Michael Gottlieb Birckner
Encyclopedia
Michael Gottlieb Birckner (21 August 1756 – 1 December 1798) was a Danish priest and philosopher.
Birckner especially explored the subject of Freedom of Speech
. The American historian H. Arnold Barton has characterised Birckner, alongside with Niels Ditlev Riegels
, as being one of "the most original thinkers" of the radical group of authors in Denmark in this period. The Danish jurist Peter Germer in his book The Nature of Freedom of Speech (Ytringsfrihedens Væsen, 1973) shows that Birckners ideas was akin to ideas that Scottish-American philosopher Alexander Meiklejohn
proposed in his Free Speech and Its Relation to Self-Government (1948).
. At age 3 he lost his mother, Anna Marie (born Wiborg), and half a year later his father, brickmason Johan Michael Birckner, died. The city mortician took in the orphan, and in due time Birckner graduated from the city's Latin school
in 1772. He achieved his theological
degree in 1784. He had also spent his time at the university
studying philosophy
and philology
, and he especially excelled in modern languages, he spoke German
like a native and he wrote verses in English
. He wanted a position as a priest, but he disliked the parlors of the rich and powerful, so he did not achieve a call until 1790. The position was as a German minister on the isolated island of Föhr
which was part of the kingdom of Denmark-Norway at the time.
Before Birckner left the capital he had become a proponent of the philosophy of Immanuel Kant
, which at that time was becoming popular in Denmark. But he was also under the influence of the radical French
anti-clergy rationalism
. He had published an article in the influential Danish periodical Minerva with the title An answer to the question: Should the nobility be suppressed? (July 1790). His answer to the question in the title was affirmative, provided that the privileges of nobility is an injustice and that the burgher can become "that which at present only the nobility is, without upsetting society as a whole". The article was soon translated into German and a reviewer of the Göttingische gelärdes Anzeigen (1792, p. 1899) praised it highly.
had incurred in Danish debate. In his solitude he expressed his thoughts on the matter in writing and the first of his many treaties on the subject was published in Minerva in March 1791.
. In the beginning he was not pleased with the transition to the small provincial town in Zealand, because he had to preach twice every Sunday instead of once every third Sunday. But after making the move, little by little his sentiments changed. He regularly was present by the dinner table of the vicar Frederik Plum, who later became bishop of Fyn
, and Birckner found company with which to share his spiritual and philosophical sentiments. It was at the Plums that he met Henriette Christine Hornemann, the daughter of vicar Jacob Hornemann, sister of the philosopher Christian Hornemann, and in 1795 he married this gifted young woman.
The journey to his new position had incurred a coughing sickness which over time became very serious. His income was very low, and he often suffered from want so badly that he at one time considered giving up the chaplaincy in favour of a position as a teacher and letting his wife contribute to the household by letting her serve as a chambermaid.
However his real struggle for freedom of the press was not carried out anonymously. He had already previously shown that the Danish laws regarding this subject did not allow for a complete freedom of the press. It was to achieve this goal that he published his major work On the Freedom of the Press and its Law ("Om Trykkefriheden og dens Love", 1797).
In this book he claims the importance of freedom of press as a powerful means of putting ideas into circulation and thereby enlighten the monarch of things that he would otherwise have been ignorant of. He also writes about it being a "revolution from above", when a "noble and patriotic" man, "brimming with feelings for the general good of man", at once appear among the powerful and without restraint "sacrifices his own splendor and absolutism". These words were aimed at the reigning crown prince Frederick
, who had shown considerable influences from the tolerant enlightenment ideas in his early years on the throne.
But Birckner does not only demand freedom to write about the affairs of government, he also demands freedom of speech in matters of religion. He shows that the way to achieve insight into the "moral truths" can only happen by discussing it in the open. However Birckner does propose some limits on the freedom of press, he does not think it should be allowed to publicly call for rebellion
, that is urging the people to overthrow the constitution of the state or in other ways oppose the actions of the government with physical force. Neither, Birckner says, should it be allowed to defame the private affairs of a man in his home, something which has no public interest and it violates the private sphere of the individual.
