Fichte: The Vocation of Man: pp 67-91 Part 1

Admittedly, even though I knew the entry was about faith, I had a difficult time reading it. It was a slow going process for a while, and I re-read many single sentences over and over again to try and glean some meaning from it.

Eventually, I settled upon the idea that Fichte was writing about his faith in truth and the voice that he kept referring too, I deemed it to be a kind of conscience. He writes of the voice, “It accompanies me, if only I listen to it attentively, through all of the events of my life, and it never denies me its advice when I have to act. It immediately justifies conviction and irresistibly elicits my assent; it is not possible for me to quarrel with it” (75). Fichte seemed to writing of an infinite kind of irresistible faith in truth, almost like a drug; something that compelled him to have purpose and a reason for doing things, despite his seeming belief in this idea that though nothing exists outside of himself he has faith in the truths that allow the sensory world to exist. That allows him to exist. And his faith was not only characterized by action, but thinking as an a wholly fulfilling action as well as he says that “only I myself produce through myself my whole way of thinking and the particular view I have of truth in general” (74).

As aforementioned this is what I settled upon as far as any meaning which I derived from the text. I had to work backwards in order to understand what was at the beginning, which was this strong relationship Fichte had with himself and the confidence he had in reason, despite all the plagues that humanity has experienced.