Metaphysical foundations of Johann Georg Schwarz’s pedagogical practice

Johann Georg Schwarz created his works, when russian philosophy was just taking its first steps and when the aesthetics was just emerging in Europe as a new branch of philosophy. Under these conditions the personality of Schwarz appears as a transitional one and suits very well for a research in the field of the history of philosophy. The article demonstrates the transitional nature of Schwarz philosophy by focusing on his notion of taste, since it contains moral features of the previous period and the purely aesthetic features that Kant would eventually attach to it. The author traces how the concept of taste allows Schwartz to connect a kind of quite eclectic philosophy of freemasonry to specific pedagogical practice that remains relevant today.