Franjo Markovic
Encyclopedia
Franjo Marković was a Croatian
philosopher and writer.
He was an academician, the first professor of philosophy at the renovated University of Zagreb
in 1874. The defender of the identity of philosophy as a metaphysical
discipline, as opposed to scholasticism
on one side, and positivism
and materialism
on the other side.
His greatest philosophical work is the Razvoj i sustav obćenite estetike ("The development and the system of general aesthetics"), which heavily influenced the development of Croatian philosophical thought due to its extensive and all-encompassing overview of the history of aesthetics
in Croatian language
and the introduction of new philosophic terms. He is the founder of the research of Croatian philosophic heritage.
As a writer, he is noted for his lyric-reflexive poetry, epic compositions and dramas. He is a characteristic Romanticist
("national-romantic spirit"), and in the poetry he is noted as an ardent follower of Adam Mickiewicz
.
at the Nobility Boarding School in Zagreb. In 1862 he left for a study of classical philology
and Slavic studies in Vienna
. He graduated in 1865, and the next year he passed his gymnasium professorship exam. He worked as an assistant, and soon became a full professor at gymnasiums in Osijek and Zagreb. In 1870, after one political protest, he left his service and headed for Vienna to study philosophy, and soon to Dresden, Leipzig, Berlin and Paris, receiving his Ph.D. in philosophy in 1872.
In 1874 he was appointed as the first head of the independent department for philosophy in Zagreb and the dean of the Faculty of Philosophy. That year the renovated University of Zagreb
was founded, and within it the Faculty of philosophy (then called Mudroslovni fakultet), and on it the Department for Philosophy (Stolica za mudroslovje teoretično i praktično sa povjestnicom). He served as a rector of the University in the academic year 1881/1882. He continued to teach until his retirement in 1909.
He served as the editor-in-chief of Vijenac
in the period 1872-1873. He was also a member of Matica hrvatska
from 1875, and a full member of JAZU
from 1876.
He served as a representative of the Križevci county in the Parliament of Croatia and Slavonia in the last two decades of the 19th century (at the period of ban Dragutin Károly Khuen-Héderváry). As a member of a mild opposition, he operated by his own principle, insisting on ethical principles in politics. As a "typical representative of Croatian minor nobility" he defends Croatian interests against Hungarian imperialistic pretensions, advocates constitutional protection, political freedom and "spiritual prospect and material development" of the common people.
, psychology
, physics
, metaphysics
, ethics
, aesthetics
, epistemology, pedagogy
and the history of philosophy
). At that period the concept of "philosophy" encompassed also history, geography, linguistics, anthropology, pedagogy, natural sciences and mathematics, which were thought by other professors.
In his teaching of philosophy he adhered to the system developed by Johann Friedrich Herbart
, which at the period (after the revolutionary 1848, which was much contributed to by young Hegelianists
, so the authorities were intent to suppress Hegel's and Kant
's influence) was generally accepted in Germany and Austria–Hungary. His system had pedagogic qualities for the development of consistence and strictness in conceptual thought and was hence fit to be "propedeutics of philosophical spirit at us". Albert Bazala, which inherited in 1909 Marković's department, abandons Herbart's system). He monitored all current spiritual movements, read German, French, English and other authors, and made his students known with their works, even if they were not sanctioned by him.
As the first professor of philosophy with a systematic teaching record, translating and writing in vernacular language (and not Latin or German), Marković made a substantial impact on the development of Croatian philosophical terminology.
In 1880 he promoted Gjuro Arnold as the first Ph.D. in philosophy, who finally joined him in 1894 as a full professor. Arnold has, along with the philosophical teachings, lead the department of pedagogy. In 1904 he habilitated Albert Bazala as a private docent of philosophy.
tradition and neo-scholasticism
, which was promoted at that time in vernacular writings by the professors of the Faculty of Theology and other theologians
. On the other side, defending the metaphysics he was confronted with materialism and positivism, which reached Croatia at that period, and where he is followed by his disciple Albert Bazala. "Nothing valuable is produced by human labour without the vigorous, logical, aesthetic and ethic tendency, i.e. without philosophic tendency."
