Schelling's Naturphilosophie is either considered one of several phases through which his philosophy passed or, as Schelling repeatedly states, it is "one side of philosophy" until at least 1830 (EPh) and, since he wrote his last work on the subject in 1844 (SW I/10:301–90), remains a constant focus of his philosophical trajectory from beginning to end.¹ The latter view is further supported by his declaration that, until 1809, "the author ha[d] confined himself wholly to investigations in the philosophy of nature" (EHF 4 [SW I/7:333]). By that point, according to the "philosophy in phases" account many Schelling scholars later imposed on his work, Schelling is supposed to have passed through his Spinozist, Fichtean, nature-philosophical, and identity-philosophical phases and to be entering instead that of the philosophy of freedom and the ages of the world which would in turn be abandoned for the positive philosophy after 1827.²