This chapter discusses the transition from Kant's view of the self to that deeper but more problematic conception of the self which characterized the later idealism. The transition from Kant's philosophy to the later idealism was a reflection of the spirit which determined the course of contemporary social events. Three features marked the mental life in Germany during the decades with which the eighteenth century closed and the nineteenth century opened, say from 1770 to 1805. The first feature was the great development of actual productive power in scholarship, literature, imaginative work, and the accompanying increase in the popular respect for great individuals. The second was that deepening of sentiment, that enrichment of emotional life, which characterized first the storm and stress period, and later both the classical and the romantic literatures of Germany in those decades. The third feature was that relative indifference to mere political fortunes.