's formalism, which provides a compromise between the exactness of natural sciences and the metaphysical speculation, with an emphasis on the strictness of conceptual thought. He emphasized psychology as a starting point of philosophy (psychologism
): "Her [of a philosophy] infinite, ultimately never reachable goal is a prudential system of cogitations and within it organised sentiments and aspirations."
Herbart's school, as hence the Marković himself, insist on maintaining diversity and irreducibility of psychic and material nature, especially contradicting materialist reducibility of former to the latter. He deems that "rational psychology and cosmology bear witness in favor of spiritism", i.e. against materialism: the matter is not sentient and free, and thus not subject to the law of causativity, so man's consciousness and freedom cannot possibly be a result of matter, but of higher and perfected being, i.e. the spirit.
issues he mostly diverged from formalistic confines of Herbart's school, taking interest into positivist and sociological currents and expressing his own, intensive ethical sentiment. He denounced naturalism
, materialism
and Darwin's theory of evolution
, which lead to the "bankruptcy of ethics", giving prominence to either egoism
, or "benefit to society, as understood by the public". Albert Bazala criticizes narrow-minded ethical principles of his teacher quite voluminously, and so does Gjuro Arnold.
Mostly dealing with the historical motifs, Marković engaged in the ongoing battle for the affirmation of Croatdom against Hungarian and German domination. Idyllic epic Dom i svijet ('The home and the world') elaborates on contemporary themes. Epic Kohan i Vlasta ('Kohan and Vlasta') portrays a battle of old Slavs and Germans on the Baltic. The tragedy Karlo Drački depicts man's suffering in the struggle for panhuman ideal of freedom against the Rome and Magyar feudal lords. The tragedies Benk bot and Zvonimir display vices and rapacity of Hungarian landlords and court. Marković also wrote poems, literary critics and studies. He composed lyrics for quire version of the song U boj!
from the opera Nikola Šubić Zrinski
.
His major books and general works published during his lifetime include:
In 1970 his selected works (Izabrana djela) were published in the edition Pet stoljeća hrvatske književnosti ('Five centuries of Croatian literature'), vol. 44.
A bulk of lecturing MSS. has been preserved, some of which have been processed and published in the periodical Prilozi za istraživanje hrvatske filozofske baštine.
Croats
Croats are a South Slavic ethnic group mostly living in Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and nearby countries. There are around 4 million Croats living inside Croatia and up to 4.5 million throughout the rest of the world. Responding to political, social and economic pressure, many Croats have...
philosopher and writer.
He was an academician, the first professor of philosophy at the renovated University of Zagreb
University of Zagreb
The University of Zagreb is the biggest Croatian university and the oldest continuously operating university in the area covering Central Europe south of Vienna and all of Southeastern Europe...
in 1874. The defender of the identity of philosophy as a metaphysical
Metaphysics
Metaphysics is a branch of philosophy concerned with explaining the fundamental nature of being and the world, although the term is not easily defined. Traditionally, metaphysics attempts to answer two basic questions in the broadest possible terms:...
discipline, as opposed to scholasticism
Scholasticism
Scholasticism is a method of critical thought which dominated teaching by the academics of medieval universities in Europe from about 1100–1500, and a program of employing that method in articulating and defending orthodoxy in an increasingly pluralistic context...
on one side, and positivism
Positivism
Positivism is a a view of scientific methods and a philosophical approach, theory, or system based on the view that, in the social as well as natural sciences, sensory experiences and their logical and mathematical treatment are together the exclusive source of all worthwhile information....
and materialism
Materialism
In philosophy, the theory of materialism holds that the only thing that exists is matter; that all things are composed of material and all phenomena are the result of material interactions. In other words, matter is the only substance...
on the other side.
