A SKETCH OF THE
AUTHOR'S LIFE AND WRITINGS
BY THE TRANSLATOR.
De mortuis nil nisi verum.1 EMMANUEL KANT was born in Koningsberg, the metropolis of the kingdom of Prussia, on the twenty-second day of April in the year one thousand seven hundred and twenty-three*; of low extraction; but his parents, though obscure, were both virtuous and industrious. His father (descendant of a Scotch family that spell their name with a C)2 was a saddler in a very small way; our hero, consequently, not nursed in the silken lap of affluence, but himself the sole architect of his fortune. "Let high Birth triumph! What can be more great? Nothing -------- but Merit in a low estate." He was taught to read and to write at a free-school; received, at the expense of his maternal uncle, a shoemaker, the rudiments of his academical educa- tion at Frederic's College; and, in the year one thousand seven hundred and forty, went to the university in his native city, where he was entirely bred, and from which, as he in his Anthropology informs us, he never travelled farther than to Pillaw once by water.3 The early part of his life, like that of the lives of most men of deep learning and abstract science, having been passed in hard study and close application, yields but few materials and little variety of incident for the biographer. His was originally intended for the church, studied divinity accord- ingly, and took orders. His regular academical course finished, he began the world as a private tutor in a clergyman's family, and was afterwards appointed a titular governor to count Kaiserlingk's children; for, as we have been told, he had not the care of any of them, though nobody could be more capable of forming tender minds, or of instilling into them the principles and the love of wisdom and of virtue. Yet "the greatest abilities are not only not required for this office, but render a man less fit for it." As he was of a mild and amiable disposition, of equal temper or good- humour, modest, of great equanimity, affable, well-bred, or of polished manners, cheerful, an agreeable facetious companion, fond of conviviality, "of the feast of reason and of the flow of soul," and, from extensive reading and an uncommonly retentive memory, possessed of an inexhaustible fund of anecdote, the count and the countess, amiable, elegant in manners, cultivated and enlightened themselves, in whose society, as well as in that of modest women in general, he took great delight, were naturally desirous of his entertaining and instructive conversation, conceived a friendship for him, generously became his patrons, and gave him that sinecure, partly with a view of enjoying the pleasure of his excellent society (for Kant was the vital principle or the enlivener of every society), partly that he might have sufficient leisure to cultivate his rare talents, his extraordinarily active, vigorous, penetrating, and comprehensive mind. And he did not eat the bread of idleness or bury his talent, but prose- cuted his studies with unwearied attention and indefatigable diligence. Having sedulously gone over the whole circle of the sciences and made himself master of them all, he found the mathematics and pure philosophy (logic and metaphysic) the most congenial to his cast of mind, and gave up the profession of theology, as a sphere too confined for the active exertion of his mental energy, for his wide range and great depth of thought. His custom was to employ the morning and forenoon in study and writing, to withdraw early in the evening from society, and to amuse him- self for an hour or two in reading sometimes history, memoirs and travels, sometimes biography, voyages and poetry, now and then a play, by way of relaxation, and even a good novel, such as Sir Charles Grandison,4 a work which he often read and praised much. He had an exquisitely delicate and a very correct taste for the fine arts, but neither a turn nor leisure for the acquirement of superficial accomplishments. In the year one thousand seven hundred and fifty-six he took the degree of Masters of Arts,* opened a class, and gave public lectures on the mathematics, on logic, and on the metaphysics. His delivery was both easy and graceful; he possessed the art not only of commanding the attention of his auditors, but of impressing his doctrines deeply in their minds; and his lectures on moral philosophy and on moral religion in particular were highly interesting and sublime. In that situation, however, he, for all his talents both natural and ac- quired, was long eclipsed by a man of very inferior parts, whose name does not deserve to be here mentioned. But Kant's time was not lost; for his talents were continually expanding themselves, and he was constantly ruminating on his new system. It was (to use a somewhat florid allegory) a solar eclipse. And he, like the sun, shone forth at last in his full meridian splendour. His opponents "hid their diminished heads," and their opinions and doctrines were dispersed and vanished like vapour. He alone illumi- nates the world with his beneficent rays. At length our philosopher was called to fill the chair of wisdom, a station which his superior abilities and talents had so long merited, and which he afterwards graced so much and dignified. He, in the year one thousand seven hundred and seventy, was created doctor and regius professor of pure philosophy in the university of Koningsberg. And, in