The Kantian Epistemology an dTl leism. MAY 11 \938 _^, (OLomM%^3 .<^> ^v>•; A DISSERTATION PRESENTED TO THE FACULTY OF PRINCETON COLLEGE FOR THE DEGREE '* OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY, /. C. WISTAR HODGE, JR. The Theism reprinted from " The Presbyterian and Reformed Review" of July, 189-4. PHILADEtPHIA: MacCalla & Company. 237-9 Dock Street, -1894- B27?S •i^ -rs^r-::,:-:;;npssasaB^ The Kantian Epistemology and Theism. MAY 11^.938 ^ A DISSERTATION PRESENTED TO THE FACULTY OF PRINCETON COLLEGE FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY, C. WISTAR^ODGE, JR. The Theism reprinted from " The Preshy terian and Reformed Review " of July, 1884. Philadclpiua; MacCalla & CoMPANV. 237-9 BocK Street, — 1S94— ■ ^'-'^'■■^'^^mmmm'^^mmmmmmmrif.'^: -mm>m^ismj The Kantian Epistemology and Theism. 'ETAPHYSICS is the most human of all departments of knowledge. This can be seen from the fact that tlie first question of unreflective thought is the same as that which holds the chief place in philosophic reflection. Man looks within and with- out himself, upon his own thoughts and passions which come and go, out upon the phenomena of nature, and the question which comes nearest to the mind and heart of all is, What is real? Whore are we to find the ground of phenomena ? Reality there surely is, or else all philosophy would be vain. This is the great intuition of which the consciousness of every age is heir ; but where is ultimate Reality to be found, and what is its nature? Such questions, from their very nature, are the first to suggest themselves to man, and when once he has consciously reflected upon them he becomes aware that not only are they logically and temporally the first questions for human- ity, but that from the standpoint of worth for the human spirit, Metaphysics is that which man as a rational being must have. Wliile humanity exists and strives, hopes and despairs, rejoices and sorrows, its own soul with its hope of immortality and belief in its freedom and responsibility, the world about it, and the God above must always be the questions of the greatest worth, and these are the questions of Metaphysics. But while we reflect upon Being or Reality, its idea has been a part of our conscious experience, and were this not so we could not have reflected upon it. By the idea of the Real then alone can we solve our problems. Now the idea or conscious experience of Real- ity is knowledge, so that the problem of knowledge is inseparable from that of Being. The first question, then, wiiich reflective thought puts itself as it proceeds to the solution of its fundamental problem is this, — Is knowledge possible? — and of course, the next question is, — If possible, how ? In seeking an answer to these two questions it is to be remembered that knowledge has been defined as the idea, that is, the mind's grasp of Reality, so that any answer which makes knowledge anything less than this must be rejected. The first question was as to whether or not knowledge is possible Now we will find that Kant's answer to the second question, as to how knowledge is possible, shows that we can't give a demonstra- tive answer to this question ; but if we assume that knowledge is possible, then the answer to the question how it is possible will lead to a result which will justify our assumption of its possibility. Kant has shown that no uncritical demonstration of the possibil- ity of knowledge is possible. lie was born in an age when two solutions of the problem of knowledge had been given, and both had reduced the organic process of experience to a mechanical basis. The Eational Movement, beginning with DesCartes and ending with Wolff, had, though in a somewhat different way in each of its representatives, postulated a parallelism between thought and Be- ing ; and in Wolff the whole of knowing had been reduced to the making explicit those ideas which were already implicit in our con- cepts, thus overlooking the real question of how the individual mind can go outside itself and lay hold on Reality. Such purely analytic judgments as are yielded by such a method, says Kant, are subjectively hecessary but do not increase our knowledge, for the question is, — How can we obtain objectivity and synthesis? Kant then breaks away from the formalism of Wolff and turns his atten- tion to the Empirical school of Locke and Ilume. His, though, is too great a mind to rest long in such a philosophy, and he shows plainly its weaknesses. Mechanism reigns supreme here. The mind is a blank, the objects of knowledge are totally unrelated to and different from mind. They come into contact with our organs of sense and set up nervous excitations which, by some mysterious transformation, be- come conscious impressions, or rather impressions of which we are conscious. But an impression is merely subjective. We cannot say that it has any objective reference, if our sole source of infor- mation be our senses. Here, then, is a purely subjectiv^e fact, but there seem to be certain necessary connections between these impres- sions, and Hume saw that this necessity was the point for which he must give an account on his own premises; but he explained it in such a manner as to explain it away altogether. Such relations as identity and causality he reduced to subjective habits resulting from association, so that, strange as it may seem, in turning to the senses for objectivity, we end in a world of illusion, impressions coming and going, related to we know not what, their coimections with one another being merely the result of habitual association. It is easy to see that knowledge has been rendered absolutely impossible, that we can no more assert the existence of matter than of mind, and that the most thorough skepticism must be the outcome of a mechanical and sensational Empiricism. We cannot, then, from tlie contact of the objects of knowledge with our sense organs, nor by the analysis of our concepts, demon- strate the possibility of knowledge, that is, we cannot thus prove that our knowledge is real and objective, so that we must approach the problem in a different way. We must first ask the Kantian question how knowledge ia possible, and the result will justify our assumption of its reality, that is, its possibility. ITow, then, is syn- thesis possible ? IIow are judgments possible which are necessary and a priori, and at the same time synthetic and not merely ana- lytic ? Two presuppositions are necessary. The first has been the great constructive work of Kant. It is the activity of mind. Mathematical science seems certain, and yet must fall if Hume gives the last word for philosophy. For mathematical judgments are synthetic and a priori. Judgments of geopietry, while a jjriori, rest not on the analysis of concepts, but on the construction of a priori intuition by the productive imagination. So also is the case where time is involved instead of space. If, then, mathematical sci- ence be possible, Kant says that space and time must not be things or qualities of things, but forms of the mind, pure a priori intui- tions. But if we advance further we will find that space and time are only forms for the possibility of the cognition of objects, and that with these alone we cannot refer our impressions to one object, nor can we cognize one object out of its relations in the context of our organic experience. We know objects only as a part of what we understand as nature with its necessary connections. Every, thing, then, must be cognized as necessary in its connections with the other objects of our conscious experience, and thus, according to Kant, impressions are referred a priori to objects, and objects are cognized in necessary relations with each other. The categories accomplish this. In the deduction of these we come to the great lesson to be learned from Kant. Ilis deduction of the categories * is substantially this: The conjunction of the manifold in an intui- tion can never be given by the senses. Neither is it contained in the form of pure intuition. It is given by the understanding in an act called synthesis. But the conception of a conjunction of the manifold includes that of unity, for conjunction is the unity of the manifold of sense, so that this synthetic unity renders conjunction possible. Now this is not the category of unity because all the categories presuppose this original act of synthesis. This is the original activ- ity of mind which has been laid down as one of the presuppositions necessary to knowledge. The " I think " is the synthesis of all im- pressions into one self-consciousness. It is that which gives objec- •Kant, Critique of Pure lieason, Mciklcjohn's translation, chap, ii, sec. 2. tivity to our judgments. It is that which illumines all things with the clear light of self-consciousness. To this unity all representa- tions and impressions are to be related, and the media are the cate- gories, hence their deduction, that is their justification as necessary elements in knowledge, is the fact that the}' are links to self-con- sciousness. Things, then, if there be such, which are not related to this objectifying self-consciousness, can never be known. For a theory of knowledge the first and last word must be self-conscious- ness. As Leibnitz * says, "there is a light born within us." There has been too much criticism of Kant which §eeks to make him a Berkeleyan idealist because he taught philosophy the great truth that things exist onl}' in relation to self-consciousness. Such criticism fails to recognize the difference between psychological and transcendental idealism. Psychological idealism reduces everything to a dream of the individual mind, while transcendental idealism shows those universal rational principles which bind the mind to reality. Moreover criticism such as this does not realize the fact that Kant's great mistakes do not follow from this his great truth, but because he failed to recognize the fact that a second postulate necessary to knowledge, — that the real is rational, — is deducible and follows necessarily from this first truth. This we shall endeavor to show, and it is here that criticism should meet Kantism. Because all things exist in relation to self-consciousness, Kant's individualistic and sensationalistic presuppositions by no means follow. Critics therefore should praise him for his great lesson to philo.sop!iy. But there is a second presupposition without which knowledge as here defined is impossible. It is that the real is rational. This is not to be confused with the assertion that the rational is the real, which is very diflerent. That the real is rational, however, is essen- tial for knowledge. If we discover self-consciousness with its activity and its categories, and then say that they are individual and human merely, difi'ering from that which is universal, then that which was to give us reality and objectivity shuts us off from it, and we come to suppose that the real is beyond us; that the world is dead matter which in some way causes impressions, that is, that it is noumenon in the negative sense of the term as that which is not the object of our sensuous intuition, and that noumena in the positive sense as objects of non-sen.suous intuition are separated from us and out of all relation, not knowable because not mechanically known. The real must be rational, and the true nature of self-con- sciousness and knowledge must be recognized. If Kant's great •Leibnitz, On the fiupersensnoua bUmenl in Knowledge and On the Immaterial inNature. A letter to Qik.cii Cliarlotle of Prussia, 1702. Vol. of translations of the Philosophical works of Leibnitz by In order to see how untenable is the doctrine of the subjectivity of the categories, it will be best to take as an example of them that of causality, as this is most intimately connected with Theism, and it will be necessary in examing Kant's Theistic discussion, to know his exact view of causality. In his discussion of causality Kant is en- deavoring to answer Hume. It is necessary to notice that Kant's method of dealing with the problem is to first write as though he admitted the precritical position that we have through perception exi^erienee of a series of events wliile the understanding then adds the elements of universality and necessity, then later to advance to his own position that the work of the understanding itself is neces- sary to perception. Hume had seen that the nerve of causality lay in the necessity therein involved. This he had entirely explained away by reducing it to a mere subjective habit of association. Kant saw that even granting that we could have experience of ob- jects through perception alone, this could give knowledge only of matters of fact, but no necessity of connection. Granting that we could perceive that one event follows another, we could never say that it must always do so. If, then, this cannot be given by percep- tion, and yet is a fact, as Hume admitted when he sought an ex- planation for it, we must seek it in the synthetic activity of thought, in a concept of the understanding. But from a concept we can never advance our knowledge by an analysis of its implicit content. We must have a proof that this category can be applied to real ob- jective sequences. This is given in the proof of the "Second Analogy."