The Encyclopedia Americana (1920)/Kirchmann, Julius von

KIRCHMANN, kĕrk'mạn, Julius von, German writer and philosopher: b. near Meresburg, 1802; d. 1884. Educated in law at Leipzig and Halle, he became, some time afterward, state attorney in the Berlin Criminal Court (1846). He was successively a member of the National Assembly of Prussia (1848) and of the German Reichstag (1871-76). He studied and wrote much upon philosophy of which he was recognized as one of the leading writers of his day. Among his published works are ‘Die Wertlosigkeit der Jurisprudenz als Wissenschaft’ (1848); ‘Ueber Unsterblichkeit’ (1865); ‘Aesthetik auf realistischer Grundlage’ (1868), and many translations from the great philosophers, including Aristotle, Grotius, Hume, Bacon, Spinoza and Leibnitz. Consult Lasson and Meineke, ‘Julius von Kirchmann als Philosoph’ (Halle 1885).