His greatest philosophical work is the Razvoj i sustav obćenite estetike ("The development and the system of general aesthetics"), which heavily influenced the development of Croatian philosophical thought due to its extensive and all-encompassing overview of the history of aesthetics
Aesthetics
Aesthetics is a branch of philosophy dealing with the nature of beauty, art, and taste, and with the creation and appreciation of beauty. It is more scientifically defined as the study of sensory or sensori-emotional values, sometimes called judgments of sentiment and taste...
in Croatian language
Croatian language
Croatian is the collective name for the standard language and dialects spoken by Croats, principally in Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, the Serbian province of Vojvodina and other neighbouring countries...
and the introduction of new philosophic terms. He is the founder of the research of Croatian philosophic heritage.
As a writer, he is noted for his lyric-reflexive poetry, epic compositions and dramas. He is a characteristic Romanticist
Romanticism
Romanticism was an artistic, literary and intellectual movement that originated in the second half of the 18th century in Europe, and gained strength in reaction to the Industrial Revolution...
("national-romantic spirit"), and in the poetry he is noted as an ardent follower of Adam Mickiewicz
Adam Mickiewicz
Adam Bernard Mickiewicz ) was a Polish poet, publisher and political writer of the Romantic period. One of the primary representatives of the Polish Romanticism era, a national poet of Poland, he is seen as one of Poland's Three Bards and the greatest poet in all of Polish literature...
.
Biography
Born in a noble family, by father Antun and mother Josipa (b. Šugh). He attended the gymnasiumGymnasium (school)
A gymnasium is a type of school providing secondary education in some parts of Europe, comparable to English grammar schools or sixth form colleges and U.S. college preparatory high schools. The word γυμνάσιον was used in Ancient Greece, meaning a locality for both physical and intellectual...
at the Nobility Boarding School in Zagreb. In 1862 he left for a study of classical philology
Classical philology
Classical philology is the study of ancient Greek and classical Latin. Classical philology has been defined as "the careful study of the literary and philosophical texts of the ancient Greek and Roman worlds." Greek and Latin literature and civilization have traditionally been considered...
and Slavic studies in Vienna
Vienna
Vienna is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Austria and one of the nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austria's primary city, with a population of about 1.723 million , and is by far the largest city in Austria, as well as its cultural, economic, and political centre...
. He graduated in 1865, and the next year he passed his gymnasium professorship exam. He worked as an assistant, and soon became a full professor at gymnasiums in Osijek and Zagreb. In 1870, after one political protest, he left his service and headed for Vienna to study philosophy, and soon to Dresden, Leipzig, Berlin and Paris, receiving his Ph.D. in philosophy in 1872.
In 1874 he was appointed as the first head of the independent department for philosophy in Zagreb and the dean of the Faculty of Philosophy. That year the renovated University of Zagreb
University of Zagreb
The University of Zagreb is the biggest Croatian university and the oldest continuously operating university in the area covering Central Europe south of Vienna and all of Southeastern Europe...
was founded, and within it the Faculty of philosophy (then called Mudroslovni fakultet), and on it the Department for Philosophy (Stolica za mudroslovje teoretično i praktično sa povjestnicom). He served as a rector of the University in the academic year 1881/1882. He continued to teach until his retirement in 1909.
He served as the editor-in-chief of Vijenac
Vijenac
Vijenac is a biweekly magazine for literature, art and science, established in December 1993 and published by Matica hrvatska, the central national cultural institution in Croatia.-Historical background:...
in the period 1872-1873. He was also a member of Matica hrvatska
Matica hrvatska
Matica hrvatska is one of the oldest Croatian cultural institutions, dating back to 1842. The name is somewhat idiosyncratic, best translated as "The Croatian Centre" . It is the largest publisher of Croatian language books...
from 1875, and a full member of JAZU
Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts
The Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts is the national academy of Croatia. It was founded in 1866 as the Yugoslav Academy of Sciences and Arts , and was known by that name for most of its existence.- History :...
from 1876.
