WHAT IS "TANTALIZING" ABOUT THE "GAP"

IN KANT'S PHILOSOPHICAL SYSTEM?

by Stephen Palmquist (stevepq@hkbu.edu.hk)

keywords added.

I am as it were mentally paralyzed even though physically I am reasonably well. I see before me the unpaid bill of my uncompleted philosophy, even while I am aware that philosophy, both as regards its means and its ends, is capable of completion. It is a pain like that of Tantalus though not a hopeless pain. The project on which I am now working concerns the "Transition from the metaphysical foundations of natural science to physics." It must be completed, or else a gap will remain in the critical philosophy. Reason will not give up her demands for this ... [KPC 251]^[1]

I. The "Gap" and the "Transition": Förster's New Interpretation

In this famous passage from a 1798 letter to Christian Garve, Kant confesses that he sees a tantalizing "gap" in his philosophical System, a gap connected in some way with the "Transition" project he was then working on, as contained in what we now call Kant's Opus Postumum (OP). Interpreters have typically assumed that the "gap" and the "Transition" refer ßto exactly the same thing, namely, to the book Kant hoped OP would become. As a result, there has been a long-standing, twofold conundrum concerning Kant's intentions in OP. First, Kant clearly states in his Critique of Judgment (CJ) that with this book (published in 1790) he brings his "entire critical undertaking to a close" [CJ 170], so how can a new gap suddenly appear eight years later? And second, Kant's Metaphysical Foundations of Natural Science (MFNS) had already accomplished, in 1786, something like a transition between the Critical System and physics, so why does there need to be another transition between this first transition and physics? These twin problems have led some scholars to suppose that, when Kant mentions mental paralysis in his letter to Garve, he is actually referring to the onset of senility, and that this affliction eventually caused the sage of Königsberg to waste the last years of his life writing nonsense.

Eckart Förster has recently proposed an interesting new alternative explanation which, he argues, could provide some much-needed clues for drawing together the diverse pieces of this puzzle.^[2]?/span>He argues that Kant must not have intended the words "gap" and "Transition" to refer to the same thing, because the idea for writing a Transition can be traced "back at least to the year 1790" [536], yet no mention of a gap is ever made until September of 1798 [537]. He thinks this indicates that something must have "happened in 1798 which prompted Kant to reflect anew on his philosophy, and which brought to his attention a gap in the critical system that had previously escaped him" [537]. Förster conjectures on the basis of an ingenious compilation of evidence that the event in question, which sparked Kant's recognition of the gap, was the publication of a Prize Essay question by the Berlin Academy of Sciences, criticizing Kant's view of mathematics and favoring "the general empirical origin of all our cognitions" [quoted in GAP 554]. This event, suggests Förster, may have "led Kant to reflect anew on the role of mathematics in philosophy and hence, ultimately, to revise his position substantially" [555]. Although he does not claim to have presented a thorough analysis, Förster points out that the theory of the role of mathematics in physics which Kant develops in OP appears to be contrary to the official "Critical" position [GAP 549-552]. This difference, Förster claims, suggests that the word "gap" refers to Kant's sudden, painful realization that "the question of the objective reality of [the first Critique's] concepts and principles still awaited a satisfactory demonstration" [GAP 551]—a question that would therefore need to be answered in OP as part of the Transition.

Förster defends his position by noting that OP contains a "polemic against mathematical foundations" [GAP 550] that seems to contradict directly the view presented in MFNS, where mathematics is regarded as the necessary link between metaphysics and physics: "A pure philosophy of nature in general", Kant explains, "may indeed be possible without mathematics; but a pure doctrine of nature concerning determinate natural things ... is possible only by means of mathematics" [MFNS 470]. If in OP "mathematics is expelled from the philosophia naturalis", then, Förster concludes, "the very possibility of a ‘pure doctrine of nature ...' is now in question" [GAP 550]. Thus the new gap that Kant supposedly recognized suddenly in September of 1798 was that the function of MFNS (see below) must now be replaced by a non-mathematical defense of the objective reality (i.e., applicability to physics) of the categories and principles defended in CPR.

