Editing Georg Forster (section)

== ''Views from the Lower Rhine'' ==
[[File:Cathedral Arch.jpg|thumb|left|One of the entrances of [[Cologne Cathedral]], which was praised in ''Ansichten vom Niederrhein'']]
In the second quarter of 1790, Forster and the young [[Alexander von Humboldt]] started from Mainz on a long journey through the [[Southern Netherlands]], the [[Dutch Republic|United Provinces]], and England, eventually finishing in Paris. The impressions from the journey were described in a three volume publication ''Ansichten vom Niederrhein, von Brabant, Flandern, Holland, England und Frankreich im April, Mai und Juni 1790'' (''Views of the Lower Rhine, from Brabant, Flanders, Holland, England, and France in April, May and June 1790''), published 1791–94. Goethe said about the book: "One wants, after one has finished reading, to start it over, and wishes to travel with such a good and knowledgeable observer." The book includes comments on the [[history of art]] that were as influential for the discipline as ''A Voyage Round the world'' was for [[ethnology]]. Forster was, for example, one of the first writers who gave just treatment to the [[Gothic architecture]] of [[Cologne Cathedral]],{{sfn|Saine|1972|p=103}} which was widely perceived as "barbarian" at that time. The book conformed well to the early [[Romanticism|Romantic]] intellectual movements in German-speaking Europe.<ref>{{Cite book|title = Encyclopedia of the Romantic Era, 1760–1850: A-L|last = Murray|first = Christopher John|publisher = Taylor & Francis|year = 2003|isbn = 978-1-57958-423-8|pages = [https://archive.org/details/encyclopediaofro002unse_v8y9/page/365 365]|url = https://archive.org/details/encyclopediaofro002unse_v8y9/page/365}}</ref>

Forster's main interest, however, was again focused on the social behavior of people, as 15 years earlier in the Pacific. The national uprisings in [[Flanders]] and [[Duchy of Brabant|Brabant]] and the [[French Revolution|revolution in France]] sparked his curiosity. The journey through these regions, together with the Netherlands and England, where citizens' freedoms were equally well developed, in the end helped him to resolve his own political opinions. From that time on he was to be a confident opponent of the [[ancien régime]]. With other German scholars, he welcomed the outbreak of the revolution as a clear consequence of the Enlightenment. As early as 30 July 1789, shortly after he heard about the [[Storming of the Bastille]], he wrote to his father-in-law, philologist [[Christian Gottlob Heyne]], that it was beautiful to see what philosophy had nurtured in people's minds and then had realized in the state. To educate people about their rights in this way, he wrote, was after all the surest way; the rest would then result as if by itself.<ref name="zeit">{{cite journal|last=Schweigard|first=Jörg|title=Freiheit oder Tod!|trans-title=Liberty or Death!|journal=[[Die Zeit]]|issue=29|year=2001|url=http://www.zeit.de/2001/29/200129_a-14_juli_xml|language=de|access-date=30 May 2006|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20050905224929/http://www.zeit.de/2001/29/200129_a-14_juli_xml|archive-date=5 September 2005|url-status=live}}</ref>