the year one thousand seven hundred and eighty-six, the Royal Academy of Sciences of Berlin chose him one of their members. They no doubt intended to confer a mark of honor on the professor; but it was soon found, that his being a fellow of their society, celebrated though it justly is, redounded to their honor. Having now reached the summit of his ambition, and wishing for nothing more than leisure to digest his critical system, "to gain the heights of science and of virtue," he refused several places of emolument and other dignities that were offered him. So early as the year seventeen hundred and forty-seven he published his coup d'essai, THOUGHTS ON THE TRUE ESTIMATION OF THE LIVING POWERS; TOGETHER WITH A FEW OBSERVATIONS ON THE POWER OF BODIES IN GENERAL; in which, he, by repudiating, at the age of four-and-twenty, the thoughts of these celebrated men, Leibnitz, Wolf, Bulfinger, the two Barnoullis, Herman and others, proves himself to be the most acute metaphysician and the ablest natural philosopher of his time. His motto is (from Seneca), Nihil magis pr¾standum est quam ne pecorum ritu sequamur antecedentium gregem, pergentes, non qua eundum sed qua it ur.5 No name, however famous, should it oppose the discovery of truth, is (says he) to be held of any value; the track of reason is the only one for us to follow in. That invective and personal attacks are not Kant's weapons the reader will see from these his concluding words [Ak. I.181]: I have succeeded in perceiving a few errors in Leibnitz's theory, it is true, yet I am one of this great man's debtors; for I should have effectuated nothing without the clue of the excellent law of continuity, for which we have this immortal discoverer to thank, and which is the only means of finding the way out of this labyrinth. In short, though the matter has fallen out in my favor, the share of honor that remains to me is so small, that I am not afraid of Ambition's demeaning herself so far as to grudge me it. Both this work and his subsequent publications will shew, that the discovery of the latent truth after which the greatest masters of human knowledge sought long in vain has been reserved for him. His GENERAL PHYSIOGONY AND THEORY OF THE HEAVENS, or an Essay on the Constitution of the mechanical Origin of the Universe according to Newton's Principles, appeared in the year one thousand seven hundred and fifty-five. In which work he evinces his profound astronomical knowledge, conjectures, with great probability, that there are beyond Saturn's orbit other planets more and more eccentric than Saturn, by consequence nearer and nearer the cometary property, and thus foretells, on theoretical grounds, what Herschel discovered six-and-twenty years after with the assistance of the telescope, the existence of Uranus (the Georgian planet or Herschel) and its satellites. Kant's theory with regard to Saturn's ring too is confirmed by Herschel's recent discoveries. It cannot but be interesting to men of science to compare the construction of the heavens, which one great man has perceived, so to say, with the telescopic eye of his mind, according to the Newtonian laws from the original birth of the celestial bodies, with the construction of the heavens as another great man has exhibited it according to telescopic observations. This publication, being rather dry and abstruse, was but little known at first; the celebrated Lambert is accused of having taken advantage of this circumstance; and that not without reason; for the very same theory of the systematical constitution of the universe, of the galaxy, of the nebule, &c. is advanced in his Cosmological Letters, which he published in the year sev- enteen hundred and sixty-one, and with which he made so great a figure. Kant himself, in one of his works, says, that the agreement of the thoughts of this ingenious man with those which I communicated to the public sixteen [sic; read six] years ago, which agreement is to be perceived in the very smallest strokes, increases my presumption, that this delineation will hereafter receive more confirmation. Sic redit ad dominum, &c.6 In the year one thousand seven hundred and sixty-three he presented the public with THE ONLY POSSIBLE ARGUMENT FOR THE DEMONSTRATION OF THE EXISTENCE OF GOD. In this treatise, which is one of his dogmatical works (for even Kant was only a dogmatist till he reached the transcendental station in his later work, CRITICISM ON PURE REASON); in this extremely recondite treatise, wherein nothing but an argument (or ground of proof) in support of the demonstration of the existence of the Deity is pretended to, the greatest acuteness or subtility, and all that which is possible to be performed by mere conceptions and by the theoretical mode of proof of the existence of that Being, will be found; in which speculative field nothing apodictically certain on this head can possibly be contained. He here does not allow but of the possibility of two methods of proof of the existence of the All sufficient Being, the Ontological and the cosmological. When logical exactness and completeness are in hand, the former mode of proof is the better, but, when comprehension to the common just conception, liveliness of impression, beauty, and the power of moving the moral springs of human nature are so, the preference is to be granted the latter. But, as that proof is not to be found in this