* Kant is to prove that " all changes take place accord- ing to the law of connection of cause and effect." His proof in sub- stance is as follows : Mere experience of succession is dependent on the a ^rwn judgment of causality. For in all empirical cognition ^^ there is a synthesis of the manifold by the productive imagination, but this synthesis may have the events in any order, either pro- . gressively or retrogress! vely. But in order that it may have objec- tive validity the events must be represented as they occur in time. Now they occur in time in a necessarily determined order ; there- fore in order that reality may be given to the sequence, this neces- sary order must be given by the category of causality determined in time a priori as invariable sequence. The proof, then, consists in *Kaiit, Critique of Pare Reason, Meiklejohn's traiisliition, p. 141. 13 simply tliis. lu the first place we admittedly have subjective sequences of our perceptions, as in the case of the perception of a house where the sensations must be successive because our conscious- ness is subject to time, but where the order is arbitrary. We do admittedly experience objective sequences where the order is not arbitrary but invariable, and just this is their distinguishing mark. Kant now asks how Ihis latter kind are possible. Not, he says, by mere perception, since this gives nothing objective without the un- derstanding. Not from the pure concept which can only make ex- plicit by analysis that which a previous synthesis has given it, and which can never prove that causality can be in objects. Experience of this objective sequence, then, is possible only from the fact that we determine the category of causality in time as invariable sequence. Such seems the meaning of this passage which has aroused so much discussion and about which opinions so various have been held. Adamson* says that Kant cannot be trying to show how invariable sequence is possible, because he is endeavoring to prove that all experience of change is possible only by means of the causal category. Jn order that any change be determined " as existing in time" it must be determined according to the law of cause and effect. So Adamson concludes that the problem is to siiow how experience of any change at all is possible. But Kant is trying to show that all experience of real or objective changes, as di.'^tinct from those due to the arbitrary play of our imagination and therefore subjective, is subject to the causal law ; and it is just this irreversibility which is their distinguishing mark, hence this distinction is just Kant's point, so far from leading to a confusion, as Adamson claims. Certainly Kant is trying to prove that all changes in an ordered objective experience are subject to this law, and, as Adamson says, it would be contrary to his whole position to hold otherwise; but of course the question is limited to that coordi- nated and related exjierience which is the sphere of knowledge. Dr. Stirling f takes a different view, but Prof. Watson :): criticises Stirling and takes a position very similar to the one just stated, " | Dr. Stirling says that Kant holds that through perception we have a knowledge of events in sequences and then by means of the causal category determine some as necessary and invariable, and then Stirling objects that if there were not some necessary order or '■ connection in the events themselves we could not know when to I * Adamson, The Philosophy of Kant, Lecture ii. t Stirling, articles entitled "Kant Has Not Answered Uume," published in Mi7i.d, Vols, ix and s. X Watson, Kant and Bii English Critics, chap. vii. 14: fipjilj^ the category. Watson says tliat Stirling has not understood Kant, who holds that no experience of the objective sequence of objects or events can be had at all without the aid of the under- standing, and that so far from trying to show when we are to deter- mine sequences as objective, Kant is really asserting that we can have no experience of objective sequence at all without the cate- gory. Prof. Watson seems to us to be right -and the criticism of Dr. Stirling wide of the mark. But nevertheless the Kantian proof is open to criticism. The question at once suggests itself as to whether this invariable sequence is causality. While it is invaria- ble sequence in one sense, it is not the invariable sequence of caus- ality. To illustrate this, take an example of subjective sequence such as that mentioned by Kant with reference to the perception of the parts of a house where the sequence is arbitrary in order. Now, in comparison with this, Kant's sequence is truly invariable; for example, in one single instance the events happen in a certain order which is invariable in that one case, but not necessarily so when the same events happea again ; so that they are invariable only in a sense very diflerent from that in which a true causal sequence may be said to be invariable. Kither Kant must mean invariable sequence in one instance only as distinct from the play of fancy, and then he has not proved causality ; or if he has proven causality, then he has dune away with the pos.sibility of the experience of non-causal sequences which we undoubtedly have. There must be, then, some mark by which to distinguish the causal sequence from the invariable sequence of Kant. It is found in the dynamic notion of efliciency and force. The omission of this idea is the fundamen- tal defect in the Kantian doctrine on this subject. He holds, in the case where the " leaden ball" produces a hole in the "cushion," that it is the definite order in time which brings it about that the hole in the cushion would not produce the leaden ball, thus making a very minute distinction of an order in time where there is not necessarily a lapse of time. But these two things, the ball and cushion in contact, exist absolutely simultaneously. Hence it is not the order, but the want of energy or force in one instance, and the presence of it in the other, which makes the real difference between them. This shows that there is some objectivity in causa- tion other than that shown by Kant. There is an objective effi- ciency in one thing independently of the finite mind which is not in another. The dynamic idea is all important for science, so we see that Kant's doctrine of causation is unsatisfactory for science. Wo must bear this in mind when we come to his Theism, for if a doctrine of causation is inadequate for science, it must be wrong a fortiori to use it in the Metaphysical sphere. 15 Taking this, then, as an example of all the categories, we conclude, first, that there is a unity of organic experience, and, secondly, an ob- jectivity of the categories, both different irora that held by Kant. As to the first of these points, Caird* shows that the unity given in K:int's doctriae of the understanding is not a necessary but only an accidental one. If the consciousness of self is consciousness of syn- thesis, and if this is judgment, then the Ego and its categories cannot be separated ; and if thought itself is synthetic, and must go out of itself, then the understanding cannot be separated from sense. The unity of conscious experience is not the mechanical putting together of separate parts, but the differentiating consciousness of that which is already united; the recognition of the distinctions in that which is a unity in diversity. And secondly, although nature depends on Mind and is the revelation of an idea, yet it is independent of the finite mind. The cosmic order is one where forces are playing independently of our mind ; forces which will crush us if we come in their path. The reaction from the eighteenth century, where this view was so exaggerated, and where the spontaneity of the individual was annihilated, where in cognition things must impress our blank minds, and where in morality we are in the chains of ]ihysical necessity, the reaction from all this so grandly expressed by Kant is carried too far. There is a necessity in the categories which bespeaks an origin other than our finite minds. Nor is this a return to the old jiosition that things exist and are perceived apart from the understanding and the spontaneity of thought which then adds on, as it were, necessity. On the contrary, it is the assertion that the work of thought cannot be separated from jterception, and also that the Cosmos is not a dead thing as in the philosophy which Kant was criticising; it is the assertion of its intelligibility, that it is built on the framework of reason, the product of mind, imma- nent with rationality, so that the finite mind finds its forms in it, thus reaching truth which is objective and at the same time making possible "synthetic judgments a priorir To say that the Cosmos is independent of our finite minds is not to say that it is independ- ent of the Universal Mind. The alternative is before us ; we must presuppose that reality is rational or we must go back to Hume. Kant's position is not tenable. His objectivity consists in being a distinction from feeling and sen.sation, it cannot logically be inde- pendent of the human consciousness. Dr. Harris \ has given forcible expression to the train of thought which we have been following. He says : " It is only because the constitution of the universe is accordant with these principles and its on-going regulated by them, * Caird, The riulosophi/ of Kant, p. 381. t Harris, I'he Philosophical Basis of I'heisni, p. 121. 16 that the universe is a Cosmos and not a chaos. They are the ^flammantia moenia mundi,' * the flaming bulwarks of the uni- verse, which no power, not even though almighty, can break through or destroy, and within which the Cosmos lies in the light of rational truth, and moves in the harmony and order of rational law to the realization of rational ideals and ends. Thus the princi- ples of Reason, together with the truths inferred from them, and the ideals and ends determined by them, are the archetypes of Nature." In view of all the preceding we are forced to conclude that if Hume is to be answered and refuted, it is not by one of the two postulates of knowledge laid down, but by both together. Tims the Kantian limit of knowledge with reference to noumena in the negative sense, that is, with reference to the mysterious unknowable " things " which cause in some way our sensations, has been removed, and it has been removed by showing that on Kant's own principles no such " things '' can exist and that the world of our knowledge is the real world. This is the teaching of tlic Nco- Kantians. But there next arises the question as to noumena in the positive sense, that is, as to objects of "non-sensuous intuition." Kant saw that man has a faculty of lleason above the understanding, the supreme category of this reason being unity. Man in seeking unity is not satisfied with the system of nature whose unity is a concate- nation of law. So that the activity of mind once shown, the nat- ural course of mental necessity leads us to demand the uncondi- tioned. Here is the point where the critic of Kant who is familiar with post-Kantian Philosophy must praise him and show that, although his system was the forerunner of British Kantisra, such was not the spirit of his system. Hamilton f praises Kant for his Agnostic position, but criticises him for maintaining that the idea of the unconditioned is natural to the human mind and something positive, instead of showing that it is merely a negation of the con- ditioned. Kant is greater than his followers. He recognizes the force of Reason, and seeks to leave his ideas in a position that can be vindicated by the Practical Reason. But the grave defects in his system must bear their fruit here also, and a brief survey of them will prepare the way for a consideration of his discussion on Theism or Rational Theology. Reason demands the unconditioned unity in a series of conditions, Kant tells us.:j: It seeks this by syllogisms which proceed through prosyllogisms to the unconditioned. Thus * Lucretius, De lierum Naiura, i, 73. t Hamilton, Essay on the Unconditioned, I Kant, Critique of Pure liecison, MeikU^obn's translation, "TransccndcDlal Dialectic," g 3. 