 The name naturally associated with this sort of inquiry is, of course, that of Leo Strauss. Yet the work of his students invariably comes to an end with post-Enlightenment thinkers, terminating typically at the end of the Enlightenment, with “Rousseau, Lessing, and Kant” (Strauss, 1988, p. 33). But if we consider that a further line of repression runs from Fichte up to the widespread institutional successes of the neo-Kantians, on the continent, and the British Idealists, elsewhere, then Lotze is situated squarely in this interregnum. It thus seems natural to wonder if the state actions of the sort noted above, when combined with the obvious sensitivities of the university appointment process, may not have suggested to Lotze that a certain circumspection and discretion might still provide the outlines of the best course of action. In a period of political reaction and repression, civil servants needed to proceed cautiously (compare Beiser, 2014, pp. 178ff).