He served as a representative of the Križevci county in the Parliament of Croatia and Slavonia in the last two decades of the 19th century (at the period of ban Dragutin Károly Khuen-Héderváry). As a member of a mild opposition, he operated by his own principle, insisting on ethical principles in politics. As a "typical representative of Croatian minor nobility" he defends Croatian interests against Hungarian imperialistic pretensions, advocates constitutional protection, political freedom and "spiritual prospect and material development" of the common people.
Teaching of philosophy
Marković held lectures on all philosophic disciplines (logicLogic
In philosophy, Logic is the formal systematic study of the principles of valid inference and correct reasoning. Logic is used in most intellectual activities, but is studied primarily in the disciplines of philosophy, mathematics, semantics, and computer science...
, psychology
Psychology
Psychology is the study of the mind and behavior. Its immediate goal is to understand individuals and groups by both establishing general principles and researching specific cases. For many, the ultimate goal of psychology is to benefit society...
, physics
Physics
Physics is a natural science that involves the study of matter and its motion through spacetime, along with related concepts such as energy and force. More broadly, it is the general analysis of nature, conducted in order to understand how the universe behaves.Physics is one of the oldest academic...
, metaphysics
Metaphysics
Metaphysics is a branch of philosophy concerned with explaining the fundamental nature of being and the world, although the term is not easily defined. Traditionally, metaphysics attempts to answer two basic questions in the broadest possible terms:...
, ethics
Ethics
Ethics, also known as moral philosophy, is a branch of philosophy that addresses questions about morality—that is, concepts such as good and evil, right and wrong, virtue and vice, justice and crime, etc.Major branches of ethics include:...
, aesthetics
Aesthetics
Aesthetics is a branch of philosophy dealing with the nature of beauty, art, and taste, and with the creation and appreciation of beauty. It is more scientifically defined as the study of sensory or sensori-emotional values, sometimes called judgments of sentiment and taste...
, epistemology, pedagogy
Pedagogy
Pedagogy is the study of being a teacher or the process of teaching. The term generally refers to strategies of instruction, or a style of instruction....
and the history of philosophy
History of philosophy
The history of philosophy is the study of philosophical ideas and concepts through time. Issues specifically related to history of philosophy might include : How can changes in philosophy be accounted for historically? What drives the development of thought in its historical context? To what...
). At that period the concept of "philosophy" encompassed also history, geography, linguistics, anthropology, pedagogy, natural sciences and mathematics, which were thought by other professors.
In his teaching of philosophy he adhered to the system developed by Johann Friedrich Herbart
Johann Friedrich Herbart
Johann Friedrich Herbart was a German philosopher, psychologist, and founder of pedagogy as an academic discipline....
, which at the period (after the revolutionary 1848, which was much contributed to by young Hegelianists
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel was a German philosopher, one of the creators of German Idealism. His historicist and idealist account of reality as a whole revolutionized European philosophy and was an important precursor to Continental philosophy and Marxism.Hegel developed a comprehensive...
, so the authorities were intent to suppress Hegel's and Kant
Immanuel Kant
Immanuel Kant was a German philosopher from Königsberg , researching, lecturing and writing on philosophy and anthropology at the end of the 18th Century Enlightenment....
's influence) was generally accepted in Germany and Austria–Hungary. His system had pedagogic qualities for the development of consistence and strictness in conceptual thought and was hence fit to be "propedeutics of philosophical spirit at us". Albert Bazala, which inherited in 1909 Marković's department, abandons Herbart's system). He monitored all current spiritual movements, read German, French, English and other authors, and made his students known with their works, even if they were not sanctioned by him.
As the first professor of philosophy with a systematic teaching record, translating and writing in vernacular language (and not Latin or German), Marković made a substantial impact on the development of Croatian philosophical terminology.