17 it reaches the subject which can never be predicate, the uncondi- tioned unity of all phenomena, and unconditioned unity of all things. Thus we get Eational Psychology, Rational Cosmology, and Rational Theology. But reason must regard these as merely empty ideas for producing a higher unity than that of the under- standing. Reason cannot assert the reality of these ideas, because she has no grounds for so doing. Now, in the first place, Kant is to be criticised for making the ideas of Reasons-mere logical universals, thus making them as ab- stract instead of as concrete as possible. He is wrong in seeking them through syllogisms, and this leads him into his difficulty. Cousin's * book makes this the main point of the whole discus- sion. We find Kant thus separating the understanding and Reason, as he had the understanding and sense. But it is not through syl- logisms that we reach these ideas. They are immanent, involved in the scientific cognition of the understanding. We cannot recog- nize the categories without also recognizing the spiritual Ego whose activity they are, nor without recognizing the Cosmos which they constitute, while the knowledge of all this as relative in- volves the recognition of the demand of Reason for Absolute and Unitary Being. And right here we meet another confusion of Kant's. lie gets the idea of the Cosmos from the unity of phenom- ena, and the idea of God from the unity of " things in themselves." This is not the true distinction. The way which seems more accu- rate is to recognize the function of Reason in the sphere of the Rela- tive, demanding a relative noumenon or ground, and its function in the Rational stage proper demanding the Absolute as the ground of all Relativity both in its phenomenal and noumenal aspects. In the second place we have to consider Kant's doctrine of the limit of knowledge as not extending to these ideas, and of their purely subjective character. One source of this doctrine has been removed in showing their concreteness and that they are not merely logical universals. But Kant's chief reason for denying knowledge of these is the same which has held him back from the full truth all along. It is his failure to recognize that reality is rational, and the false presupposition that reality is given by sense. Then the con- clusion is inevitable that these ideas of Reason are empty because they cannot have a content of sense intuitions. But if we recog- nize the spiritual nature of reality this presupposition is done away with, and all ground for denying a knowledge of rational ideas goes with it. Then there is no reason for saying tliat sensation is neces- sary for all knowledge because it is necessary for a certain kind, the only ground for such a statement being this very presupposi- * Cousin, The Philosophy of Kant. .J 18 tion. If, then, we deny the possibility of Icnowledge in the sphere of Reason we deny that the real is rational, and if we deny this we can have no knowledge in the sphere of science, so that we must conclude that the postulates necessary to render knowledge jjossible in scientific cognition make it possible in all spheres. Again wc must say cither Hume or a knowledge of the ideas of Keason, Kant's half-way position is untenable. We leave the llational stage within the sphere of the Relative which demands the recognition of the relative noumena, and turn to the sphere of Reason proper which demands the Absolute as the ground of all Relativity. Reason's category unit}' cannot be satis- fied with two relative noumena, and moreover the consciousness of ourselves as dependent and finite, involves the knowledge that Abso- lute Being must exist. This is the first great truth of Philosophy, that back of the Relative exists Absolute Being. But immediately questions of the greatest importance press upon us. What is the nature of Absolute Being ? Can it be known ? The importance of these questions cannot well be exaggerated. The importance of the former for the problem of knowledge, which we have been con- sidering, is fundamental. The complete justification of the assump- tion that the real is rational will depend upon the determination of the Absolute as self-conscious, personal Spirit. We may define the Absolute as existing out of all relation to the Relative and as includ- ing all possible modes of Being, or as the One Substance, or Uncon- scious Idea, the result of which will be to give the Absolute a nature which has no warrant for its truth in exi^erience, a nature such that all knowledge of it is impossible under those categories in which we must have knowledge of it if we can know it at all. The conclusion must be that if the Absolute is out of all relation to us we can never attain any knowledge of it, and that if Being is iden- tical with Non-being or Nothing, the whole process of knowledge has its formal basis in logic taken away, and the Absolute of this Philosophy becomes the Unknowable of the Agnostics who have been lead to their position from the Metaphysical standpoint bv just this definition of the Absolute as the negation of all that we can know. But, on the other hand, if Absolute Being is God, a self conscious personal Spirit, then the postulates of knowledge are fully justified. Knowledge we saw was impossible on the supposi- tion that there was any reality other than the content of our objec- tive ideas, that in reality is that which is the direct object of our con.sciousness and there is no thing in itself which makes this un- real or phenomenal. But in order that we may show that this is knowledge in the true sense, we must show that the world is the product of Intelligence ; for if an intelligent idea is not immanent 19 in it, it cannot be in direct relation to consciousness as the object of its knowledge, and our knowledge is subjective after all. Also if the Absolute be not more completely determined its unknowability must follow, lleligion and ^forality are also at stake. Everything depends on holding right ideas as to the relation of man, the world, and God. If they are not kept distinct, lieligion and Morality, wliich have to do with the relation of the individual to God and Duty, sufler. If on the other hand, these three ideas are isolated and out of mutual relations our knowledge of all that is unphe- nomenal becomes impossible. Now it is only God and not an abstraction such as Absolute Being which can stand in proper rela- tions to man and the world. As Coleridge, the poet-philosopher puts it : " 'Tis the sublime of nmu, Our noontide majesty, to know ourselves Parts and proportions 'if one wondrous whole ! This fraternizes man, lliis constitutes Our charities and beariugs. But 'tis God Diffused through all, that doth make all one whole." The Absolute Being must be of such a nature as to reveal Him- self to us in all the relations involved in Knowledge, Morality, and Eeligion. AVe must choose between the doctrine "Omnis determina- tio est 7iegatio" and that of Leibnitz, who says :* " The perfections of God are those of our own souls, but He possesses them without bounds. He is an ocean from whom we have received but a few drops. There is some power, some knowledge, some goodness in us, but they are whole and entire in God. Order, proportions and harmony enchant us; painting and music are samples of them. God is all order. He always keeps an exquisite justness of propor- tions. He creates the universal harmony. All beauty is an expan- sion of His rays." From what has been said it will be seen that it is necessary that the Absolute be Spirit. But this notion involves first intelligence, and secondly energizing activity in accordance with a moral nature. Now these two notions involve those of self- conseiousness and personality, and thus the highest metaphysic accords with experience for, while we know unconscious states of self-conscious spirit, we do not know tmconscious spirit, and that which we do know by direct introspection is conscious and personal. Lotze teachesus that experience justifies the position we have stated. He says,f " We cannot, however, for a moment admit that this con- ception of an unconscious Spirit has in this sense any real meaning whatever. We cannot, indeed, deny that there are within our spir- itual life unconscious states and processes, but it does not follow * Leibnitz, Essais de TheodiceS, quoted by Salsset, Modern Pantheism. t Lotze, miowphy of Reliyioii, p. 55. m^^Mvmmmw. 20 that these, as unconscious, and as at the same time states of a Spirit, ever occur except iu those beings which are bj nature conscious spirits. Wc must only loolc upon them as cases in wliich a con- scious, spiritual life is arrested or limited." We have learned, then, that for the sake of the gravest interests of humanity, the Absolute must be recognized as a self-conscious and personal spirit, and from Lotze we have learned that this accords with experience. More- over the solution of all subsequent questions of Metaphysics will have a character determined by the way in which this first ([ucstiou is settled. It is not enough to say that the Ultimate Realitv is spirit. The whole Hegelian movement was anti-materialistic, but because it failed to attribute self- consciousness and personality to Absolute Being, it could not grasp the fact of Creation in any other way than that of the necessary evolution of the Absolute, thus losing all the Reality of the Relative, the consequences of which in the sphere of Religion and ilorality being too obvious to require stating. Thus the doctrine of creation and with it that of the human psyche and the Cosmos, depend on the question at issue. Further- more Being which is nothing, is an abstraction which can never become clothed upon with concreteness unless it have iu it a necessary principle of movement, but if it is Non-being or Notiiing how can we say that there is a living dialectic in it, and why is not Agnosticism a more logical development from such a doctrine than Hegelianism ? It Metaphysic is to be at all possible in any true sense, we must have God as the starting point and not the culmina- tion only. Thu^the question to be discussed and in which we are to seek the cure for Agnosticism, should at tlie same time be a cor- rective for the Pantheism of Hegel. That Agnosticism and Pan- theism are to have the same remedy does not seem strange when we reflect that it was the defect of Kautism which led on to Fichtc, Schelling, and Hegel. This same point should be one of correction for the school of thinkers who think that the problem of knowl- edge is to be solved by breaking awav from the individualistic ten- dencies of Kant, but who are not careful to avoid his abstraction. It is not by avoiding any one cause of the Kantian limitations that we can hope to find a satisfactory solution of the problem of knowl- edge. It can be done only by a careful consideration of tlie merits and failures revealed by the history of thought. Kant has shown that the categories and synthetic unity of apperception are neces- sary for knowledge. But this self-consciousness was human and moreover only an empty notion. Now, says the school in question, tlie rational is the real, so for the individual thought without a thinker substitute a Universal Idea or spiritual principle without transcendent jiersonality, and the jiroblem is solved. But when wc 21 have a principle which is merely the unity of subject and object, and when we have substituted the universal thought for the indi- vidual we are no farther away from abstractions. At the very out- set we said that for Kant's "synthetic unity of apperception" was to be substituted the concrete, individual, self-conscious, personal " I," .so now it is this " I " which should be raised to universality, and not the abstraction of Kant. The problem is to be solved in such a way that we can say that our thoughts are the correct ideas of reality, and not by the identification of the rational and the real, for, while we have claimed that a necessary postulate of knowledge is that the real is rational, it by no means follows that the rational is the real in the sense that the two spheres are identical and coex- tensive, for reality as spirit is far wider than mere thought. More- over, when we have said that Kant's acknowledgment of the spiritual activity of the ego leads us to link our organic experience or knowledge to a real noumenal subject which is concrete, instead of to the acceptation of Kant's own doctrine which was the result of presuppositions contrary to the spirit of his system, we have, I think, shown that Neo Kantisra,* as represented by such men as Cohen, Lange, and Vaihinger, is not a true development of the spirit of Kantism. These men say, and rightly too, Rve think, that on Kantian principles there can be no thing in itself in the Kantian sense, this is a mere category to complete experience; but then they accept Kant's doctrine of the merely logical and subjective char- acter of the ego, and so hypostatize experience, resting it on nothing. Here is abstraction again. If the spirit of Kant has taught us any- thing, it has taught us that the noumenal reality of the ego is neces- sary to experience so that we have an anchorage at once immanent and transcendent. But now having done away with the abstract Kantian thing in itself, the complete justification of our belief that the Cosmos or world of our knowledge is the real world, depends on whether or not the Absolute is a Personal Spirit who can be at once immanent and transcendent, and create the Cosmos according to ])riuciples with which lie has endowed llis creatures. Having a belief in ourselves and God we have no difficulty in accepting the fact that it is by Reason and not by sense that we get the reality of the Cosmos, and are content to let Psychologists debate as long as they will. Furthermore it was the ab.stract and a priori definition of the Absolute in a way which has no justification in experience which led Sir William Ilamilton and Dean Mansel to Agnosticism. Abstraction is the bane of all true Philosophy. We have just *See Stiihlin, Kant, Lotze and Ritschl ; also Setli, article entitled "The Epie- tcmology of Neo Kantism," Philosophical Review for May, 1893. 