unbeaten path (the theoretical or speculative field), we must turn to the broad highway of practical reason, or, in other words, have recourse to the moral argument; for, as God is a moral being, the proof of his existence can only be a moral one. Though it is absolutely necessary to convince one's self of His existence, it is not equally necessary, that it should be demonstrated. Indeed it is not, for want of intuitive data, susceptible of that strictness which is requisite to the evidence of mathematical demonstration. Nor can it by any effort of the speculative use of our reason be confuted neither.7 The teleological contemplations interspersed in this work are highly interesting and edifying, and have a great tendency to corroborate (the minds of men in general) in the belief in the Eternal Being. Kant's later doctrine and more profound sentiments on this the most important of all subjects are to be found in the aforementioned Criticism and in his other systematical works, wherein he, by rendering essential service to moral science, to the true enlightening of the human mind, and by consequence to the cause of truth and of virtue, proves himself a great benefactor to mankind. He, in the year seventeen hundred and seventy, excited the attention of the thinking part of the public by his inaugural dissertation, DE MUNDI SENSIBILIS ATQUE INTELLIGIBILIS FORMA ET PRINCIPIIS; the most remarkable phenomenon in the philosophic hemisphere since Newton's PHILOSOPHI® NATURALIS PRINCIPIA MATHEMATICA. It may be said, with great truth, that, in this work of Kant, which comprises the creative architectonic idea and complete foundation of his future system, the profundity of a Newton, the acumen of a Leibnitz, the solid argumentation of a Hume, and the systematic arrangement of a Wolf conspire to render it perfect. It alone entitles his statue to distinguished niches in the temples of Science and of Fame. "Others are fond of Fame, but Fame is fond of him." He had attained the age of fifty-eight ere his CRITICISM ON PURE REASON made its first appearance in the year one thousand seven hundred and eighty-one. This, the most abstract profound metaphysical work that ever was written, and which the Germans, by way of eminence, name, The Criticism, is unquestionably the triumph of intellect. It comprehends, in one octavo volume of eight hundred and eighty-four close-printed pages, his whole theoretical system, the complete investigation of the procedure of the sensitive faculty, of the understanding, and of the faculty of reason itself. In it the wings of all false speculative philosophy that attempts to soar above the sphere of possible experience are effectually clipped. In it the doctrines of materialism, of atheism, of free thinking incredulity, and of unthinking superstition, all of which may be universally pernicious to so- ciety, as well as those of idealism and of scepticism, which are dangerous more especially to the schools and can hardly be ever communicated to the public in general, are quite overthrown. This single publication, abstracting from his other works (Metaphysic of Morals; Criticism on Judgment; Criticism on practical Reason; &c.; all masterpieces), distinguishes this perspicacious metaphysician and subtile philosophical critic as both the ornament of his native country, and the pride of the republic of letters.* And history informs us, that Nature, though bountiful to the human race, is not so lavish of her favors, as to produce a man of such supereminence of mental powers every century. His METAPHYSICAL ELEMENTS OF THE PHYSICS were published in the year seventeen hundred and eighty-six. They contain the pure principles of Somatology. The metaphysic of corporeal nature is first treated of; then the mathematics are applied to the doctrine of bodies, which cannot become natural philosophy but by them. In this inimitable treatise he has fully exhausted the subject of the metaphysical somatology. The table of the categories (not those of Aristotle, that trifling puerile enumeration of predicates, but his own) he has used as the only scheme for the completeness of a metaphysical system. He has reduced these (what he with modesty names) elements to four heads: under the first of which, motion, as a pure quantum, is considered as to its composition, without any quality of what is moveable, and this head is denominated Phoronomy; under the second it (motion), as belonging to the quality of matter, is considered under the name of an originally motive power, and hence is this head distinguished by the appellation of Dynamics; under the third, matter with that quality is considered by its own motion in relation to itself, and this head is termed the Mechanics; and under the fourth, the motion or the rest of matter is determined merely with reference to the mode of representation, or modality, and the title of this head is Phenomenology. On this great work, perhaps the most profound of all his works, none but men of science, of deep science, and the few who reason, can venture to pronounce; to all others it will seem a mere gallimatia [i.e. confused or meaningless talk]. This little octavo book of but one hundred and fifty-eight pages proves its eminent author to be the only man that ever possessed mathematical and metaphysical knowledge united in the highest degree, and that ever discursively reflected (philosophised) profoundly on the mathesis. And thus much as to the first writings of this prince of mathematicians and of philosophers. A complete description or review of all his systematical works would alone fill a thick volume. But what has been here said may suffice to shew, that they are extant in Germany, and, it is to be hoped, will induce those, who do not think themselves already too knowing to stand in need of more knowledge, to study them. The task indeed is not easy, but it will reward the labour abundantly.