When Lotze published these works, medical science was still much under the influence of Schelling's philosophy of nature.
The prevailing winds in this region, which the sea traverses longitudinally, are westerly, but the sea itself causes the formation of bands of low barometric pressure during the winter season, within which cyclonic disturbances frequently develop, while in summer the region comes under the influence of the polar margin of the tropical high pressure belt.
The murder of Kotzebue by Karl Sand, however, shocked him out of his extreme revolutionary views, and from this time he tended, under the influence of the writings of Hamann and Herder, more and more in the direction of conservatism and romanticism, until at last he ended, in a mood almost of pessimism, by attaching himself to the extreme right wing of the forces of reaction.
He also carried out many experiments in magneto-optics, and succeeded in showing, what Faraday had failed to detect, the rotation under the influence of magnetic force of the plane of polarization in certain gases and vapours.
His high conception of God's transcendence, it may be supposed, led him to ignore intermediary agencies, which are common in the popular literature, and later, under the influence of this same conception of transcendence, are freely employed.