22 mentioned Agnosticism. Its cure lies just at this point. Kant's question was that of knowledge, and so we are especially con- cerned with this relation of Theism to Epistemology. The imme- diate cause of Agnosticism is Epistemological, that is the sub- jectivity of the human Reason, but the cause of this is the identi- fication of the Absolute with Non-being or pure abstraction. Are the categories, which render possible synthetic judgments a 2^riori, those of God who created the Universe rational and placed in our mind the frame work of reality, or are they merely individual forms, and we tlms forever shut up to Kantism? Tlic answer to this depends on our determination of the Absolute as a self-con- scious and personal Spirit, for only such a Being can be self-reveal- ing, and, as has been'' said, if men are left with a reason which differs essentially from reason Universal, to grope after God, they must end in despair, and everywhere will be found altars " to the unknown God." But if He be a self-conscious, personal Spirit then is He near to each one of us and every way to Him is one which He Himself has made and which humanity has but to traverse. Reason, the great emotions common to all humanity, Science, Morality and Religion, every road will lead us to Him, humanity will befilled with His presence, and Philosophy's main i>roblem will be solved. There is another thought which will help us in examining Kant's Theism, and which is suggested by the two movements resulting from his system, and which have been mentioned. Both transcendental Idealism and Agnosticism stand alike open to criti- cism for making 15oing Nothing, but there is another point of view in which they differ totally, and from which a lesson of vital importance in examining Kant will be gained. The difference between the two systems mentioned may be expressed by the word immanence. The Agnosticism of Spencer, besides coming from his abstract definition of the Absolute, results also from the fact that he thinks that he can explain the world by matter and a Relative Force, so that the Absolute stands apart and is unknowable. But in Hegelianism the case is entirely diflerent. The Absolute is everything to this system. Immanence is the profound truth to be learned from this system, and which, if rightly apprehended, will do away with Agnosticism. Kant's God is only transcendent, and his doctrine must be transcended in a system which will recognize the truth of immanence, and the great question now is how can we have an immanent and at the same time a transcendent God, and a world and creatures distinct from Him and finite. If we ascribe self-consciousness and personality to God, and realize that this involves a consciousness of self as distinct from both nature and 23 other ]icrsonalities, then God can be conceived as separate from, as well as revealed in, nature and the human psyche. Transcendence is not to be lost sight of in emphasizing immanence; we must have a God above as well as in man and nature or we must give up Ethics, yes, and Christianity too, for there is not one Bible doctrine that can stand if only immanence be true. But immanence is only half the truth. There is no opposition between immanence and transcendence. But only a self-conscious and personal God can be at the same time immanent and transcendent. Now the true nature of Theism which holds fast both immanence and transcendence, and can show that they are not mutually exclu- sive ideas because God is self-conscious and personal, needs emplia- sis. No less a thinker than Schopenhauer, has not grasped it, and he speaks of the far-away Unknowable of Agnosticism and the mechanically conceived God of the eighteenth-century Deism as though they were the God of Theism, saying that before Kant there was a dilemma between Materialism and Theism, but that Kant has given us a starting jioint for a third alternative which will free us from the dilemma. He says :* " Before Kant there was a real dilemma between Materialism and Theism, that is, between the supposition that either a blind fate, or an Intelligence directing things from the outside according to ends and concepts, had l)rought the world into being, nor was there any third alternative. .... But now Kant, by his profound distinction between phe- nomenon and the thing in itself, has taken the foundation from Theism, and has opened the way on the other hand to an entirely different and more profound interpretation of Being." Here we see that Schopenhauer has misunderstood Theism. It is true that Kant has "taken away the foundation" from the theory that an Intelligence directing in a mechanical way from without is at the ground of things, but this is Deism and not Theism. Now between Materialism and Theism rightly understood as including both immanence and transcendence, our choice has still, and always will have to be made, for, as Schopenhauer says, Kant has driven us from Deism, and we cannot accept any theory which recognizes only immanenci! because personality and self-consciousness arc ulti mates. The answer of Schopenhauer to the great question is no better than that of llcgel, for wc cannot say that the DiiKj an sick is blind will striving to be, because will separated from Intelligence is as much of an abstraction and impossibilit}' as Being which is Nothing and has to " become " before it can really and self-consciously be. If it could be so, despair would be the last word of Philosophy. Amid the deep sorrows of life and its daily cares which sometimes seem * SchopcuUauer, Die Weli ah Wille und Vorstellung, p COS. 24 so heavy, instead of hope to sustain men, the best that they could do wonld be to cease to will to live. Between Theism, then, and the " blinder Zufall " our choice must be made. Blind chance or Intel- ligence, and not Intelligence merely but personal self-conscious Intelligence, for here alone immanence and transcendence can unite. It is clear, then, that the interests nearest the heart of humanity depend on whether or not the Absolute Being is God, that is a self- conscious and personal Spirit. The question, then, is whether the Absolute of Philosophy is God, that is, a self-conscious, personal Spirit. The question now comes up as to whether there is any a priori rea- son for believing that this is so. Reason gives an affirmative answer. Her supreme category is Unity. A complete and abso- lute Unity must bo attained. Now there arc the spheres of nature and of freedom. But nature is independent of our finite wills. If therefore all we can say is that Absolute Being exists, the dualism between nature and freedom cannot be done away with. The only possible unity is one where the ends of freedom are realized in nature, and this can be only if nature is controlled by a Unitary Being which is active for ends, directing nature for the realization of these ends of freedom. Mechanism is not chance but law, and the idea of law includes in it that of an end. Thus mechanism leads by necessity to Teleology, and the only unity is a teleological one where self-conscious intelligence and will is subjecting Mechanism to its own ends. "T'he supreme unity is found when Mechanism and Teleology harmonize in the nature of a Being who is the source of both moral and natural law. Reason is satisfied only where the heart is satisfied, in the belief and knowledge that above all is one personal, self-conscious Spirit, the Absolute God who has predeter- mined all things for the realization of His own glory and the well- being of humanity. Kant recognizes this a j^riori necessity. He argues* that the Absolute mu-st be conceived as one and individual because it is the primal source of all things ; and in another place,t he tells us that the highest unity is a teleological one so that Intel- ligence must be predicated of the Ab.solutc. In fact the connecting link of Kant's whole system is Teleology. He sets forth Nature and her categories in the Critique of Pure Reason; and after leaving noumena beyond the reach of knowledge so that we cannot even say that they exist, he shows us that they exist and opens up the world of freedom in the Critique of Practical Reason ; but he connects the two spheres in his Critique of Judgment by means of the Teleologi- * Kant, Critique of Pure ifoMo;?, ^leiklejohn's translation, "Transcendental Dialectic," Bk. ii, chap, iii, ^5 2. f Critique of Pure Reason, Appendix to the "Transcendental Dialectic." 25 cal judgment which reflects on nature as though she were subject to a Supreme Intelligence and realizing the ends of freedom. But with Kant an a priori necessity is only a subjective one. To say that anything is a priori with him is equivalent to saying that it is sub- jective only, and he seeks to show that all arguments a posteriori with reference to this question are fallacious. He grants what has been given a priori, but only as a subjective necessity, and then shows the dialectical procedure of Reason in the Theistic argument. But it is clear from the introductory remarks on knowledge that this identification of a prioriness and subjectivity is groundless. The fact that a truth is a priori necessary by no means proves that it has no objectivity, nor does it even leave us powerless to claim for it objectivity. The fact that it is a priori is strong evidence of its objective truth. And it is also true, as has been shown, that Kant's separation between the a priori and the a posteriori in knowledge is false. They are two aspects of truth which is a unity. Therefore the a j^osleriori must not conflict with the a 2^riori, and if we find that it does we may be sure that one or the other is not genuine. If it be true, then, that a priori we must say that the Ab- solute is self-conscious and personal Intelligence, then it is of the very greatest importance that this be justified a posteriori, that is, in experience ; for if this be not possible we may well question our supposed a priori necessity. Now the a posteriori justification of our belief in the existence of the Absolute and of our determination of it as personal self-conscious Intelligence, is the Theistic argument. The arguments of which this is composed are a posteriori with the exception of one aspect of the Ontological argument. The question before us, then, is as to whetlier or not the Kantian criticism has overthrown the historic Theistic arguments. There is one point, however, which should be carefully noted before estimating the weight of Kant's criticism. It is that the idea of God which he uses as the object of these arguments is very different from the God of Theism when rightly understood ; and also very diflerent from the God which we might infer from what Kant himself has ad- mitted as an a priori though subjective necessity. The God of The- ism is a self-conscious and personal Spirit and this realizes both the ideas of immanence and transcendence. Now as we are seeking the a posteriori jasiiRcntion of that which we have detcrmined'a priori, of course this same idea of (rod which has been reached a priori should be the subject of the Theistic argument. Moreover since Kant has admitted the a priori necessity of determining the Absolute as intel- ligent and personal, such a God could be immanent as well as trans- cendent, and such a Being should have been made the subject of his criticism. But such is not the case. The God which is the subject of 26 bis remarks on the Theistic argumeuts is the God of eighteenth-cen- tury Deism, and of course they avail against this. His theory of knowl- edge was marred by its mechanistic character, and so the objects of knowledge come to have a mechanism about them and exist apart from consciousness. God stands apart and in a purely external and mechanical relation to the world and man. The idea of God which he gives* has three elements. First the sum total of the possi- bility of all experience. Second the conception of an ens realissi- 7nnm. And in the third place the attributes which we get by what he calls " hypostatizing " tlie idea ; that is, he argues that from it all things dferivo their reality and so it is regarded as primal. A primal Being must be one and simple. Then we regard it as the ground of all things, and cogitate the whole sum of our experience as an in- dividual whole, giving the idea of individuality, and so reach the idea of God. Now nothing could be more mechanical than this. God is not the sum total of all existence regarded as a whole and individual, lie is not a sort of mine or fund of reality from which we draw. lie is not a sum total of all reality as though reality were, as a house, made of different mechanically constructed parts. God is a spirit existing in spiritual relations to His finite creatures. It was just such "a. mechanical and pantiieistic definition as this which lead Sir William Hamilton and Dean Mansel into so many difficulties. Dr. Runze f speaks to the point on this mechanical conception. He says that the mechanical conception of a sum total which limits God to a mere aggregate, is not interchangeable with the idea of the Highest Being. " Much rather," he says, " does the highest reality lie at the foundation of the possibility of all things as a cause and not as a sum total." We must carefully bear in mind that it is God, a living Spirit who exi.sts in spiritual relations to us, whom we are seeking ; and not a God who is afar off, and in merely mechanical relations to us, or else out of all relation. Tlie Theistic arguments, Kant's treatment of which we are now to examine, are four in number. There is the Ontological argu- ment which tells us a ^n'on' that if the Absolute or Necessary Being e.sist we must predicate infinity of all its attributes, and identify it with the All Perfect Being ; and a posteriori this argument ex- presses the truth that God througli this perfect idea has spoken in and ti> the consciousness of humanit}^, so that His existence maybe inferred as the cause of this idea. Next there is the Cosmological argument which proceeds from the contingent to the necessary, and thus from *Kant, CriVjgwc 0/ Pure iv«(/.?