* Kant is the founder of the CRITICAL PHILOSOPHY, so named to distinguish it from other systems or modes of philosophising, till it shall be universally allowed, that there cannot be but one (true) philosophy. As this vast system, the rich harvest of the constant study, reflection, meditation, and Herculean labour of some fifty years, and which embraces the whole sphere of philosophy, is now taught in all the protestant universities of Germany, and but little known yet in Great Britain and Ireland, it cannot be improper to give a slight conception of it in this place. It is, then, a new method of philosophising, which, distinct from all former methods, is founded in a most accurate dissection of the whole faculty of cognition, determining the utmost bounds of this faculty, and denominated TRANSCENDENTAL PHILOSOPHY; from which mental anatomy all true philosophy must set out.[ ] This modern method of philosophising has quite choked the weeds of all former systems and (to continue the figure) cleaned the ground of intellectual research. This assertion may seem somewhat exaggerated to those not much conversant in such perquisitions [i.e. careful investigations] as these; but the destruction of all false systems is infallibly accomplished by just reasoning founded in an accurate and a deep philosophy of mind. Whoever reads Kant's transcendental philosophy (contained in his Prolegomena to the Metaphysics* and in his Criticism on pure Reason) with the requisite degree of attention and of reflection must allow, that his reputation of being the ablest anatomist that ever dissected the human mind is firmly established. He seems even to have fully exhausted his subject, and left nothing material for us to do, but to read, to understand, to admire, and to be grateful for his inestimably precious labours. This profound transcendental philosophy is not only the most sublime, but the most useful of all sciences. Were it not laid as a foundation, no metaphysic at all were possible, we could recur to nothing for first principles, never reach, in the philosophic field, beyond empirical science, which, like the bust in La Fontaine's fable, has a fine head, but no brains. It is however the most difficult and the most abstract of all science; for what can be more so, than the reflex act of the mind, the turning of the intellectual eye inwards on its own operations? A little learning is a dangerous thing; drink deep or taste not of the Pierian spring. There shallow draughts intoxicate the brain, and drinking deep sobers us again. Beautifully and justly said by Pope; for superficial knowledge elates or puffs up, but profound [knowledge] (by shewing the very limited stretch of our faculties, and that the most cultivated reason cannot, with regard to the essential ends of humanity, advance a single step farther, than the most common understanding) abates our pride or arrogance, and teaches us modesty and humility.8 In this admirable system (in his Criticism on Judgment) quite a new theory of taste, of the beautiful, and of the sublime, of both nature and art, is advanced; and the doctrine of teleology, or of philosophical ends, handled after the most masterly method. In the Groundwork for the Metaphysic of Morals, the Criticism on practical Reason, and the Metaphysic of Morals, he treats of his system of moral philosophy which he divides into ethics and law, and is the first that lays down pure principles of morality. In those incomparable works it is clearly evinced, that the Heteronomy of the arbitrament (that is, the dependence upon laws of nature, to follow some one incentive or inclination, when the will gives itself not the law, but the direction for the rational observance of pathological laws) never can comprise the universally legislative form, and not only cannot be the basis of any obligations, but is, though the action, which results from the maxim of heteronomy, should be legal, even contrary to the principle of pure practical reason, consequently to the moral mindedness. All the matter of practical rules ever depends upon subjective conditions, which yield it nothing but a conditional universality for rational beings, and all those conditions turn on the pivot of the principle of one's own happiness. The principle of happiness may afford maxims, but, even were the universal happiness the object, never can such ones, as are fit for laws of the will. All the possible determinatives of the will are either merely subjective, and therefore empirical, or objective and rational; either external, or internal. The following are all principles of heteronomy [cf. Ak. V.39-41 (Critique of Practical Reason)]: education (according to Montaigne), the constitution (after Mandeville), the physical sense (according to Epicurus), the moral sense (after Hutcheson), perfection (according to the Stoics and Wolf), and the will of the Deity (after Crusius and other theological