Förster's new alternative, then, is that "Transition" refers to the book that was to be composed out of the notes contained in OP, whereas "gap" refers to the recognition while writing this book that his former "Critical" view of mathematics (as developed in MFNS) was mistaken and therefore needed to be replaced. Unfortunately, Förster has overlooked several problems that render his novel explanation untenable. After uncovering these problems, I shall demonstrate how they can be resolved by means of an alternative interpretation of the terms "gap" and "Transition".

The first problem raised by Förster's conjecture is that it seems rather far-fetched to suppose that the person who is arguably the most influential philosopher in modern times, and who showed such extreme (often annoying) confidence in the validity of his work, would suddenly revise one of the most basic tenets of his (by then) well-established System, just because someone saw fit to question it. This would not be the recognition of a gap, but a revolutionary rejection of an important part of the Critical enterprise, in favor of something closer to traditional empiricism. Moreover, such an interpretation fails to explain why Kant would say repeatedly in OP that this book adopts the "highest standpoint of transcendental philosophy" [e.g., OP 23,32]. If OP is intended to revise such basic Critical doctrines as the role of mathematics in physics, then it would hardly seem appropriate for Kant to call it the highest standpoint of his System, but, at best, a revision of the standpoint formerly adopted erroneously! Yet, as I shall argue shortly, no such problematic revision need be supposed, once the thoroughly perspectival structure of Kant's philosophical System is taken into account. The views expressed in OP are in no sense intended to replace the views expressed in any of the three Critiques, but instead are intended to answer some of the same questions from a different standpoint. Solving this first problem, then, will require an explanation of how the apparently contradictory theories Kant proposes in MFNS and OP can be rendered compatible.

The second problem arises when Förster [in GAP 538] denies the traditional view of MFNS, whereby it is regarded as a partial fulfillment of Kant's plan to write a Metaphysics of Nature.^[3]?/span>Förster rightly recognizes that MFNS is "Kant's philosophy of physics, or, rather, of physics' rational part" [GAP 544]; however, he believes its function in Kant's System should be understood in connection not with the proposed Metaphysics of Nature, but with CPR, as a kind of extended footnote to the Schematism: "Since the Schematism chapter dealt exclusively with time-determinations and inner sense, it did not specify the ‘sufficient' conditions of the application of the categories; it required supplementation by a work that laid out the form and principles of outer intuition in their entirety" [GAP 542]. MFNS can thus serve "to supplement the Schematism and to complete the proof of the objective reality of the categories" [GAP 543]. In fact, Förster goes so far as to conclude from certain comments in Kant's Preface [MFNS 477-478] that MFNS is not intended to be "part of the metaphysical system" at all [GAP 538-539]. He infers this from the fact that Kant uses a rather unfortunate metaphor in describing the relation between MFNS and "general metaphysics ... (properly, transcendental philosophy)" [MFNS 478]: Kant says MFNS is like "a shoot springing indeed from [the] root [of general metaphysics] but only hindering its regular growth"; hence in MFNS Kant "plants this shoot apart ... [from] general metaphysics."

The second problem is that there are at least five weighty objections to this aspect of Förster's interpretation. First, if MFNS served such a key role in the completion of the first Critique, then Kant would certainly have made a point of stressing this fact at some point in the second edition (published one year after MFNS); yet the second edition makes no reference to MFNS. Second, he would probably also have included these crucial new arguments themselves in the second edition (at least in summary form), since without them the arguments in the Critique are supposedly "insufficient"; yet no such arguments numbered among the many revisions Kant made to CPR in 1787. Third, the analogy of the "shoot" being entirely separable from the original plant, so that each can survive independently, would be wholly inappropriate if Förster's position is correct. Instead of emphasizing the sufficiency of CPR to stand on its own, as Kant intended, just the opposite would be true: the mother plant's roots (CPR) would not be able to survive once the shoot (MFNS) were transplanted. Fourth, Förster's accurate recognition of the need for a "completion" of the Schematism, with its exclusive emphasis on time, is misplaced. For he neglects the fact that this need is actually satisfied in the very next chapter of CPR, the Principles of Pure Understanding (and especially in the second edition Refutation of Idealism), where space is reintroduced into the system of knowledge, and its formal characteristics defined. Finally, in MFNS Kant clearly portrays his purpose as being, much like the purpose of his later Metaphysics of Morals (MM), not to provide a formal completion of CPR, but to provide material for its proper application—i.e., "instances (cases in concreto) to realize the concepts and propositions of [CPR]" [MFNS 478]. And this is not the task of Critique, but of Critically enlightened metaphysics.