«;i, Jleiklejohn'B translation, "Transc. Dialect," chap, ill, S2. I Runze, Der Ontologmhe OolUsbexecis, p. 81. 27 this wc infer the existence of a necessary Being which the Oatologi- cal argument on its a prion side tells us is the Most Perfect, the In- finite Being. Then there is the Teleological argument, which argues from the adaptations of means to ends in nature to design, and thence infers that Intelligence is to be predicatedof the Absolute. Lastly we have the Moral argument, which from our moral nature and the supreme categories of Morality infers the moral nature of the Absolute. The most notable and important fact with reference to these arguments is their vital connection with, and mutual assistance of, each other ; while at the same time each preserves its own identity in the performance of its special function. They are parts of one whole, which cannot stand hostile criticism if separately required to perform the whole task. Thus the Cosmological argument gives us the existence of the Necessary Being, but nothing more. The Teleo- logical and Moral arguments give us attributes of this Being, while we leave experience and say a /jrwn that these attributes are infinite and so identify the Absolute with God. Therefore these arguments can neither be separated nor identified. They have been most happily likened to a bundle of twigs, which when bound together the strongest arm cannot break, but when separated may be broken by the weakest. They are the a posteriori ground of that firm con- viction that the Absolute of Philosophy is the God of the Bible, and together with the a priori ground of this same belief they change it into a reflective knowledge by which man's reason bids his heart take courage as it faces the assaults of skepticism. Kant first criticises the Ontological argument.* lie discusses it in its a priori form. Anselmf is the author of this, so we must look to him for a statement of it. He gives it thus: "And we believe that Thou art a Being than whom a greater cannot be con- ceived And certainly that than which a greater cannot be conceived cannot be in the intellect alone. For if it be in the mind only there can be thought a Being existing in reality also, which is greater. If therefore that than which a greater cannot be conceived is in the mind only, it follows that that, than which a greater can- not be conceived is that, a greater than which can be conceived : but certainly this cannot be. There exists, therefore, beyond a doubt a Being than whom there can be no greater, both in thought and in reality." Anselm's reasoning is simply that if we could conceive the non-existence of that than which a greater cannot be conceived, tnen a greater could be conceived, which is a contradiction. But, of *Kftnt, Critique of Pare Reason, Meiklejolm's translation, "Transcendental Dialectic," cluip. iii, § 4. t Anselm, Proslogion, Caput il. 28 course, this is after all merely a necessity of conception founded on the impossibility of conceiving the opposite. It asserts a co f.radic- tion in the removal of existence as a predicate, asserting that it is contained necessarily in the concept. Now Kant's first criticism is that the arguments which have been drawn to show the corre- spondence between thought and things have been taken from judg- ments, not from things. This criticism attacks the argument as though Anselm's position were that what exists m intelleclu exists also in re. But this is not his argument, as Dr. Patton* shows. His argument is, as has been stated, that existence is necessarily in the concept of the Perfect Being. Kant realized this, and pro- ceeded to criticise the argument in this form by showing the differ- ence between analytic and synthetic judgments, and that being is not a real predicate. He argues as follows : If there is a contradiction involved in the denial of this predicate, it must be contained in tlio concept ; and must therefore be a merely logical predicate and so say nothing as to reality : therefore though the annihilation of this predi- cate involves a contradiction, both subject and predicate may be together suppressed without contradiction. But if the judgment is to express existence, that is if being is a real predicate, it must add something to the concept and so its removal will not involve a con- tradiction. Moreover existence is not a real predicate, or there never could be a correspondence between the concept and object, the object always being greater. Now in order to estimate the force of this we will state three -posi- tions which may be held with reference to the Ontological argument. 1. There are those like Anselm, who hold that it is an a priori demonstration of exivStence. 2. There is the view of Leibnitz,! who believes that Anselm's argument needs to show first that the idea of a Most Perfect Being is possible, that then the conclusion follows, and that this is done when it is shown that there are no contradictions involved in this Idea conceived as existing. 3. There is the position which we have indicated, that the a priori side of the argument is not designed to prove existence, but to show that the Necessary Being of the Cosmological argument is the Infinite and Perfect Being of our idea. And a posteriori this argu- ment is to express God's witness to humanity of Ilis existence, through this perfect idea. Now the first of these positions Kant has successfully overthrown. His arguments against any a pj-tori demonstration of God's existence merely from the idea are unanswerable. There are a priori Tea- •Patton, Syllahui of Lectures on, Theum. t Leibnitz, Thoughts on Knowledge, Truth and Ideas. 29 sons, but from the mere concept a demonstrative proof in the Ansel- mian way is not possible. He has also been successful against the position of Leibnitz; for if the possibility of the idea is to be shown by the mere absence of all contradiction, Kant's distinction between analytic and synthetic judgments will rise against us, and the Leibnitzian view will not difter from the Anselmian. But against the third position Kant's arguments can have no force. He has made two errors in his criticism. He has taken the a priori side of this argument, which is only designed to identify a certain idea with the Necessary Being of the Cosmological argument, and has required tliat existence be shown a ^iriori. But that which is the far greater mistake is the fact that he has neglected the a posteriori side of tlie argument altogether. DesCartes is the author of this aspect of the Ontological argument. He gives the Anselmian proof, but also argues that the idea of God is Perfect and Infinite, and that therefore God must be its cause. He says,* "And, in truth, it is not to be wondered at that God, at my creation, implanted this idea in me, that it might serve, as it were, for the mark of the workman impressed on his work; and it is not also necessary that the work should be something different from the work itself; but considering only that God is my Creator, it is highly probable tbat He in some way fashioned me after His own image and likeness, and that I perceive this likeness, in which is contained the idea of God, by the same faculty by which I appre- liend myself ; in other words, wlien I make my.self the object of reflection, I not only find that I am an incomplete, imperfect and dependent being, and one who unceasingly aspires after something Ijetter and greater tban he is; but, at the same time, I am assured likewise tliat He upon whom 1 am dependent possesses in Himself all the goods after which I aspire, and tbat not merely indefinitely and potentially, but infinitely and actually, and that He is thus God." Kant has done away with an a priori demonstration of the far- away God of the eighteenth-century Deism. But he has left untouched tlie Ontological argument as the grand expression of the truth of My.sticism, the truth that God is near, and that the conscious- ness of humanity is a God-breathed consciousness with a God-given idea. Negatively, He speaks to our spirits in the feeling of weak- ness and dependence which grows into the reflective knowledge of our finitude. In the dissatisfaction with tlie world and ourselves we see that we are not of earthly origin, that there is in us that which comes from a source above Nature, and that we can have been produced by no natural process. And all tliis would not be * De.sCarte3, Diteourse on Method and the Meditations, MoJitat. 3, also The Principles of Philosophy, Part i, J 18. 30 possible if God had not inspired our consciousness with the positive idea of Ilimself as the Father of our spirits. In ourselves wc feel His presence, and then know it ; in the world we see an Ideal that is not of the world. God as a self-conscious and personal Spirit can be thus near to us. The strongest and most spiritual minds in all ages have felt Ilis presence, and have testified to the truth of Mysti- cism. God is truly present to the consciousness of humanity both in its idea of Iliiu and in its .ispirations after Ilim. He has spoken to men, and Rationalism can never dissuade them from belief in this truth. Kant next criticises the Cosmological argument. This is tlio argument from the contingent to the necessary. Aristotle is itH author. He argues* for tlie existence of a First Mover, thus regarding the world under the category of motion, as contingent. Kant gives the argument so as to include the finite ego under the category of contingency. He gives the argument as follows -.t "If something exists, an absolutely necessary being must likewise exist. Now I, at least, exist. Therefore there exists an absolutely neces- sary being." The argument, he says, proceeds thus. " A necessary being can be determined only in one way, that is by only one of all the opposed predicates ; therefore, it is completely determined by its concept, and there is only one concept which can completely determine a thing a priori, that is the concept of an ens realissimum ; therefore, as this is the only concept by and in which we can cogi- tate a necessary being, therefore a supreme being necessarily exi.sts." Now, in order to meet the Kantian criticism of the Cosmological argument, we must have a clear idea of its function and relation to the Ontological argument; tiiat is, to the a priori side of that argument, which it is to be remembered Kant always means, and which for convenience we will refer to as the Ontological argu- ment in discussing Kant's criticism of the Cosmological. The Cos- mological argument gives us the existence of a necessary Being, but caimot determine the nature of that Being. The Ontological argu- ment a priori shows us that if such a Being exists its nature must be of a certain character; but it cannot give a jorjori demonstration of tiie existence of this Being. Now Kant makes an error similar to that which he made in criticising the Ontological argument. He criticised that argument as though it were designed to demonstrate a priori the existence of a Being corresponding to its concept. Now we see that he states the Cosmological argument as though it * Arislotlo, Metajihygies, Rk. ii, chap. vii. t Kant, CritUjue of Pure Reason, JIciklejohn'3 translation, "Transcendental Dialectic," chap, iii, | 5, sq. 31 were meant to perform not only its own work, but that also of the Ontological argument in the determinatiou of the nature of the necessary Being. That which he terms the first part of the argu- ment shows that an absolutely ueccssary Being exists. Now, instead of seeing that this is all that is required of this argument, lie pro- ceeds to add the Ontological argument as a second step in the Cos- mological ; and then states as his first point of criticism, that experi- ence, that is the Cosmological argument, merely aids Reason to make the first step to the existence of the necessary Being ; and that we must turn away from experience to the conception of an ens realissimum to determine the properties of this Being, so that the Cosmological argument becomes the Ontological. Now it is per- fectly true that the Cosmological argument is insufficient by itself; but Kant should have realized that the inference to the existence of a necessary Being is all that this argument can be legitimately required to do. Moreover, when, after adding the Ontological argu- ment in its a priori aspect as a second step in the Cosmological, ho says that reason believes that we may infer the existence of a nec- essary Being from the concept of an e7W realissimum, he seems to have forgotten that he has admitted on the very same page that " experience is held to aid reason " in showing the existence of a necessary Being, and that he him.self added this second part "to determine the properties," and not to demonstrate the existence of this Being. We see, then, that Kant's first criticism of this argu- ment consists in putting the Ontological and Cosmological argu- ments together, and criticising each because it cannot perform sepa- rately their joint task. He tries also to bring out this same criticism by logic. He says that the nervus probandi of the Cos- mological argument is the proposition that every absolutely neces- sary being is an ens realissimum ; and if this be true, since all entia realissima are alike, it follows that this proposition may be con- verted simply, and we have the proposition that every ens realissi- mum is a necessary being ; and this proposition being determined a priori by concepts, we have the Ontological argument. In short, he says that in the identification of the ens realissimuvi with the necessary Being, we assume that we can infer the latter from the former. But this is not true. It is difficult to see why the Cosmo- logical argument, in turning to the Ontological to determine the nature of the Necessary Being as Infinite in its attributes, after having shown its existence, must proceed on the assumption that the Ontological argument must show a priori the fact of existence. Kant also makes the following objections to the Cosmological argument:* First, that the transcendental principle of causality is *Kftnt, Critique of Pure Reason, "Trausccnclental Dialectic," chap, iii, §5, p. 374. 