Georg Friedrich Daumer

Georg Friedrich Daumer was a German poet and philosopher. He was educated at the gymnasium of his native city, at that time directed by the famous philosopher Hegel. In 1817 he entered the University of Erlangen as a student of theology, but abandoned that study for philosophy. For a number of years Daumer was professor at the gymnasium of Nuremberg; owing to ill-health he was pensioned in 1832 and henceforth devoted himself entirely to literary work. While at Erlangen he came strongly under the influence of Pietism. Soon, however, he became sceptical and exhibited decided leanings towards pantheism. From an orthodox Protestant he gradually became a bitter enemy of Christianity, which he attacked in a number of writings and for which he strove to substitute a new religion "of love and peace", formulated in his work Religion des neuen Weltalters. Karl Marx and Frederick Engels joined in writing a critical review of Daumer's Die Religion des Neuen Weltalters in January through February 1850 which was published in the Neue Rheinische Zeitung: Politisch-Ökonomische Revue. Marx and Engels criticized Daumer's theory of history from class point of view. Instead of a struggle between economic classes in society, Daumer saw only a struggle between "coarseness" and "culture."