The mistaken character of Förster's interpretation of Kant's analogy of the "shoot" is made more obvious when we read MFNS 477-478, where Kant says MFNS's separation from the rest of the System can be done "without mistaking its origination from metaphysics or ignoring its entire outgrowth from the system of general metaphysics. Doing this does not affect the completeness of the system of general metaphysics" because this "separate metaphysics of corporeal nature" is now to be viewed as a smaller part (i.e., a subsystem) within "the larger system of metaphysics in general". Kant's point, in other words, is simply that, in keeping with his usual systematic method, he will divide his subject-matter into different "standpoints", and deal with each separately. The word "separately" here does not imply a complete detachment from his overall System, but simply a strategy of "divide and conquer".^[4]?/span>Kant is saying that, instead of mixing together topics that adopt different standpoints, he prefers to treat them separately, with the understanding that they all remain under the "umbrella" of the general Perspective of the System (i.e., the Copernican Perspective, as described in the Preface to the second edition of CPR). Of course, this second problem gives rise to the need to determine more accurately the precise nature of the relationship Kant saw between MFNS and the rest of his System—a task I shall attempt to fulfill later in this essay.

In addition to the problems associated with Förster's assumption that Kant would decide to make a fundamental revision of his entire System at such a late stage in his life, and with his assumption that MFNS fills a gaping hole in CPR's Schematism, a third problem now rears its ugly head: namely, Förster accepts the traditional view that Kant's overall purpose in OP was to construct his infamous "Transition". Because Kant says in his letter to Garve that his current project "concerns the ‘Transition from the metaphysical foundations of natural science to physics'", commentators have almost universally assumed he intended this, or something like it, to be the title of that work [see e.g., P8 281n]. But this completely ignores the fact that a significant portion of OP (e.g., most of fascicles one and seven) is concerned not with physics and theoretical reason but with theology and practical reason. It also ignores the fact that the first fascicle contains quite a few notes that are obviously ideas for prospective titles, presumably either for major divisions or for the work as a whole. "Transition ..." is only one of many titles that appear here, and was probably intended to apply to only one of the twelve divisions of OP (perhaps the twelfth [see OP 22.543]), since it does not aptly reflect the book's overall content. Indeed, even a cursory reading of OP reveals that Kant's interests were much broader than simply to establish such a Transition. This third problem, then, gives rise to the need to describe more fully the true purpose of OP.

A fourth and final problem with Förster's interpretation is that it fails to give an adequate explanation for why Kant would describe the gap in his System as giving rise to "a pain like that of Tantalus". If the gap is really the recognition that his previous view of the relation between mathematics and physics is wrong, then this gap would not be tantalizing, but sickening, especially for someone who had devoted so much time and energy to the task of developing a System that rests (at least in part) on what would now be seen to be an incorrect view. The whole tenor of Kant's remarks to Garve suggests that the gap in question is tantalizing because it would complete the System for the first time, not because it would revise a System he had formerly thought to be complete. Providing an alternative interpretation that avoids this final problem will therefore require a more direct explanation of the implications of Kant's allusion to the myth of Tantalus.^[5]

In the remainder of this paper I shall offer another new explanation of the facts—one that enjoys the benefits of Förster's helpful suggestions, but provides solutions to the four problems raised above. I shall begin this task in the next section by examining some of Kant's long-term motivations for constructing a philosophical System; this will provide an important background against which the issues we are considering can be accurately viewed. §III will then provide a general overview of the architectonic relationships between the different books that constitute this System, including a new explanation of what Kant was aiming to accomplish in OP, thus solving the first three problems raised above. Finally, I shall demonstrate in §IV how this way of explaining the role of OP provides a perfect solution to the fourth problem, by revealing the significance of Kant's reference to the myth of Tantalus.