In 1880 he promoted Gjuro Arnold as the first Ph.D. in philosophy, who finally joined him in 1894 as a full professor. Arnold has, along with the philosophical teachings, lead the department of pedagogy. In 1904 he habilitated Albert Bazala as a private docent of philosophy.
Philosophical orientation
Marković, the first Croatian professor of philosophy that was not a priest, cherished self-consciousness of philosophy as opposed to the scholasticScholasticism
Scholasticism is a method of critical thought which dominated teaching by the academics of medieval universities in Europe from about 1100–1500, and a program of employing that method in articulating and defending orthodoxy in an increasingly pluralistic context...
tradition and neo-scholasticism
Neo-Scholasticism
Neo-Scholasticism is the revival and development of medieval scholastic philosophy starting from the second half of the 19th century. It has some times been called neo-Thomism partly because Thomas Aquinas in the 13th century gave to scholasticism a final form, partly because the idea gained ground...
, which was promoted at that time in vernacular writings by the professors of the Faculty of Theology and other theologians
Theology
Theology is the systematic and rational study of religion and its influences and of the nature of religious truths, or the learned profession acquired by completing specialized training in religious studies, usually at a university or school of divinity or seminary.-Definition:Augustine of Hippo...
. On the other side, defending the metaphysics he was confronted with materialism and positivism, which reached Croatia at that period, and where he is followed by his disciple Albert Bazala. "Nothing valuable is produced by human labour without the vigorous, logical, aesthetic and ethic tendency, i.e. without philosophic tendency."
Herbart's school
In his lectures and writings he continued the metaphysical tradition of European school of thought, following essentially HerbartJohann Friedrich Herbart
Johann Friedrich Herbart was a German philosopher, psychologist, and founder of pedagogy as an academic discipline....
's formalism, which provides a compromise between the exactness of natural sciences and the metaphysical speculation, with an emphasis on the strictness of conceptual thought. He emphasized psychology as a starting point of philosophy (psychologism
Psychologism
Psychologism is a generic type of position in philosophy according to which psychology plays a central role in grounding or explaining some other, non-psychological type of fact or law...
): "Her [of a philosophy] infinite, ultimately never reachable goal is a prudential system of cogitations and within it organised sentiments and aspirations."
Herbart's school, as hence the Marković himself, insist on maintaining diversity and irreducibility of psychic and material nature, especially contradicting materialist reducibility of former to the latter. He deems that "rational psychology and cosmology bear witness in favor of spiritism", i.e. against materialism: the matter is not sentient and free, and thus not subject to the law of causativity, so man's consciousness and freedom cannot possibly be a result of matter, but of higher and perfected being, i.e. the spirit.
Aesthetics
Aesthetically he's a formalist: aesthetic is only the form, not the content; this is where his scholary personality suppressed his artistic predilections. The art must provide aesthetic pleasure; it should aspire to panhuman ideal, rise above the reality to the value. Therefore Marković is not particularly supportive of naturalism and realism: naturalism simply depicts abject and vicious sides of life. The object of art must be beauteous not only by its form, but also venerable by its content. Illustrious artists are "folk teachers, the creators of life".Ethics
In ethicalEthics
Ethics, also known as moral philosophy, is a branch of philosophy that addresses questions about morality—that is, concepts such as good and evil, right and wrong, virtue and vice, justice and crime, etc.Major branches of ethics include:...
issues he mostly diverged from formalistic confines of Herbart's school, taking interest into positivist and sociological currents and expressing his own, intensive ethical sentiment. He denounced naturalism
Naturalism (philosophy)
Naturalism commonly refers to the philosophical viewpoint that the natural universe and its natural laws and forces operate in the universe, and that nothing exists beyond the natural universe or, if it does, it does not affect the natural universe that we know...
