This new edition was issued in 1844 and attracted
little attention. The fact that so powerful and original
a work, one too that possessed the grand merit of
lucidity, a merit almost tmknown in the Grerman phi-
losophical world, should have fallen almost still-born
from the press a second time, speaks most unfavour-
ably for the independent judgment of the Grerman
public. Large allowance must, however, be made for
the debased political state of the country : all intel-
lectual interest and vigour were sapped ; such as existed
found expression in patriotic conspiracies and enthu-
siasms : young Grermany was too preoccupied, old Grer-
many too apathetic, to probe a new system of phi-
losophy. The storm was brewing, the horrors of the
revolution were soon to burst, but Schopenhauer, ab-
sorbed in his speculations, had not felt the pulse of
his age carefully enough to recognise that these hateful
disturbances would prove the thunderstorm that clears
the atmosphere of impurities and makes room for more
vigorous life.
In 1846 Schopenhauer made the acquaintance of
Julius Frauenstadt, who at once became his Metro-
dorus. Attracted by ' Die Welt als Wille imd Vorstel-
lung,' he sought an interview with the philosopher,
the more readily accorded as he had preceded his visit
by a laudatory notice of Schopenhauer's philosophy.