The book became a bestseller in Denmark-Norway. A second revised and improved edition appeared the same year, and a third printing was made for the first volume of the Collected Works of Birckner (a work which had 2.100 subscribers at the beginning of its publication, a very high figure in Danish literary history). Furthermore he translated the book into German and it was printed in the German periodical Beiträge zur Verdlung die Menschheit, 2. vol., 1. part, 1797, and the same year published as a stand-alone work under the title Ueber die Preszfreiheit und ihre Gesetze, von dem Verfasser selbst aus dem Dänishcen übersetzt, durchgesehen und herausgegeben von C.J.R. Christiani, Kopenhagen und Leipzig.
These ideas met opposition from several contemporary writers. Some thought Birckner went too far in his support of free speech, while others thought there should be no limits whatsoever. This prompted Birckner to publish his Further Reflections on the Freedom of Press and its Laws ("Videre Undersøgelser om Trykkefriheden og dens Love") the following year (1798). His response is especially aimed at the criticism posed by professor Johan Frederik Vilhelm Schlegel. Only at one point in this book does he change his stance from his previous work, and that is only "half unwillingly" he thinks that writers who "with their filthy imagination attempts to awaken impure desires in his readers", these individuals should be sentenced "a fitting punishment". His "half unwillingness" for this stems from the fact that he sees "what the result would be, of such a power administered by the judges of geniuses, and how easily such a power can be abused most savagely... And yet, all art and beauty be damned, if it misleads just a single person to stray from the path of virtue".
that was donated to his grieving widow and children. .
and prefaced by an account of the last days of Birckner written by dean Frederik Carl Gutfeld (Samlede Skrifter, 4 vols., 1797-1800).
Birckner especially explored the subject of Freedom of Speech
Freedom of speech
Freedom of speech is the freedom to speak freely without censorship. The term freedom of expression is sometimes used synonymously, but includes any act of seeking, receiving and imparting information or ideas, regardless of the medium used...
. The American historian H. Arnold Barton has characterised Birckner, alongside with Niels Ditlev Riegels
Niels Ditlev Riegels
Niels Ditlev Riegels was a Danish historian, journalist and pamphleteer.Niels Ditlev Riegels was known for his extensive authorship that was extremely critical of the Danish society and institutions. He was influenced by the radical enlightenment ideas of the French and English thinkers. The...
, as being one of "the most original thinkers" of the radical group of authors in Denmark in this period. The Danish jurist Peter Germer in his book The Nature of Freedom of Speech (Ytringsfrihedens Væsen, 1973) shows that Birckners ideas was akin to ideas that Scottish-American philosopher Alexander Meiklejohn
Alexander Meiklejohn
Alexander Meiklejohn was a philosopher, university administrator, and free-speech advocate. He served as dean of Brown University and president of Amherst College.- Life and career:...
proposed in his Free Speech and Its Relation to Self-Government (1948).
Biography
Michael Gottlieb Birckner was born in CopenhagenCopenhagen
Copenhagen is the capital and largest city of Denmark, with an urban population of 1,199,224 and a metropolitan population of 1,930,260 . With the completion of the transnational Øresund Bridge in 2000, Copenhagen has become the centre of the increasingly integrating Øresund Region...
. At age 3 he lost his mother, Anna Marie (born Wiborg), and half a year later his father, brickmason Johan Michael Birckner, died. The city mortician took in the orphan, and in due time Birckner graduated from the city's Latin school
Latin School
Latin School may refer to:* Latin schools of Medieval Europe* These schools in the United States:** Boston Latin School, Boston, MA** Brooklyn Latin School, New York, NY** Brother Joseph C. Fox Latin School, Long Island, NY...
in 1772. He achieved his theological
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...
degree in 1784. He had also spent his time at the university
University of Copenhagen
The University of Copenhagen is the oldest and largest university and research institution in Denmark. Founded in 1479, it has more than 37,000 students, the majority of whom are female , and more than 7,000 employees. The university has several campuses located in and around Copenhagen, with the...
studying philosophy
Philosophy
Philosophy is the study of general and fundamental problems, such as those connected with existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind, and language. Philosophy is distinguished from other ways of addressing such problems by its critical, generally systematic approach and its reliance on rational...
and philology
Philology
Philology is the study of language in written historical sources; it is a combination of literary studies, history and linguistics.Classical philology is the philology of Greek and Classical Latin...
, and he especially excelled in modern languages, he spoke German
German language
German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....
like a native and he wrote verses in English
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
. He wanted a position as a priest, but he disliked the parlors of the rich and powerful, so he did not achieve a call until 1790. The position was as a German minister on the isolated island of Föhr
Föhr
Föhr is one of the North Frisian Islands on the German coast of the North Sea. It is part of the Nordfriesland district in the federal state of Schleswig-Holstein. Föhr is the second-largest North Sea island of Germany....
which was part of the kingdom of Denmark-Norway at the time.