II. Kant's Critical Dreams as the Motive for a Philosophical System

The word "tantalizing" may seem oddly out of place in a discussion of Kant's writing, so much of which is characterized by his often dry and abstract style of reasoning. This is true, at least, until we turn our attention to what is probably the most unjustly neglected work in Kant's corpus, his essay on Swedenborg's mystical experiences, entitled Dreams of a Spirit-Seer, Illustrated by Dreams of Metaphysics (DSS)—the work in which Kant compares the dangers of fanatical mysticism to those of speculative metaphysics. For its dual emphasis on the hope for mystical experiences and metaphysical knowledge of spirits, together with its paradoxical and sometimes shocking insistence that such hopes are bound to be disappointed, makes DSS one of the only books Kant wrote that can legitimately be said to tantalize the reader. Moreover, this same book gives us a glimpse of Kant's dawning awareness of a new, "Critical" way of doing philosophy. Inasmuch as DSS sets out for the first time a general problem that Kant devoted the rest of his life to solving, it can be regarded as the "seed" that eventually sprouted and grew into the "tree" of Critical philosophy.

Although DSS is often interpreted as evidence of a radically "empiricist" stage in Kant's development, supposedly constituting a kind of Humean position, a careful examination of its contents reveals that his true intention is already to encourage a Critical attitude (though he did not yet call it by this name). While he comes down hard on the misuse of sensation and reason by spirit-seers and metaphysicians, respectively, when they regard their "dreams" as a source of knowledge [see S1 146], he clearly expresses his own dream that a properly balanced approach to both mysticism and metaphysics would someday emerge. As we shall see, Kant's Critical philosophy can be regarded as an attempt to construct a secure foundation for such an approach. Although the "tree" had matured by 1790, its "fruit" did not begin to ripen until shortly before 1798. For, as I shall argue in §III, OP was to be Kant's attempt to complete at long last the cycle that began with DSS, by bringing to full fruition the twofold task of Critical philosophizing. A brief overview of the contents of DSS will enable us to see more clearly what this fruit actually is.

Before beginning his examination of the similarities between fanatical mysticism and speculative metaphysics, Kant hints at the Critical nature of the inquiry that is to follow, by asking two opposing questions, but offering a "third way" out. In the Preface to DSS he asks "Shall [the philosopher] wholly deny the truth of all the apparitions [eye-witnesses] tell about?" or "Shall he, on the other hand, admit even one of these stories?" In response, Kant advises philosophers to "hold on to the useful" [DSS 317-318(38)], thus avoiding both extremes. He then divides the main text into seven chapters, with the first four constituting the "Dogmatic" Part and the last three constituting the "Historical" Part. The correspondence between this division and the Critical philosophy he was soon to begin constructing in his mind is evident from the fact that Part One ends with a chapter on "Theoretical Conclusions", while Part Two ends with a corresponding chapter on "Practical Conclusions" [DSS 348(85),368(115)], thus foreshadowing, however dimly, the division between the first and second Critiques.