moral- ists). All material principles are totally unfit for the supreme moral law. In the aforementioned works it is likewise proved, that the Autonomy (the universal self-legislation) of the will is the only principle of all moral laws and of the duties suitable to them. The maxim of self-love (prudence) advises merely; but the law of morality commands. Is there not however a great distinction between what is advisable for us to do, and what we are obliged to do? It is difficult and requires a knowledge of the world to know how to act on the principle of heteronomy; but quite easy to the most common understanding to know how to act on that of autonomy. In a word, The formal practical principle of pure reason is the only possible principle fit for practical laws (which make a duty of actions) and for the principle of morality in general.* And in The Religion within the Bounds of bare Reason, a signally sublime publication, there is taught a purified philosophical doctrine worthy of the notice of enlightened rational beings. Kant, in this work, shews, that the New Testament, explained agreeably to established moral principles, contains a pure moral religion. No other can possibly stand the test of time or have a right to have its issue in the catholic or universal religion of man. Nothing but ignorance or monkish superstition can furnish confessors in the cause of any other form of belief; and this none but those influenced by selfish views and sectaries and bigots, or blind zealots, who are all deaf, or unwilling to listen, to the sacred dictates of reason or obligations of moral- ity, can possibly deny. Many divines by profession and all theological moralists, as they are heteronomists, make a use of reason that perverts it, and thereby, though not intentionally, subvert morality.* But the author of the great work under review distinguishes himself as not only a strict autonomist but a pure rationalist in matters of belief, or a moral theologist, and as the justest and most profound reasoner, as well as the most consequential and systematical writer of any of those, who have ever treated of the subjects of morality and of religion. The critical philosophy perhaps has had more expositors, commenta- tors, and epitomists during the space of twenty years, than the Platonic and the Aristotelian systems united have had during many centuries. It unques- tionably fixes a grand epoch in both the annals of science and the history of the progress of the human understanding. And every unprejudiced and competent judge will join us with pleasure in paying this grateful tribute of praise (that "envy dare not flattery call") to the manes of the matchless founder of this noble system: That he, being undoubtedly the father of metaphysic as a science, and the discoverer as well as the first teacher of the doctrine of pure morality, and as no other man ever left posterity so valuable a legacy, has a just right to be held the luminary of the learned world, and to bear the palm of science unrivalled perhaps for ever. If it is a fact, that, objectively considered, there cannot be but one (true) philosophy, and it is a stubborn fact, that Kant's method of critical philosophising has totally overthrown all former philosophical systems, can any one, unacquainted with it, venture to dignify himself with the title of philosopher, in the proper sense of the word? If he presumes so to do, it must be through a happy ignorance indeed, and an overweening self- flattery. "Seest thou a man wise in his own conceit? There is more hope of a fool, than of him." [Prov. 26:12] From what has already been said of Kant's temper or disposition of mind it may be easily gathered, that he, as to his manners or behaviour, was by no means a cynic, or a snarling churlish teacher of virtue, and, though he was in some essential points a stoic, had not the least taint of severity or moroseness.[*] The austerity of the anachorite [i.e. recluse or hermit] was not an ingredient in his composition, and he neither lived in a tub like the currish Diogenes, nor secluded himself from the world like a torpid monk, but habitually frequented the best company, of which he was the very soul, and well aware, that "happiness and true philosophy are of the social still, and smiling kind." Besides, he was constantly visited by all persons of rank, by all travellers of distinction, as well as by all men of eminence in every line, whose admiration he, by his hospitality, by his great knowledge of the world, and by his rich and edifying conversation on every topic, never failed to excite, from whom he always received the tribute of due esteem, and who were all proud of having had an opportunity of seeing and of conversing with so distinguished a character. That our sublime master could sometimes unbend his mind in writing too, the following is a specimen: That the husband is destined to rule and the wife to obey, we, were it not sufficiently pointed out by nature, have St. Paul's authority for maintaining. I, says Kant, in one of his miscellaneous works [Ak. VII.310-11 (Anthropology)], would, in the language of gallantry (yet not without truth), say, that the wife should rule and the husband govern. The conduct of the husband must shew, that he has the welfare of his wife above all things at heart. But, as he must know the situation of his affairs better, and how much money he can afford to spend, he, like