Before Birckner left the capital he had become a proponent of the philosophy of Immanuel 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....
, which at that time was becoming popular in Denmark. But he was also under the influence of the radical French
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
anti-clergy rationalism
Rationalism
In epistemology and in its modern sense, rationalism is "any view appealing to reason as a source of knowledge or justification" . In more technical terms, it is a method or a theory "in which the criterion of the truth is not sensory but intellectual and deductive"...
. He had published an article in the influential Danish periodical Minerva with the title An answer to the question: Should the nobility be suppressed? (July 1790). His answer to the question in the title was affirmative, provided that the privileges of nobility is an injustice and that the burgher can become "that which at present only the nobility is, without upsetting society as a whole". The article was soon translated into German and a reviewer of the Göttingische gelärdes Anzeigen (1792, p. 1899) praised it highly.
Stay at Föhr
Birckners stay at Föhr did not turn out to be as desolate as he and his friends had feared. He passed his time with studies, social visits and a pursuit to "form a young man into a productive citizen". The inhabitants of the island was pleased by his "philosophical" preachings which he held every third Sunday. He did express regret at not being within easy reach of the literary means of the capital, but he learned to pass his time thinking instead. It became his habit to first think a subject matter through in his mind before reading what others had written about it. He especially worked on the problem about the freedom of press and its limits, which among other things the recent conviction of the satiric poet Peter Andreas HeibergPeter Andreas Heiberg
Peter Andreas Heiberg was a Danish author and philologist. He was born in Vordingborg, Denmark. The Heiberg ancestry can be traced back to Norway, and has produced a long line of priests, headmasters and other learned men...
had incurred in Danish debate. In his solitude he expressed his thoughts on the matter in writing and the first of his many treaties on the subject was published in Minerva in March 1791.
Chaplain
The following year he was surprised to learn that his friends had petitioned on his behalf for the chaplaincy in KorsørKorsør
Korsør is a Danish town and port. It is out on the Great Belt, on the Zealand side, just south of where the Great Belt Bridge lands. It was the site of the municipal council of Korsør municipality - today it is part of Slagelse municipality...
. In the beginning he was not pleased with the transition to the small provincial town in Zealand, because he had to preach twice every Sunday instead of once every third Sunday. But after making the move, little by little his sentiments changed. He regularly was present by the dinner table of the vicar Frederik Plum, who later became bishop of Fyn
FYN
Proto-oncogene tyrosine-protein kinase Fyn is an enzyme that in humans is encoded by the FYN gene.This gene is a member of the protein-tyrosine kinase oncogene family. It encodes a membrane-associated tyrosine kinase that has been implicated in the control of cell growth...
, and Birckner found company with which to share his spiritual and philosophical sentiments. It was at the Plums that he met Henriette Christine Hornemann, the daughter of vicar Jacob Hornemann, sister of the philosopher Christian Hornemann, and in 1795 he married this gifted young woman.
The journey to his new position had incurred a coughing sickness which over time became very serious. His income was very low, and he often suffered from want so badly that he at one time considered giving up the chaplaincy in favour of a position as a teacher and letting his wife contribute to the household by letting her serve as a chambermaid.
Struggle for Freedom of the Press
But neither his sickness nor his poverty prevented him from continuing his philosophical endeavours. When the bishop of Zealand Nicolai Balle Edinger had reported the poet Malthe Conrad Bruuns recently published book The Catechism of the Aristocrats (Aristocraternes Catechismus, 1796) to the authorities for infringing the press laws, Birckner anonymously published a small tract which criticised the bishop for playing the part of head of police instead of minding his ecclesiastical pursuits.However his real struggle for freedom of the press was not carried out anonymously. He had already previously shown that the Danish laws regarding this subject did not allow for a complete freedom of the press. It was to achieve this goal that he published his major work On the Freedom of the Press and its Law ("Om Trykkefriheden og dens Love", 1797).
In this book he claims the importance of freedom of press as a powerful means of putting ideas into circulation and thereby enlighten the monarch of things that he would otherwise have been ignorant of. He also writes about it being a "revolution from above", when a "noble and patriotic" man, "brimming with feelings for the general good of man", at once appear among the powerful and without restraint "sacrifices his own splendor and absolutism". These words were aimed at the reigning crown prince Frederick
Frederick VI of Denmark
Frederick VI reigned as King of Denmark , and as king of Norway .-Regent of Denmark:Frederick's parents were King Christian VII and Caroline Matilda of Wales...