32 only valid in the sensuous world, because the purely intelligible or intellectual conception would never produce a synthetic, that is, an objective proposition. The answer to this objection is the rejec- tion of his doctrine of the limit of knowledge. Thought is syn- thetic of itself, and it is not the object of sense which makes it so. And it is obviously false reasoning to argue that, because in scien- tific cognition the content of the category is given in the sphere of experience, therefore, this is the only kind of causality admissible. Of course, if we define causality as invariable sequence, and then say that this includes all causality, we rule out the Cosmological argument by definition. But his doctrine of causality as merely invariable sequence is inadequate for science ; bow much more so, then, must it be for metaphysics, and how unfair its application in this sphere. We cannot use a purely mechanical and physical category when wc have reached the sphere of spirit. The contin- gent involves the nece.ssary, but a caused cause is still contingent. Our idea of causation is not fully satisfied with a cause that is itself caused, as is the case with every cause in the relative sphere; and the mind must find its type of causation in the causality of will de- termined by motive and character, but free from physical necessity. If this be not admitted, the alternative is physical necessity, and this leads to, or rather involves, materialism. The categories of science may be used with no materialistic implications at all ; they have their legitimate sphere. It is only when the metaphysician tries to use them that materialism ensues. Thus Mr. Spencer, in trying to explain the univer.se by relative and material forces, ex' hypothesi shuts himself oft' from any valid inference to the Ab.solute and his postulate of the Unknowable has nothing on which to rest. If it is manifested in the material and relative force which explains the universe, the implication is materialistic as to the nature of ultimate reality; or if this Unknowable is entirely apart from the relative force which explains tilings, then why postulate if/ This is merely to show the danger of making physical categories do metaphysical work. However, in making the inference of the Cosmological argument, we go beyond the sphere of natural causa'- tion in the very idea of the argument, which expresses the necessity of the existence of Absolute Being. Kant's last objection to this argument is that the impo.ssibility of an infinite series of causes is assumed, and that this is a prin- ciple which cannot be justified. This is simply a statement, in a slighily dififerent form, of the principle of which we have just been speaking, or, more accurately, may be inferred from this principle, — that everything contingent must have a cause. The highest category of causation is not satisfied with anything but 33 a non-contingent and uncaused cause. The stage of scientific cog- •nition is not denied wlien we assert tins; but -that which we recognize as real in one stage of reflection, is seen at a later stage to be not the ultimate reality; and while wc admit the reality of the one, we may reflect upon it as only a partial view of reality and go on to higher categories. If, then, we are to admit the validity of our highest spiritual categories, — and we must if any knowledge at all is to be possible, — we must admit that an infinite series is impossible. Kant goes on in this same cliapter to explain the dialectical illusion substantially as follows. On the supposition that something exists we cannot avoid the inference that something necessary exi.sts. But let us form any conception whatever of a thing, nothing prevents me from cogitatiug its nonexistence. We may thus be obliged to admit that all existing things have a neces- sary basis, while at the same time we cannot cogitate any individual thing as absolutely necessary ; and the conclusion is that neither necessity nor contingency are properties of things, but merely sub- jective principles. In other words, we may be obliged to admit that all existing things have a necessary basis, and yet because we cannot find this among any of these contingent things, we conclude that these principles are only subjective, or else we break down in contradiction. Obviously, the conclusion does not follow. If we try to find the Absolute as one of the series of contingent things, wo find that we can cogitate none of these as neceasary. But it is just for these very contingent things that we are seeking a basis that shall not be one of them. If we try to cogitate the Absolute Spirit after the analogy of the world-series we can reach no result ; but when it is shown that it is a false supposition tiiat all objectiv- ity for knowledge is given by sense, then we need not conclude that principles which transcend the sensuous sphere are merely subjec- tive. We are groping for Being where everything is Becoming; and trying to find a changeless resting place where decay is a prin- ciple as well as beginning to be. If we search in the right place, we shall find that Absolute Being is not far from every one of us. Only we should be careful to let the brightest, truest light within us, show us where to look. The Teleological argument next meets the Kantian criticism. This argument, which Kant calls the Physico-Telcological, from the adap- tations which are observable in Nature infers design, and thence at- tributes Intelligence to the Absolute Being. This argument Kant says deserves to be mentioned with respect. He says,* " The world around us opens before our view so magnificent a spectacle of order, variety, beauty, and conformity to ends, that whether we * Kant, Critique of Pure Reason, " Transceiidentiil Diiilcctic," chap, iii, § 0. -«*» 34 pursue our observations with the infinity of spacQ^in one direction, or into its illimitable divisions in the other, whether we regard the world in its greatest or its least manifestations, even after we have attained to the highest summit of knowledge which our weak minds can reach, we find that language, in the presence of wonders so in- conceivable, has lost its force, and number its power to reckon, nay, even thought fails to conceive adequately, and our conception of the whole dissolves into an astonishment without the power of ex- pression, all the more eloquent that it is dumb." Kant's criticisms of the Teleological argument in the Critique of Pure Reason are two in number, and arise, as before, from the fact that he requires this argument to do the work of three. He says, in the cha[)ter from which we have just quoted, "We cannot approve of the claims which this argument advances to a demonstrative certainty and to a reception on its own merits, apart from favor or support from other arguments." Now we do not make this cla.ni for it. We neither claim for it " demonstrative certainty," nor that it can be con- sidered apart from other arguments. Let us see exactly what can be expected from it in its organic connection with the other argu- ments. The Cosmological argument shows us that a Necessary Being must exist, and now by the Teleological argument we infer that it must be {)Ossessed of Intelligence wonderfully great, which the Ontological argument on its a j^riori side shows to be infinite. The Teleological argument, then, is to show that the cause of the world is an Intelli- gent Cause, and this is all that can be legitimately required of it. In order to indicate how it does this we cannot do better than quote from this same chapter of the Critique of Pure Reason: "The chief momenta in the physico-teleological argument are as follows: First, we observe in the world manifest signs of an arrangement full of jiurpose, executed with great wisdom, and existing in a whole of a content indescribably vaiious, and of an extent without limits. Second, this arrangement of means and ends is entirely foreign to the things existing in the world, it belongs to them merely as a con- tingent attribute ; in other words, the nature of different things could not of itself, whatever means were employed, harmoniously tend towards certain purposes, were they not chosen and directed for tho.'^e purposes by a rational and disposing principle in accordance with certain fundamental ideas. Third, there exists, therefore, a sublime and wise cause, or several, which is not merely a blind, all-power- ful nature, producing the beings and events which fill the world in unconscious fecundity, but a free and intelligent cause of the world. Fourth, the unitip of this cause may be inferred from the unity of a reciprocal relation existing between the parts of the world, as 35 portions of an artistic edifice, an inference which all our observation favors, and all principles of analogy support." In this chapter of the Critique of Pure Reason Kant makes two criticisms of this argument. The first he expresses thus — " Accord- ing to the physicoteleological argument the connection and har- mony existing in the world evidence the contingency of the form merely, but not of the matter, that is, of the substance of the world. .... This proof can at the most therefore demonstrate the exist- ence of an architect of the world whose efforts are limited by the capa- bilities of the material with which he works, but not of a creator of the world, to whom all things are subject." Now in the first place this objection involves the asking too much of this argument: all that is sought from this argument is to show that the Absolute Being, of whose existence as the cause of all relativity we are assured on other grounds, is possessed of intelligence. This would be a sufficient answer to Kant's criticism, but we may go even farther. Dr. Flint* says tiiat this objection can be urged, only if order were not of the very essence of matter itself, and not merely something superim- po.sed in the arrangement of it. "Science," he says, "shows that the order in the heavens and in the most complicated organisms is not more wonderful than the order in the ultimate atoms them- selves. The balance of evidence is that order penetrates as deep as matter itself." Kant's second criticism is that from the order in the world we can infer only a cause proportionate thereto. We can conclude there- fore from this argument, only that the Intelligence and Povver of the wotld-cause is very great; but not that the Intelligence is infinite and the Power absolute; and they must be so determined, as such a predicate as " very great " gives no determinate conception of this Being, nor does it inform us what it may be. Empirical con- siderations failing to give this determination to the concept, we ac- complish tliis by falling back upon the Cosmological argument, which is the Ontological in disguise. "After elevating our- selves to admiration" of the power and wisdom of the world's author, and finding that we can advance no farther by this method, we proceed to infer the contingency of the world from the order in it, and then argue from its contingency to the existence of a Necessary Being, arid thence to the concept of the ens realissimum. This objection obviously arises from the demand that the Teleolog- ical shall alone do the work of all tliree argument", and it only gives an illustration of their unity and organic connection. When Intelligence has been predicated of the Absolute, this argument has performed its function. When once this is done all materialistic •Flint, Theism, Lect. vi. 36 explanations of ultimate reality become impossible, and we are then obliged a priori to say that this Intelligence is infinite. Thus it refers directly to the a priori