a dutiful minister, first complies with the orders of his monarch, who thinks of nothing but pleasure and perhaps wishes to build a palace; only that at present there is no money in the treasury, that certain more pressing wants must be supplied, &c.; so that her majesty may do whatever she pleases, but on this condition only, that her minister shall furnish her with the means. And this biographical incident, as it evinces a noble independence of spirit, as well as a manly and inflexible firmness of mind that characterises the practical philosopher, and betrays a zealous champion in the cause of truth, morality, and religion, we conceive, deserves to be here recorded: The present king of Prussia's father and predecessor, by the instigation of a clerical hypocrite, sent for Kant, and desired, that he would retract some sentiments expressed in his work on moral religion.----Your majesty (answers he) may dispose of my person as you please. I am your majesty's faithful, obedient, respectful, and dutiful subject and servant. But no power on earth can control my thoughts or has a right to compel me to recant a single sentiment on any subject that flows from my reason or to deny or even but to conceal what I deem truth.9--To the honor of the absolute monarch be it related, No farther interruption was ever given to the free publication of all the works of the Prussian Socrates. His having led a single life adds another illustrious instance to lord Verulam's remark relative to bachelors: Certainly the best works, and those of greatest merit for the public, have proceeded from the unmarried or childless men. All Kant's pursuits were obviously of a metaphysical or in- tellectual nature. He devoted himself to the sciences entirely and to litera- ture. But we, even in this light Sketch, have had a proof of his having made his more particular addresses to Philosophy, "the fair," whom he certainly has elevated to the very throne of reason. Notwithstanding a very delicate constitutional frame of body (for he was by no means gifted with corporal qualities as with those of the mind),* and a life passed in laborious study and intense meditation, he, by means of going to bed early, and of rising betimes, of constant occupation, of temper- ance, of regular exercise on foot, of tranquillity of mind, and of cheerful society, retained the use of his mental faculties, his intellectual activity and vigour, almost unimpaired till the age of seventy, and had attained the ad- vanced period of life of eighty years [actually, 79] and upwards before he, on the twelfth day of February in the year one thousand eight hundred and four, was seized with an apoplexy that occasioned his speedy dissolution, and numbered his freed spirit with the purified spirits that live for ever. While Kant stood upon the verge of this world, Death, that king of terrors to the guilty, was not armed with any thing terrific, but [was like] the prince of peace, to him. He made the awful transition from time to eternity, from this corporeal earthly scene to the intelligible world, with philosophical serenity or composure of mind, with the dignity peculiar to a wise man, with the calmness, fortitude and resignation of a virtuous mind deeply penetrated with a firm belief of reason in the Supreme Intelligence, and in a future state, the life spiritual, or the prolongation of our moral existence to infinity. "Virtue alone has majesty in death." On that melancholy occasion the whole city of Koningsberg, lamenting the decease of so excellent a man, by which they conceived that they sustained a national and an irreparable loss, went into deep mourning, and people of all ranks and of all ages in town and from the neighbourhood, bewailing this sad catastrophe and with settled sorrow in their counte- nances, flocked promiscuously to his interment, which was more like the pompous sepulture of a proud emperor, than the plain funeral of an humble philosopher. Soon after that mournful event a fine medal in honor of his great worth and uncommon endowments was struck in Berlin; it has on the one side his image and name with the year of his nativity, and on the reverse Pallas is represented sitting and holding an owl in her [sic] right hand, with this motto, Altius volantem arcuit [He restrained the (birds) that fly higher]; an allegorical designation of his having marked out proper boundaries to the field of empirical science, determined the sphere of speculative philosophy, or restrained the merely speculative use of reason to the objects of possible experience. ------ "What boots it o'er thy hallow'd dust To heap the graven pile or laurel'd bust? Since by thy hands, already rais'd on high, We see a fabric tow'ring to the sky." The true criticism on his moral character, as well as the most sublime panegyric that can be made on him, is, That he earnestly and stedfastly en- deavoured to practise what he professed, to make the moral law, the great comprehensive rule of duty, the spring of his actions. For, his life was, so to say, a comment or illustration to his pure doctrine, and almost exempli- fied it, or was led as nearly up to it, consequently he, by precept and by ex- ample, came as near the idea of a sage, or of a perfectly wise and virtuous man, as perhaps the frailty inherent in the human nature allows. So that he gives us a conspicuous proof of the feasibility of acting (as far perhaps