, who had shown considerable influences from the tolerant enlightenment ideas in his early years on the throne.
But Birckner does not only demand freedom to write about the affairs of government, he also demands freedom of speech in matters of religion. He shows that the way to achieve insight into the "moral truths" can only happen by discussing it in the open. However Birckner does propose some limits on the freedom of press, he does not think it should be allowed to publicly call for rebellion
Rebellion
Rebellion, uprising or insurrection, is a refusal of obedience or order. It may, therefore, be seen as encompassing a range of behaviors aimed at destroying or replacing an established authority such as a government or a head of state...
, that is urging the people to overthrow the constitution of the state or in other ways oppose the actions of the government with physical force. Neither, Birckner says, should it be allowed to defame the private affairs of a man in his home, something which has no public interest and it violates the private sphere of the individual.
The book became a bestseller in Denmark-Norway. A second revised and improved edition appeared the same year, and a third printing was made for the first volume of the Collected Works of Birckner (a work which had 2.100 subscribers at the beginning of its publication, a very high figure in Danish literary history). Furthermore he translated the book into German and it was printed in the German periodical Beiträge zur Verdlung die Menschheit, 2. vol., 1. part, 1797, and the same year published as a stand-alone work under the title Ueber die Preszfreiheit und ihre Gesetze, von dem Verfasser selbst aus dem Dänishcen übersetzt, durchgesehen und herausgegeben von C.J.R. Christiani, Kopenhagen und Leipzig.
These ideas met opposition from several contemporary writers. Some thought Birckner went too far in his support of free speech, while others thought there should be no limits whatsoever. This prompted Birckner to publish his Further Reflections on the Freedom of Press and its Laws ("Videre Undersøgelser om Trykkefriheden og dens Love") the following year (1798). His response is especially aimed at the criticism posed by professor Johan Frederik Vilhelm Schlegel. Only at one point in this book does he change his stance from his previous work, and that is only "half unwillingly" he thinks that writers who "with their filthy imagination attempts to awaken impure desires in his readers", these individuals should be sentenced "a fitting punishment". His "half unwillingness" for this stems from the fact that he sees "what the result would be, of such a power administered by the judges of geniuses, and how easily such a power can be abused most savagely... And yet, all art and beauty be damned, if it misleads just a single person to stray from the path of virtue".
Death
His struggle for freedom of speech was not looked upon favorably in government circles. Nevertheless he was appointed vicar of Vemmelev and Hammershøj 28 November 1798, an appointment that would have meant the end of his poverty. But this royal grace came too late, his illness had become lethal and he died 1 December the same year. His contribution to Danish literature was first acknowledged after his death. His friends praised his character and 2100 subscribers signed up for the first edition of his collected works. Furthermore they collected 2500 rigsdalerDanish rigsdaler
The rigsdaler was the name of several currencies used in Denmark until 1873. The similarly named Reichsthaler, riksdaler and rijksdaalder were used in Germany and Austria-Hungary, Sweden and the Netherlands, respectively....
that was donated to his grieving widow and children. .
Collected works
Birckner had already begun working on a collected edition of his works prior to his death. This collection was to include all his writings except the two anonymous tracts against bishop Balle. He did manage to publish three volumes of this collection, and the fourth volume was published in 1800 edited by Anders Sandøe ØrstedAnders Sandøe Ørsted
Anders Sandøe Ørsted was a Danish politician and jurist. He served as the Prime Minister of Denmark in 1853-1854 as leader of the Cabinet of Ørsted....
and prefaced by an account of the last days of Birckner written by dean Frederik Carl Gutfeld (Samlede Skrifter, 4 vols., 1797-1800).
Sources
- H. Arnold Barton, Scandinavia in the Revolutionary Era 1760-1815, University of Minnesota Press, 1986. ISBN 0-8166-1393-1.
External links
- The collected works of Michael Gottlieb Birckner (in Danish) in PDF-format can be found on Wikimedia Commons.
- His article An answer to the question: Should the nobility be suppressed? (in Danish) i Minerva 1790 3. vol. is to be found on Google Books
- Dansk Biografisk Lexikon, II. volume