Without going into the detailed arguments of these seven chapters at this point [but see P3 360-369], we can take note of some of the ways in which they adopt or prefigure views later defended in Kant's Critical philosophy. The first chapter of Part One begins with a discussion of what a spirit is or might be, and eventually appeals to freedom as the key determining principle [DDS 327n(52-53n)]: "Whatever in the world contains a principle of life, seems to be of immaterial nature. For all life rests on the inner capacity to determine one's self by one's own will power." The question of the possibility of spirits is also answered in an entirely Critical way: "The possibility of the existence of immaterial beings can ... be supposed without fear of its being disproved, but also without hope of proving it by reason" [323(48-49), emphasis added]. Kant's negative remarks about those such as Swedenborg, who actually claim to perceive spirits, are well known. What is not so well known is that Kant does not, in fact, go to the skeptical extreme that is typically attributed to him. Instead, he cautiously admits in Chapter Two that in an apparition, "delusion is mingled with truth", so that it tends to deceive a person "in spite of the fact that such chimeras may be based upon a true spiritual influence" [340(71-72), emphasis added]. Moreover, he develops in Chapter Two a complex theory of spiritual beings that focuses on the moral character of all spiritual reality: he argues that "the community of all thinking beings" is governed by "a moral unity, and a systematic constitution according to spiritual laws." Thus, "because the morality of an action concerns the inner state of the spirit", its effect can be fully realized not in the empirical world, but "only in the immediate communion of spirits" [336(65)]. There is no hint of skepticism here!

In truly Critical fashion, however, Kant proceeds in Chapter Three to present what he calls an "Antikabala"—i.e., "A fragment of common philosophy aiming to abolish communion with the spirit-world" [DSS 342(74)]. Here he "renders entirely superfluous the deep conjectures of the preceding chapter" [347(82)] by demonstrating that the same experiences and knowledge-claims can be explained without making reference to anything beyond the empirical world. This skeptical chapter also contains Kant's harshest ridicule of those dogmatists who, like Swedenborg and like Kant himself just a few pages earlier, have been smitten with the "disease" [e.g., 340(71)] of seeing mystical or metaphysical visions. What is rarely acknowledged is that the fourth and final chapter of Part One takes a step back from the conflicting views defended in Chapters Two and Three, and seeks a balanced position between the foregoing dogmatic and skeptical perspectives. In other words, Kant never intended his words of skeptical ridicule to be taken as representing his true position. For he now requests us to check "the partiality of the scales of reason" by letting "the merchandise and the weights exchange pans" [348-349(85)]. By this he means first, that we must give up all former prejudices, whether skeptical or dogmatic [see 349(85-86)], and second, that if we do, we will discover that "[t]he scale of reason is not quite impartial", for it favors the pan "bearing the inscription ‘Hope for the Future'" [349(86)]. In other words, just as the Critical philosophy remains disjointed and incomplete until the first two Critiques are "crowned" by the third [cf. CJ 170]—i.e., by the Critique corresponding to the question, "What may I hope? [see e.g., CPR 833]—so also at this relatively early stage in his career, Kant had already come to recognize that "even those light reasons [of hope] ... outweigh the speculations of greater weight on the other side" [DSS 349(86); cf. CPR 617,795,811]. "This is the only inaccuracy [of the scales of reason] which I cannot easily remove, and which, in fact, I never want to remove" [DSS 349-350(86)]. Far from concluding on a note of skepticism, Chapter Four insists that, even though "in the scale of speculation they seem to consist of nothing but air", the dreams of spirit-seers (and metaphysicians) "have appreciable weight only in the scale of hope" [350(86-87)].

Part Two begins with a chapter that recounts three stories concerning Swedenborg's spiritual powers. The next chapter then summarizes Swedenborg's own explanation of his "ecstatic journey through the world of spirits" [DSS 357(98)]; here Kant emphasizes that, in spite of being "utterly empty of the last drop of reason", the ideas of his "hero" have a striking resemblance to "the philosophical creation of my own brain" [359-360(101)]—i.e., to the theory of spirits proposed in Chapter Two, as Kant's own, independently-constructed position. He apologizes for wasting the reader's time, confesses he is still "in love" with metaphysics, and insists that metaphysics as a rational inquiry "into the hidden qualities of things" (i.e., speculative metaphysics) must be carefully distinguished from "metaphysics [as] the science of the boundaries of human reason" (i.e., metaphysics as Critique). This distinction then becomes the focus of the "practical conclusion" given in the third chapter of Part Two.