argument and not indirectly through the Cosmological as Kant says. It does not, then, depend on this argu- ment, much less is it identical with it. It needs only the Ontolog- ical argument on its a priori side for its completion, wliile the Cos- mological argument needs both the other two. Kant's criticism, then, amounts to showing the connection of these arguments, since his objections may be all classed under two heads: Finst, those criticisms which do not rest on the separation of the arguments, but which we have seen only to avail again.st the mechani- cally conceived God of Deism, but not against a God who is a Spirit at once immanent and transcendent; and secondly, those criticisms which rest on the separation of the arguments, and the requirement of one to do the work of all ; and the.so we have shown to be unfair. We may learn from this that every road, whether a priori or a pos- teriori, will lead us to some aspect of Absolute Being. In God are all things, and every line of reasoning must culminate in Him ; while no one way can lead us to the whole truth, which is so vast that the human mind can never hope to comprehend it. The inspired writer was only expressing the sense in which we must all be Agnos- tics, when he said : " Canst thou by searching find out God '!" And yet it is because " lie is not far from every one of us" that we ap- prehend Him in everything. We have yet, however, to consider Kant's most subtle criticism of the Teleological argument. This is given in the Critique ofJud'jment where it is discussed much more elaborately than in the Critique of Pure Reason. This criticism is that finality is merely a subjective principle of reflective judgment. In order to make clear his somewhat confused discussion it will be necessary to state a little more precisely the steps in the Teleo- logical argument. Lotze* has hit the nerve of the design argument, though Ills criticism of it does not seem just. He says that the argu- ment is involved in a piece of circular reasoning, because it rests on the assertion of the improbability of certain results happening if they were not designed ; but that this improbability holds only if we presuppose design, for then things which resulted without being designed would seem exceptions to the general rule ; but if we do not presuppose design, then all this improbability vanishes ; for tlie argu- ment, says Lotze, rests on the belief that " what is without purpo.se, perverse and irrational, has a better title itself to existence, or is more likely, as such, to be real, than what is not so." This is not true. The design argument makes no presuppositions as to what ♦Lotzc, Philosophy of Religion, chap, i, gg 10, 11. 37 is or is not likely to exist in sucli and such a case; nor does it pre- suppose design ; but without any preconceived ideas at all, upon ob- servation of the wonderful adaptations in nature, it argues that it is liighly improbable that this could have happened if it had not been designed. Of course this is not demonstration, and it is open to critics to deny this improbability on which the argument rests; though we do not believe that tliey can show adequate grounds for this denial. However the nerve of the argument is this improba- bility just mentioned; and the argument is primarily, as has been remarked, "to design" and not "from it." Three distinct steps may be traced in the argument. First, ob- servation shows order, harmony, adaptation, and law in Nature. This rests on observation, and is not denied by those who will not admit finality. But, in the second place, is this order and adaptation linality ? Are there ends in Nature? Can this order be explained by mechanical causes alone ? The order and system is too vast and complex to have been produced by chance, but will not mechanical law and efficient causation explain it? Now we fee phenomena where the results seem to have required such an extraordinary and complex combination of circumstances and mechanical causes, and where there is such an agreement of the present with the future, as Janet * puts it, that we are compelled to believe that this wonderful combination could not have been brought about if the idea of the end did not exist in the cause and determine the means. Now we have a direct knowledge only of the nature of our own acts, but here we find a direction of means to ends. But the actions of other men resemble our own in every particular, and it seems as if they were directed to ends. Then the acts of animals while differing from those of men in that we do not ascribe any intentionality to them, which is not the question here as should be carefully noted, yet resemble them in being apparently directed to ends. Next, the relation between organ and function, organism and environment, is a witness of adaptation. In view of all this we conclude that finality is a law of nature. But, in the third place, does finality in- volve intentionality '( Can we infer intentional finality and hence a conscious and intelligent cause of it? Here we argue that inten- tional finality is the only rational view. For since it is nature which forces us to admit finality, it cannot be merely subjective. We have left, then, as a cause of finality, either Nature itself or con- scious Intelligence. We know by our own consciousness that intel- ligence is a sufficient cause for it, and we know that it is charac- teristic of our intelligence to act for ends; but of unconscious finality we know nothing ; so we conclude that it is more logical to infer •Janet, Pinal Causes, Bk. i, chiip. i. 38 conscious Intelligence than that of which we know nothinfr, not even its possibility. Either the First Cause is absolutely unknow- able or else this much anthropomorphism is necessary. It is the fact that we are created in God's image that enables us to know Ilim. So that anthropomorphism is the assertion that His nature is iu us to an imperfect degree, and not an imputation of our nature to Ilim ; and it is difficult to see why Zoomorphism should be preferred to tliis. We are now concerned, however, not with the Philoso[)hy of the Unconscious, but with Kant's doctrine of subjective finality ; but because of the difficult nature of his discussion of this, we have out- lined these steps in the argument in order that we may use them as guides in our examination of the Kantian doctrine, to which we now proceed. As to tlie first step in the argument, the order and adaptation ob.scrvable iu nature. This he recognizes and presupposes in the Critique of Judijmi'nt, directing liis wliole discussion to the last two steps as stated. He asks whctlier this adaptation is " purposive," and whether we can infer an Intelligent Cause of the world. But ho mingles these two points in the discussion, sometimes considering both at once and sometimes going from one to the other, so that we will endeavor, for tiie sake of clearness, to separate these points, and to present a brief statement of his views on each of these points, as given by him in the Critique of Judgment. But before examining his theory of finality, we must see what the assumption of order and harmony involves. Dr. Flint* takes the position that it is merely a kind of finality, but Janet f and Diman X make order the basis of a separate argument for intelli- gence, so that even though we cannot infer finality from order, we may use the latter in our Theistic argument. Kant takes this order for granted, and then says that mechanical causes explain it, except in some cases where mechanism breaks down and wliero we must con- ceive an Intelligent Cause. Janet has made this mistake also, and Dr. Pattoii ^' has criticised Iiim for it. The relation of intelligent causation to mechanism is not that the former comes in when the latter breaks down. There is a deeper relation than this. We ask, even where things are explained by mechanical causes, what is the cause of tlicse causes? The Cosmos is a vast system of matlicmat- ical relations and dynamic .sequences apart from any question of finality. Now we cannot pro|iose mechanical law as the explana- tion, because it is precisely this law which we are seeking to account for,so tiiat this would be begging the question. Law itself is the thing * Flint, Thchm, Lect. ii. f Janet, Final Cansas, Bk. i, chfip. v. X Uiiiiiin, 2'lie Theistic Argwnciit, chap. iv. § Palton, Syllabus of Lectures on Theism. 39 to 1)6 explained, and our alternatives are chance and intelligence, so that if we abandon the former we are driven to the latter. There is no other alternative, since we have seen it to bo a lietiiio 'jtrincvpu to hypostatize law, making a metaphysical entity out of it for its own explanation. And no more can we hypostati/ie chance. So that it seems that intelligence is the only possible conclusion. The world, considered as a Cosmos, is nearly as wonderful as when con- sidered under the category of finality. It seems, then, that Kant's admission of the reign of law makes the concession which the Thei.st wishes, even though finality could not be proved. The argument from finality, iiowcver, is a still stronger evidence of in- telligent causation, so that it is of the greatest importance to the Theist in giving tiie a posteriori side of Theism. Wc proceed, there- fore, to a critical examination of the Kantian doctrine of finality. In considering the question which has been given as the second step of the argument, whether we can infer finality from order and adaptation observed, Kant seeks to show that finality is merely a subjective principle of the reflective judgment. Its origin he ex- plains substantially as follows:* The Understanding legislates a i-iriori for knowledge of Nature as an object of sense. The liea- fion legislates a priori for the causality of freedom in the supersen- sible sphere. But the supersensible must be able to determine the sensible in regard to the causality of freedom, because the effects must take place in the sensible world, and although the possibility of this cannot be comprehended, it must be presupposed. The effect in accordance with the concept of freedom is the final cause which ought to result in the natural world, hence the conditions of its resulting are presupposed in Nature. The Teleologieal judg- ment does this, and thus bridges the gap between the phenomenal and noumenal spheres. Therefore, it is a necessary judgment. But what is its nature? Juogment in general is the faculty of thinking the particular as contained in the universal. Now, if this universal be a necessary concept which renders experience possible, as do the categories of the Understanding, then tlie juplgment is called a determinant one. But if we have only a particular emjiiri- cal law, and try to find the concei)t for it, then the judgment which makes the subsumption is called a reflective judgment. Such a judgment cannot borrow its principle from experience, for it is seeking a necessary principle ; nor can it get it from the Understand- ing, for then it would be a determinant judgment ; therefore the fac- ulty of judgment must itself supply this principle a priori. The principle is this. For reflection on Nature, if this is to be possible, *Kant, Critique of Judgment, traiislutioa by lleruurd, lutroductiou aiul Division 3. 40 the same a priori certainly must be conceived to be in the particu- lar laws of nature as in the universal ones. They must be consid- ered as if they proceeded from an Understanding, though not our own, so as to render possible a system of experience embracing the whole of nature; in short, nature must be conceived as purposive. Uere are Kant's own words :* " As universal laws of nature have their ground in our understanding whicli prescribes them to nature, although only according to the universal concept of it as nature; so particular empirical laws, in respect of wliat is in them left unde- termined by these universal laws, must be considered in accordance with such a unity as they would have if an Understanding, though not our Understanding, had furnished them to our cognitive facul- ties so as to make possible a system of experience according to par- ticular laws of nature. Not as if in this way, such an Understand- ing must be assumed as actual, for it is only our reflective judgment to which this Idea serves as a principle, for reflecting, not for deter- mining; but this faculty thus gives a law only to itself and not to jiature." This concept, then, is only necessary for our understand- ing ; and whether or not it is true objectively we cannot say, because it arises from the peculiarity of our understanding. It is the pecu- liarity of the human Understanding, says Kant, that it is discursive, that it proceeds from universals to particulars. But as these are undetermined by the universal concept, in order that they may be subsumed under it Reason demands that they be conceived as pur- posive. But Kant goes on to say that we must recognize the possi- bility of an Understanding which is intuitive and not discursive. Such an Understanding would intuite the whole and its parts in one act, so that there would be no necessity for any distinction between final and efficient causes, but the whole could contain the possibility of the parts, and itself be merely the result of them as