as a mortal is capable of acting) on pure moral principle; by his active, useful, and immaculate life he teaches us how to live, by his invaluable instruction and moral lessons how to grow wiser and better, and by his memorable death how to die. Quid virtus et quid sapientia possit, utile proposuit nobis exemplar Kanten.10 The way to excel unquestionably is, optima qu¾que exempla et imitandum proponere,11 yet it, in strict propriety, is not the conduct of any man, how good soever it may be, but the moral law itself by which we should strive to direct our actions or to regulate our lives. Not the conduct of man as it is, therefore, but the idea of what it ought to be, can be a pattern for imitation, or set up as the standard of moral judgment or comparison. But, as we in general are neither so good nor so bad as our friends or our enemies usually represent us, as the virtue or moral goodness of the best of us is but relative, for absolute perfection does not fall to the lot of man in this transitory life, as no human portrait can be painted without some shade, we have made every possible inquiry among those envious of Kant's well-earned fame and "hating that excellence they cannot reach," (for he had no other enemies, but was esteemed and beloved by every body who was acquainted with him) to find out a spot in his reputation, or character in the opinion of the world, and all that they can lay to his charge is, that his economy bordered on avarice, or sordid parsimony. But even this imputation his friends deny, say it is an aspersion, and maintain, that his rigid frugality or strict economy in early life was the effect of urgent ne- cessity, but that, at a later period, he, when possessed of the means, did not suffer his increase of fortune to contract or to harden his heart (for an ample fortune is sometimes apt to contract and to harden the heart), but, so far from wanting brotherly love, was generous on proper occasions, beneficent to the honest industrious poor, not however "before men, to be seen," [Matt. 6:1] out of vanity or ostentation, but from a sense or motive of duty, bestowed his charity in private, "denied them nothing but his name," and that his principles were not only laid down in his head, but written and set- tled in his heart. For, as he was a man of a good heart, his benevolence was active, and his sympathy or fellow-feeling warm, but always regulated or governed by his understanding, always ruled by his reason, which superior faculty it was the study of his whole life to cultivate, and to exercise freely on all subjects and on all occasions, to the utmost of his power. O Virum Sapientia sua simplicem, et Simplicitate sua sapientem! O Virum utilem sibi, suis, Reipublicae, et humano Generi!12 In fine, it is easy to foretell, that a grateful posterity, edified and enlightened by the critical philosophy, and not biassed by the jealousy or ri- valry but too prevalent among contemporary authors, will, when Kant's il- liberal opponents and their superficial writings shall be buried in utter oblivion, and time shall have allayed envy, embalm him in their remem- brance, and, actuated by a generous emulation only, not fail of acknowl- edging his great merit, of doing his invaluable works full justice, and of bearing his memory due respect. THE END NOTES: 1 'Concerning the deceased, [speak] nothing but the truth.' Cf. Ak. VI.295 (Metaphysics of Morals, Part I), where Kant quotes Diogenes La‘rtius, saying 'De mortuis nil nisi bene.' Editors notes are numbered or placed in square brackets in the text (see above, p.80n). * See page xliii of the Preface to the second edition of his Criticism on pure Reason. [Kant was actually born in 1724. The text Richardson refers to reads: '(this month [April 1787] I reach my sixty-fourth year)'. Kant must have been referring to the fact that, on one's 63rd birthday, one is actually beginning ('reaching') one's 64th year of life.] 2 See Ak. XII.204: 'my grandfather ... originally came from Scotland'. Richardson, too, was Scottish (cf. p.81 above). 3 See Ak. VII.169. Pillau is about 45 kilometres from Kšnigsberg, where the Peninsula joins the Baltic Sea. Cf. William Wallace, Kant (Edinburgh: Blackwood, 1901), p.2. 4 Self-published by Samuel Richardson (no known relation to John Richardson) in 1753. * In Germany the degree of M. A. is a much greater dignity among the learned, than it is with us. 5 'Nothing is more important than that we not, like the cattle, follow the herd of those preceding and trot along, not where one should go, but where one does go.' 6 'On the Latin, see above, pp.31 (Ak. VIII.69), 62 (note 8). The text before the Latin appears in Ak. II.68n (The Only Possible Argument [1763]). 