In this final chapter of DSS, any doubt about the Critical (as opposed to dogmatic or skeptical) character of this treatise is resoundly dispelled. For example, after distinguishing between what we can know for science and what we need to know for wisdom, Kant emphasizes the importance of determining what is impossible to know, so that "the limits set to human reason by nature" can be recognized, in such a way that "even metaphysics will become ... the companion of wisdom" [DSS 368(115-116)]. In order to accomplish this task, he says, a new kind of philosophy is necessary: once philosophy "judges its own proceedings, and ... knows not only objects, but their relation to man's reason, then ... the boundary stones [will be] laid which in future never allow investigation to wander beyond its proper district" [368-369(116)]. The fact that the proper drawing of this boundary will exclude knowledge of spirits need cause no concern to either mystics or metaphysicians, as long as we recognize that "such knowledge is dispensable and unnecessary", because reason does not need to know such things [372(120)]: for "true wisdom is the companion of simplicity, and as, with the latter, the heart rules the understanding, it generally renders unnecessary the great preparations of scholars, and its aims do not need such means as can never be at the command of all men."

Such comments make it abundantly clear that DSS served as a catalyst prodding Kant to set out a complete System of Critical philosophy. Indeed, a proper understanding of DSS, as forming a vital part of the Critical philosophy's historical context, is necessary for anyone who wishes to understand the general purpose of Kant's System, and so also, to interpret properly the purpose of OP. For if we keep in mind Kant's foundational comparison between the sensation-dreams of those who claim to have mystical experiences and the reason-dreams of those who claim to have metaphysical knowledge, then the fact that Kant saw DSS as requiring him not to give up his love of metaphysics, but rather to reform it (by applying to it the Critical method he was gradually coming to recognize), clearly implies that he also hoped for the day when the same Critical reform could be applied to the claims of mystics. In other words, the connection between mysticism and metaphysics represents not just a passing phase in Kant's early development, but an undercurrent that can be seen operating throughout his entire System. For if no other message comes through the pages of DSS, the notion that Kant saw the possibility of mystical experience and of metaphysical knowledge as standing or falling together, as two sides of the same coin, shines forth like the noonday sun.

III. The Opus Postumum as the "Grand Synthesis" of Kant's System

Keeping in mind the foregoing account of one of Kant's most significant background motivations for constructing a philosophical System, we can now return to the problems introduced in §I, in hopes of finding a fresh solution to each. Solving the third problem, concerning the true role of OP in Kant's System, is one of the main concerns of the present essay. But any solution to that problem depends on how one solves the second problem, concerning the precise relationship between MFNS and Kant's other systematic works. I shall therefore begin by attempting to solve this second problem, pass from there to a consideration of the third and central problem, and conclude this section by considering the first problem, concerning the apparent change in Kant's view of mathematics in OP, versus that in MFNS. Solving the fourth problem, concerning the full significance of Kant's reference to the myth of Tantalus, will then be the task of the fourth and final section of this paper.

In CPR 869 Kant explains that a complete system of metaphysics must include a speculative (i.e., theoretical) and a practical subsystem. He calls the former "metaphysics of nature" and the latter "metaphysics of morals". He then divides the former into four parts: "(1) ontology; (2) rational physiology; (3) rational cosmology; (4) rational theology" [874]. The first corresponds to "transcendental philosophy" itself, whereas the third and fourth are types of "transcendent physiology" [873-874]. This leaves the second as "the doctrine of nature" proper, which can itself be divided into "physica rationalis and psychologia rationalis" [874-875], in accordance with the distinction between inner and outer sense. If we take into consideration the corresponding twofold division of the Metaphysics of Morals (between inner morality, or virtue, and outer morality, or justice) [see e.g., MM 205], this means Kant originally intended the overall division of the Metaphysical wing of his System to cover four types of science: (1) science of body (i.e., rational physics); (2) science of mind (i.e., rational psychology); (3) science of right (i.e., rational politics); and (4) science of virtue (i.e., rational ethics). The architectonic relationship between these four branches of Metaphysical Science can be neatly expressed in the form of the following diagram:^[6]

In CJ 170 Kant explains that, although a third Critique is necessary, "no separate [i.e., third] division of Doctrine is reserved for the faculty of judgment". Hence, no third book on metaphysics is necessary either: "with judgement Critique takes the place of Theory [i.e., of Metaphysics]; ... the whole ground will be covered by the Metaphysics of Nature and of Morals."

