Cassirer:Zur Metaphysik der symbolische

When the third part of Ernst Cassirer's "Philosophy of Symbolic Forms", the "Phenomenology of Cognition", appeared in 1929, not all of the texts written for this volume were published: The final section, which was actually intended, no longer found a place in it. In addition to this concluding text of Cassirer's main work, the study edition contains other important texts by Cassirer on the metaphysics of symbolic forms. There has been widespread speculation as to whether Cassirer intended to write a further, fourth volume of his main work. The answer can be seen from the texts published here: They contain drafts and elaborations on the critique of contemporary philosophy announced in the third volume, whereby Cassirer goes far beyond previous works on, for example, the philosophy of life or anthropology. At the same time, the presentation of his own philosophy is deepened: with the doctrine of basic phenomena, he attempts to give the "philosophy of symbolic forms" the framework and centre that it had previously only received in rudimentary form. The volume follows the first volume of the "Nachgelassene Manuskripte und Texte" in identical pages.