, materialism
Materialism
In philosophy, the theory of materialism holds that the only thing that exists is matter; that all things are composed of material and all phenomena are the result of material interactions. In other words, matter is the only substance...
and Darwin's theory of evolution
Darwinism
Darwinism is a set of movements and concepts related to ideas of transmutation of species or of evolution, including some ideas with no connection to the work of Charles Darwin....
, which lead to the "bankruptcy of ethics", giving prominence to either egoism
Egotism
Egotism is "characterized by an exaggerated estimate of one's intellect, ability, importance, appearance, wit, or other valued personal characteristics" – the drive to maintain and enhance favorable views of oneself....
, or "benefit to society, as understood by the public". Albert Bazala criticizes narrow-minded ethical principles of his teacher quite voluminously, and so does Gjuro Arnold.
Critical spirit and rising of the people
Marković applied Herbart's glorification of philosophy as a bellwether of culture to Croatian circumstances. He emphasizes the significance of industrious labor on the cognition and cultivation of critical spirit. Philosophy has a long-term educational task of rising people to the fulfillment of its potential. Philosophy is the "sentient cultural spirit", which metamorphosises and sets path towards prosperity of the nation and its "life style" in general. It creates "spiritual homeland", the "homeland of thoughts", which is the defender of material homeland. By learning from other nations, one has to develop distinctiveness and peculiarities at a path to the cognition of the ideal of truth, goodness and beauty. That is a duty not only to the people, but to the human kind itself: philosophy already brings individuals closer, and given enough time it shall unite even the nations.Literary work
Marković published a series of literary works, most important of which are the epics and the dramas in national-romanticist tradition. As opposed to the formalistic and racionalist conception of philosophy, "Marković his personal aspect, his sentimentalism and desireful ponderings ensconces under the veil of poetry."Mostly dealing with the historical motifs, Marković engaged in the ongoing battle for the affirmation of Croatdom against Hungarian and German domination. Idyllic epic Dom i svijet ('The home and the world') elaborates on contemporary themes. Epic Kohan i Vlasta ('Kohan and Vlasta') portrays a battle of old Slavs and Germans on the Baltic. The tragedy Karlo Drački depicts man's suffering in the struggle for panhuman ideal of freedom against the Rome and Magyar feudal lords. The tragedies Benk bot and Zvonimir display vices and rapacity of Hungarian landlords and court. Marković also wrote poems, literary critics and studies. He composed lyrics for quire version of the song U boj!
U boj, u boj
"U boj, u boj" is a Croatian patriotic song. It was written and composed by Ivan Zajc in 1866, who later incorporated it as an aria into his opera Nikola Šubić Zrinski where it is sung by a male choir....
from the opera Nikola Šubić Zrinski
Nikola Šubic Zrinski
Nikola Šubić Zrinski , was a Croatian nobleman and general in service of Habsburg Monarchy, ban of Croatia from 1542 to 1556, and member of the Zrinski noble family...
.
Philosophic works
Occupied by lecturing and literary work he published few pieces in philosophy. He published the book Razvoj i sustav obćenite estetike (1903).His major books and general works published during his lifetime include:
- Estetička ocjena Gundulićeva "Osmana", Zagreb, 1877.
- O piscih filozofijske struke a hrvatskoga roda, "Vienac", 44/1881. (inaugural speech as a rector)
- Filosofijski rad Rugjera Josipa Boškovića, Zagreb, 1887.–1888.
- Etički sadržaj naših narodnih poslovica, Zagreb, 1889.
- Prilog estetičkoj nauci o baladi i romanci, Zagreb, 1899.
- Razvoj i sustav obćenite estetike, Zagreb, 1903.
In 1970 his selected works (Izabrana djela) were published in the edition Pet stoljeća hrvatske književnosti ('Five centuries of Croatian literature'), vol. 44.
A bulk of lecturing MSS. has been preserved, some of which have been processed and published in the periodical Prilozi za istraživanje hrvatske filozofske baštine.