In 1797 Kant published MM, explaining in the Preface [205] that this book expounds the "science of right" and the "science of virtue"—the third and fourth divisions of metaphysics cited above. He also explains that this book "forms a counterpart to the ‘Metaphysical Principles of the Science of Nature,' which have been already discussed in a separate work (1786)" [205]. This passage, which Förster unfortunately never mentions,^[7]?/span>clearly indicates that Kant eventually came to regard MFNS as sufficient to serve as a sufficient realization of the "rational physics" aspect of his planned Metaphysics of Nature.^[8]?/span>He was no doubt aware of the fact that MFNS does not contain a rational psychology, and had perhaps decided that the Metaphysics of Nature no longer needs the latter, since psychology is better pursued as an empirical science.^[9]

Reverting back to this more traditional view of the role of MFNS enables us not only to avoid the five objections raised in §I against Förster's problematic position, but also to see more order in the overall structure of Kant's System as it stood in 1798, when Kant wrote his letter to Garve. Pausing for a moment to specify the precise architectonic relationship between the books Kant had written up to this point may enable us to gain an invaluable clue as to the role of OP in Kant's System. The eight major works that make up the philosophical System Kant constructed during the thirty-one years following the publication of DSS can be classified into three types: those following the synthetic method (viz., the three Critiques); those companion volumes that support each Critique by following, for the most part, the analytic method (viz., PFM, FMM, and RBBR); and those developing the Metaphysical implications of Critical philosophy (viz., MFNS and MM). This classification of Kant's main systematic works, which I have defended at length elsewhere [see above, note 4], can be depicted in the following table:

The nature of the first two types of systematic works is relatively unproblematic, but that of the third type requires more explanation, especially since this table reveals what appears to be a gap in Kant's System as it stood in 1798.^[10]

The foregoing solution to the second problem raised in §I, together with this summary statement of the structure of Kant's System, now gives rise to a rather obvious hypothesis as to how the third problem can best be solved: perhaps the "gap" Kant mentions in his letter to Garve is identical to the gap represented by the question mark in the above table; and perhaps Kant's ultimate goal in writing OP was to fill this final gap by writing a General Metaphysics that adopts (like CJ) what I call the "judicial" standpoint.^[11]?/span>In order for this hypothesis to carry much weight, two questionable points must be demonstrated: first, that Kant himself (in spite of his above-mentioned statement to the contrary) had at least considered the possibility of writing a third part to his Critical metaphysics; and second, that the contents of OP justify regarding it as such a "grand synthesis".

We have already seen that Kant explicitly denies the need for a book that would occupy the empty square in the above table, for he asserts in CJ 170 that the third Critique will not require a corresponding book in the Doctrinal part of his System (i.e., in metaphysics proper). But let us take a closer look at how he describes this situation. A few pages later [176-179], he states that philosophy technically consists of only two parts, the theoretical and practical, and that a third part is necessary only for the purpose of completing the task of establishing the Critical foundations for metaphysics. He then explains [emphasis added] that "judgment" is connected with the faculty of "pleasure or displeasure" in order to "effect a transition from the faculty of pure knowledge, i.e., from the [theoretical] realm of the concepts of nature, to that of the [practical] concept of freedom, just as in its logical employment [i.e., within the theoretical system] it [i.e., judgment] makes possible the transition from understanding to reason."

