As an advocate of a free and united Germany, he shared in the student agitations of 1821–24 and was jailed from 1824 to 1830[1] in the fortress of Kolberg, where he studied Plato and the Greek poets.

Moving to Halle on his release, he published a number of plays (including Schill und die Seinen, a tragedy) and translations of ancient Greek texts (e.g. Oedipus at Colonus).

At the same time he criticized Hegel for having given an interpretation of history which was closed to the future, in the sense that it left no room for novelty.

"The Jahrbücher was detested by the orthodox party in Prussia; and was finally suppressed by the Saxon government in 1843, and Ruge left for Paris.

[1] In the revolutionary movement of 1848, he organized the extreme left in the Frankfurt Parliament, and for some time he lived in Berlin as the editor of the Die Reform.

He also wrote many poems, and several dramas and romances, and translated into German various English works, including the Letters of Junius and Buckle's History of Civilization.