed by the East Germans in 1958. In 1963 the Evangelisches Gymnasium of West Berlin adopted its traditions and added "zum Grauen Kloster" to its name.
Johann Friedrich Wilhelm Ferdinand Collmann was a German painter and professor, and between 1821 and 1837 he was a member of the Preußische Akademie der Künste.
The (Geheime) Berliner Mittwochsgesellschaft was a small group of German liberal thinkers in Berlin.
In 1740 Frederick II, known as Frederick the Great, came to power in the Kingdom of Prussia. Under the rule of the philosophically-oriented Frederick II, Berlin gave birth to an intellectual renaissance in which it became one of the most important centers of the Enlightenment in Europe. The city was an important printing press location, as well as the new home of many drama groups. Later, it hosted a National Theater, the Academy of the Arts and the Academy of Sciences.
The Institute for Research on the Jewish Question was a Nazi Party political institution, founded in April 1939. Conceived as a branch of a projected elite university of the party under the direction of Alfred Rosenberg, it officially opened in Frankfurt am Main in March 1941, during the Second World War, and remained in existence until the end of the war, in 1945.
Christian Felix Weiße (1726–1804) was a German writer and pedagogue. Weiße was among the leading representatives of the Enlightenment in Germany and is regarded as the founder of German children's literature.
Maximilian Julius Leopold of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel, Prince of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel and nominal Duke of Brunswick and Lüneburg was a Prussian major general and one of the few high officers in the armies of the late European Enlightenment, for whom the subordinate soldier was more than an expendable tool in the hands of the commanding officer. Princely charity towards soldiers and citizens and the circumstances of his death made Leopold famous.
Philosophy of culture is a branch of philosophy that examines the essence and meaning of culture.
Franz Michael Leuchsenring was a German writer of the German Enlightenment.
Johann Erich Biester was a German philosopher. With Friedrich Nicolai and Friedrich Gedike, he formed what was known as the 'Triumvirate' of late Enlightenment Berlin.
Königsstädtisches Theater was the name of different theater buildings in Berlin in the 19th and 20th century.
Dietrich Karl Nummert was a German journalist and author.