This interesting, dual use of the word "transition" gives us an important clue as to how best to interpret Kant's use of the same word (Übergang) in his letter to Garve. Here in 1790, Kant is stating that the vital transition within the first Critique (via the role of judgment in the Principles of Pure Understanding) is analogous to the vital transition in the Critical philosophy as a whole (via the Critique of Judgment), and that metaphysics itself requires no such transition. Instead, he tells us, the principles of judgment can, "when needful be annexed to one or [the] other [division of pure philosophy] as occasion requires" [CJ 168]. This usage is especially interesting in view of the fact that Förster demonstrates, on the basis not of this passage, but of evidence found in letters to and from Kiesewetter, that Kant's idea for writing the Transition from MFNS to physics "seems to go back at least to the year 1790" [GAP 536]. In other words, it seems that in the same year he published CJ, where he claimed that a third "transition" is possible, though not necessary for the completeness of his overall System, Kant promised his friend Kiesewetter that he would some day attempt to write a third transition after all!

We now have evidence of three kinds of "transition", strongly suggesting that, when Kant uses this same word in his 1798 letter to Garve, he has in mind the extension of his "transitional" writings beyond CJ and RBBR to metaphysics itself. Such an interpretation requires us to assume that, between 1790 and 1798, Kant gradually changed his mind and came to see a third part of metaphysics no longer as an optional extra, but as an indispensable part of his System. Whereas in 1790 his friendly gesture to Kiesewetter committed him to writing only "a few sheets" concerning this Transition [quoted in GAP 536], by 1798 this same Transition was causing him to experience "a pain like that of Tantalus"! What could have caused such a change to occur? My suggestion is that in 1790 Kant could not bring himself to add yet another project to the already heavy workload he had cut out for himself. Many of his letters, even from earlier years, allude to his concern about whether or not he would live long enough to complete his current plan for a System [see also note 7, above]. As a 66 year old philosopher, who was just on the verge of completing his Critical propaedeutic to metaphysics, Kant knew in 1790 that a considerable amount of work still lay ahead if he wished to expound the System's metaphysical implications: RBBR, MM, and a more complete version of the Metaphysics of Nature still remained to be written, not to mention his various essays on history and politics. He already found it difficult to imagine living long enough to complete everything else he had planned, so how could he possibly commit himself to undertaking yet another major work? Yet, as each year went by and he completed more and more of his other projects, it became more and more likely that he would complete them all with some time and energy to spare; hence, it gradually dawned on him that this third Transition was too important to be merely "annexed" to other parts of the System.

If we consider now the content of OP, we discover that the notes Kant left behind relate to far more than just a dry (and perhaps useless) Transition from MFNS to physics. This, surely, was to be part of the project he was working on in 1798; and it is important to recognize that this Transition would belong in a work on General Metaphysics, because such a book would pass from the theoretical standpoint of MFNS to the more concrete, judicial standpoint of physics. Yet many of Kant's notes relate to the practical side of his System, with the apparent intent of revealing how still another Transition takes place, this time passing from the practical standpoint of MM to the more concrete, judicial standpoint of real ethical judgments. For example, Kant has much to say in OP about the immediacy of the moral law, which can be regarded as the very "voice of God" in our heart, and about the personhood of the God in whom we intuit all things—even though this same God is still beyond the grasp of our theoretical knowledge. In such notes (found especially in the first and seventh fascicles) Kant seems to be coming closer than ever before to achieving the goal of describing the "Critical mysticism" which, as I have argued elsewhere [see P4 67-94 and P6 321-323], characterized his own attitude throughout his entire life.

Our earlier discussion of DSS demonstrated that Kant first conceived of the laborious task of reforming metaphysics as part of a twofold problem. By 1798 Kant had satisfactorily accomplished his main task of thoroughly reforming the speculative tradition, not by disposing of metaphysics altogether, but by constructing a Critical metaphysics to put in its place. In the works composing the same philosophical System, he had also already made some significant progress in accomplishing his secondary task of thoroughly reforming the fanatical tradition, not by disposing of mysticism altogether, but by constructing a