7 Most of this paragraph is quoted and/or paraphrased from the concluding section of the essay in question. See Ak. II.162-63. * The late professor Beck of Rostock informed me, that Kant had made himself so much master of his subject before he printed this Criticism, that he neither corrected nor transcribed the manuscript of it, but sent it sheet by sheet as he wrote it to the press. [J.S. Beck moved from Halle (where he had taught John Richardson) to Rostock in 1799, which was also the year Richardson completed his initial spurt of translating Kant. See above, p.81n, and Ak. XIII.607.] Amicus Aristoteles, sed magis amica veritas. [Aristotle is a friend, but the truth is a better friend.] * To study this system effectually, it may be advisable to follow the plan, which Descartes holds so indispensable to the attaining of right insights, and which is this: To forget, during the study of a new doctrine, all the conceptions that one may have formerly acquired relatively to the same subject, and to set out on the road of truth without any guide but mere sane reason. It is interesting to know, that Hume's hint relative to the conception of the connexion of cause and of effect was what first roused Kant from what he calls a dogmatic slumber of many years, and gave occasion to this total reform in philosophy, by means of which reform that celebrated man's doubt, on which neither Reid, nor Beattie, nor Oswald, nor Priestly, nor any of their followers, could ever throw the least light, is fully resolved, not however with the aid of common-sense that they extol so much, but with that of pure reason after the method of the critical philosophising. [Richardson's missing footnote marker must be placed in this or the next paragraph, or at the end of the previous one.] * Translated into English by the author of this Sketch, and will soon be published. 8 Kant makes this point in the first Critique, p.B859, which is partially quoted here. * This new system, which is really the victory of human reason, the author of this Sketch takes the liberty of recommending once more to the notice of the learned.--In a political point of view our insular situation is highly advantageous to us, but in a literary and scientific one, very hurtful. This, however, were our literati less supine, not (what foreigners perhaps not unjustly accuse them of being) so proud, and less national, might be obviated. Does not the commonwealth of learning embrace the whole world? Whatever conquests are made in the kingdom of truth, they belong to humanity in general. The Germans are as well acquainted with our literature as we ourselves, and do it the justice to admire it. But it is not so with us; we in general know but little of theirs, and are totally ignorant of their best philosophical works. For, unfortunately, nothing but the very refuse of the productions of the German press, with a few exceptions, is transplanted to our island. Formerly publishers and printers were men of letters, could judge for themselves, and were interested in science. It were well worth a British philosopher's while to learn German for the sole purpose of studying the critical philosophy; for that language, as it is a key to more science than either Greek or Latin, would certainly repay him fully for his time and labour. Mean-while, if I am fortunate enough to be instrumental towards transplanting the genuine seeds of that philosophy to this country, I shall enjoy the consciousness of contributing essentially to the dissemination of real science, and therefore of not having travelled in vain or of not being altogether a passive or useless member of society. * By theological moralists we understand those who, previously assuming the existence of God, derive the moral law immediately from his will; by which procedure the universal self-legislative power of pure practical reason is quite destroyed. The moral theologist, on the other hand, on its indispensable condition, liberty, unfolds the moral law out of the universal reason of man, and postulates God and immortality as absolutely necessary conditions of the possibility of its fulfilment. The Ethics do not extend beyond the reciprocal duties of man and subsist by themselves even without the idea of the Supreme Being, but infallibly lead to, the very sublimation of morality, Religion, whose essence, subjectively considered, consists in the maxim of discharging our moral duties as Divine commandments, and which crowns all morality. [Cf. Ak. VI.3-6, 154 (Religion).] * The Cynics, or the followers of Diogenes, derived their name from the suburb of Athens called the Cynosarges, in which they taught. 9 This paraphrased excerpt from Kant's 1794 letter to King Friedrich Wilhelm II (see Ak. XI.527-30) slightly misrepresents Kant's true response to the edict issued by the king's 'clerical hypocrite', J.C. Wšllner. The reason there was no 'interruption' of Kant's subsequent publications (as Richardson points out in the sentence after this note) is that Kant himself agreed to restrain from any public utterance on religion until after the king died. * He was of a little stature, his thorax or chest so narrow as scarce to leave room for the play of his lungs, and, when walking alone, in a thoughtful mood, stooped very much, especially in the decline of life.--The portrait sketched by Hopwood, which is the frontispiece to this work, is the copy of an engraving by Lips of Weimar from an original painting, a striking likeness of Kant at the age of seventy-one, by Wernet of Berlin. [An enlargement of part of this portrait appears on the front cover of the present book.] The only circumstance peculiar to Kant's diet, is, that he made but one meal a day, his dinner; a habit, which, by the way, we do not think conducive to longevity. 10 'Kant's example has beneficially displayed to us what virtue and what wisdom can be.' 11 '... to display the best examples whatsoever, and [the person who is to be] imitated ...' 12 'O man, simple in his wisdom, and wise in his simplicity! O man, beneficial to himself, to his own [people], to the country, and to mankind!'