However, let us go a little more deeply into our confident jurist s most exhaustive specialised studies and his erudition deepened by three years of court practice. Herr D hring tells us of Lassalle that And so we are forced to say that Herr D hring would certainly not have been able to perpetrate this historical depiction in the grand style {556} against Lassalle if he had ever had the Code Napol on  in his hands. We must therefore state as a fact that modern French law, the only modern civil code, which rests on the social achievements of the great French Revolution and translates them into legal form, is completely unknown to Herr D hring. In another place, in the criticism of trial by jury with majority decision which was adopted throughout the Continent in accordance with the French model, we are taught: We can accordingly come to no other final conclusion than that Herr D hring's most exhaustive specialised studies consisted in his absorption for three years in the theoretical study of the Corpus juris,  and for a further three years in the practical study of the noble Prussian law. That is certainly quite meritorious, and would be ample for a really respectable district judge or lawyer in old Prussia. But when a person undertakes to compose a legal philosophy for all worlds and all ages, he should at least have some degree of acquaintance with legal systems like those of the French, English and Americans, nations which have played quite a different role in history from that played by the little corner of Germany in which Prussian law flourishes. But let us follow him further. Further: Similarly, his complaints about the compulsory introduction of religious practices in birth, marriage, death and burial {407} apply to Prussia alone of all the greater civilised countries, and since the adoption of civil registration they no longer apply even there.  What Herr D hring can accomplish only by means of a future socialitarian state of things, even Bismarck has meanwhile managed by means of a simple law. It is just the same with his plaint over the inadequate preparation of jurists for their profession {501}, a plaint which could be extended to cover the administrative officials {503} it is a specifically Prussian jeremiad; and even his hatred of the Jews, which he carries to ridiculous extremes and exhibits on every possible occasion, is a feature which if not specifically Prussian is yet specific to the region east of the Elbe. That same philosopher of reality who has a sovereign contempt for all prejudices and superstitions is himself so deeply immersed in personal crotchets that he calls the popular prejudice against the Jews, inherited from the bigotry of the Middle Ages, a natural judgment based on natural grounds , and he rises to the pyramidal heights of the assertion that It is hard to deal with morality and law without coming up against the question of so-called free will, of man's mental responsibility, of the relation between necessity and freedom. And the philosophy of reality also has not only one but even two solutions of this problem. True, Herr D hring's treatment of history is different. In general, being a record of error, ignorance and barbarity, of violence and subjugation, history is a repulsive object to the philosophy of reality; but considered in detail it is divided into two great periods, namely (1) from the self-equal state of matter up to the French Revolution, (2) from the French Revolution up to Herr D hring; the nineteenth century remains One of the most significant morsels of the new deep-rooted science {219} is the section on individualisation and increasing the value of life. In this section oracular commonplaces bubble up and gush forth in an irresistible torrent for three full chapters. Unfortunately we must limit ourselves to a few short samples. But this far from exhausts the deep-rootedness of our law of difference {219}. We are further given the following extremely practical rules of life: We should try out life, full life. There are only two things which Herr D hring prohibits us: For the rest, Herr D hring might be slightly more liberal in regard to spirituous liquors. A man who, by his own admission still cannot find the bridge from the static to the dynamic {D. Ph. 80} has surely every reason to be indulgent in judging some poor devil who has for once dipped too deep in his glass and as a result also seeks in vain the bridge from the dynamic to the static.
1877: Anti-Duhring - XI. Freedom and Necessity