causes ; but in accordance with the peculiarity of our Understanding the whole must be considered the result of the parts, and it is impossible that it should contain tlie ground of the possibility of the parts, so that the idea of the whole must contain the possibility of the form and adjustment of the parts, and this idea of the whole is a purpose. So Kant concludes that finality is merely a concept necessary for our minds. This constitutes the nerve of his objection to the Tclcological argument ; for when we come to consider the two criti- cisms which he makes on the third step of the argument, that of the inference to an Intelligent Cause of finality, we will find that this same 'loctrine of subjective finality is repeated, and that it is tiie only one of the two criticisms which could have any weight. So that this second point being established, the Theist would have •Kant, Oritique of Judgment, translated by Bernard, Introduction, t 4- 41 gained his point as far as Kant is concerned. Of course, in a treatise on Theism the doctrines of Hegel, Schopenhauer, and von Ilartmann would also have to be considered. Kant's doctrine of finality is open to the following objections : In the first place tiie deduction of the principle of finality in nature from a necessity of connecting nature and freedom is a mistake. This is taking finality in its a priori and spiritual signifi- cance as referring to ultimate moral ends, and trying to introduce, or rather force, it into the sphere of ob.servation and natural phenomena. This highest category of Reason has its proper place as we have seen, but not in the a jwsteriori argument from final causes. The conce])t of finality in nature, that is the finality inferred from the ada]itations of means to ends in nature, cannot be deduced a priori from the concepts of morality. Any attempt to derive one of these teleological concepts from the other must lead to confusion, and it has led K;uit into an unfair criticism of the a posteriori argument in question, because, having deduced the principle a priori, tlie argument would have to presuppose a knowl- edge of ultimate ends in the spiritual sphere. But this argument does not jiresuppose any knowledge of these, and is grounded entirely on observation, inference, and probability; so that Kant's criticism of it because of our ignorance of ultimate ends is ground- less and arises from the confusion pointed out. In the second place, his doctrine of the subjective origin of finality is open to criticism. We have seen how he sought a more specific origin of this princi- ple than the one just mentioned. The principle is a rational ten- dency due to the peculiar nature of our understanding, which is discursive and not being able to intuite the whole and its parts must use this principle in the subsumption of particulars under universals. Now, of course, if the principle of finality in nature were a priori in the same sen.se as is that of causality, that of con- ditioning experience, then it would be objective ; but this we con- cede to Kant is not the case. But we deny his statement that experience cannot prove it, and believe that he is wrong in making it merely a rational tendency. If by experience he mean direct observation, then this does not give the principle ; but it is an infer- ence from this with all the weiglit of probability upon probability until it almost reaches necessity and certainty. Finality is forced ujion us by our observation of nature. It is a demand of Eeason upon occasion of experience and therefore objective. Says Dr. Patton,* " If we were under the necessity of seeing finality in everything, then subjective finality would be the best guarantee of objective finality. It would be an a priori truth. But there is no » Pillion, Si/Uabus of Lectures on Theism. H 42 such subjective necessity. And since we see finality in some things and not in others there must be some objective ground for tiiis dis- tinction." Trendelenburg also shows a contradiction at this point of Kant's argument. Uere is his view, as summarized by Janet :* " If finality were a necessary form of our knowledge, as space and time are necessary forms of our sense intuition, all things would appear to us in the relation of means to ends. But no, according to Kant, the help of finality is called in when the explanation liy efficient causes no longer suffices ; it is the object itself which forces the mind to quit the road it was following. It is then the object which determines when wo must apply the purely subjective principle of finality." The demand for this principle is occasioned by observa- tion of nature. It is true, as Kant says, that our minds being con- stituted as they are we must conceive nature thus. But this is not a sufiicient guarantee of its subjectivity. The assertion that it is, is merely his assertion of the relativity of knowledge, which postu- lates witliout grounds the existence of a reality which is not the object of consciousness. Knowledge implies a knowing mind, it is the mind's grasp of objective truth. We cannot say then, that because it requires a mind to know, knowledge is subjective. Tiie knot of the question is whether or not there is an}' connection between our minds and their principles of knowledge, and Universal Reason which is the ground of all things. If we deny this connec- tion, absolute skepticism must be the result. Tliis objection of Kant to finality on the ground of its subjectivity finds its strongest answer in a criticism of his theory of knowledge. We conclude, then, that finality is an objective fact which demands our acceptation and calls for explanation. With reference to the third step of the Teleological argument as stated, Kant's criticism is twofold. The first one is this:f After criticising thedoctrincs of Epicurus, Spinoza, and of llylozoism, he says of Theism tliat, while it is the best of all systems becau.se it ascribes the purpo.scs of nature to Intelligence, it neverthelci^s does not establish its claim.s, because it rests its inference on the basis of finality, which has been shown to be only a subjective principle. The second criticism, given in the section entitled "Physico-Theology," is this: :j: However far Phys- ico-Theology be pushed, it can never disclose tiie ultimate purpose of creation, bccau.sc it does not extend its inquiries beyond expe- rience. It is based on inquiries into the purpose for which nature exists, and on this the concept of a Supreme Intelligence rests. Our * Janet, Final Causes. f Knnt, Critique of Judgment, Ucrimnrs triiiislnlion, § 73. X ICiinl, Critique of Judgment, tj 85. 43 ignorance of this ultimate jmrposo prevents us from inferring an Intelligent Cause of finality. The first objection, that finality is merely a subjective principle, has been alreatly dealt with ; and we have seen that finality is a real truth to be explained, and, as Kant says, granting this. Theism seems a more reasonable theory than those of Epicurus and Spinoza and, we may add, than that of llegel. The second criticism was that the argument presupposed a knowl- edge of the ultimate end for which nature was created ; and that our ignorance of this vitiates the argument, since from the knowledge of contingent ends in nature we cannot infer an Infinite Intelligence. "With reference to this, it may be said that tliis a posteriori argu- ment does not seek to infer Infinite Intelligence, but only to show that the First Cause is possessed of intelligence. It therefore does n(jt presuppose any knowledge of ultimate ends; but from the won- derful ada])tation of means to ends in nature, the mind concludes that the cau.se of all this mu.st have been an intelligent cause. When this is done this argument has performed its special function. This last criticism is irrelevant, because it requires the argument to prove too much. As long as men continue to seek adequate reasons for the j)he- noniena about them this argument will continue to have weight, in spite of the sul)tle criticisms of philosophers. Men never can be made to believe that this vast and wonderful cosmos resulted Irom chance or that mechanical law is self-e.Kplanatory. Neither will they believe that it resulted from the evolution of an immanent jirinciple which reaches self- consciousness only in man, and so can- not be "external to anything;" no more will they believe that their firm conviction is a mere vagary resulting from the peculiarity (if their mind. The belief will always exist that Conscious Intelli- gence is at the beginning of things as well as that it is their ground, immanent in nature and man, yet external to both. The supernat- ural can never be reduced merely to the spiritual. The conclusion from all this would seem to be that the petition reached a priori is confirmed by a posteriori considerations. Tiiat we get a true view of reality, no matter which of the two stand- jioints we take. That tliey thus agree is strong evidence of the truth of each. » To leave the consideration of any aspect of Kantism without including the results of the ilntaphysics of Ethics and the Critique of the Practical Reason would be unjust and would give no adc- (juate conception of his system. In an age when the commands of duty had been reduced to maxims of prudence or of inclination, he raised his voice more powerfully tlian any other to show the sacred- 44 ness of duty ; for in spite of tlic Utilitarian way in wliicli his cate- gorical imperative voices itself, this is given as a test rather than a ground of Iliglitness, the ground being found in man's noumenal nature, which connects him through freedom to Reason Univer- sal. The autonomy of the will is the basis of his Ethics, and is open to severe criticism ; but he certainly did uphold duty as against a calculating morality. And furthermore he showed the necessity of a Metaphysical basis for Etiiics. We will have to consider, then, very briefly, his Ethical teaching, and here of course only so far as it bears directly on Theism. The relation of Theism and Ethics he conceived, we believe, inadequately. The true relation between them, or the moral argu- ment for Theism is, briefly, this. The three fundamental categories of Ethics are Moral obligation, the Right, and the Good. Our con- sciousness tells us that we are under an unconditional obligation to conform our conduct to a certain standard of Rightness and to real- ize a certain end or stimrnum lonum. This is all that our moral consciousness tells us, but there must be some ultimate metaphysical explanation of these categories. Beginning with the fact of mora! obligation, we see that to give this any empirical deduction would result in reducing it to a hypothetical imperative ; and to make the will absolutely and unconditionally legislative for itself must result either in a philosophy of caprice which would explain away the categorical imperative, or else in the Ethical Pantheism of Fiehte. The only adequate explanation of the categorical imjierative, there- fore, is one which distinctly separates the Absolute and Relative wills; regarding moral obligation as the Will of God binding His creatures to Right, which must consequently be explained as Ilis nature, and to realize the good, which must embra(;e human well- being or perfection and hapjnncss, and God's glory. That the Absolute must be possessed of moral attributes is thus the testimony of moral jihenomena. Lot us now examine Kant's doctrine of tlio relation of Theism and I'lthics. lie lays down what he believes to be the two great foundations of Ethics in his Metaphysics of Eiliics. lie tells us* that from experience we can never tell of an action whether it is objecitively right only, or whether it is also subjec- tively right, that is, done merely' out of respect for the moral law ; but that we conclude that whether or not there are actions of this latter kind cannot be the question, and that Reason itself, independ- ent of all experience, tells us what ought to take place, and that this imperative is categorical. This imperative, being a fact of con- sciousness, must have some exjilanation which will render it possi- ble, lie lays down the principle of the autonomy of the will as *Kiiiil, 3If(aph>/su-s nf Ethics, Abbot's traiisliition, I'rcfuce, §2. 45 the ground and explanation of tlie moral law. The will must legislate for itself by an a priori maxim, because all heteronomous theories are inadequate, cmpirieal principles being unable to give a categoi'ical imjierative, and the rational principle of jjcrfection being too indefinite, while the theological view of connecting the moral law with God would necessitate an "intuition of the Divine Perfec- tion" which we cannot have. So he concludes that the moral law in our con.sciousness is the "ratio co'jnoscendi" of freedom, while freedom is the " ratio essendi " of the moral law. This being the case, wc expect some siqjerficial conception of the connection of God and Morality. It is found in the consideration of the siimmum hoimm. Tliis is the material category of Ethics, and Kant shows* that it must include happiness as well as virtue, — " worthiness to be happy." It is here that the existence of God can be shown. Kant gives this in sukstauce as follows: f Man ought not to seek happi- ness, but he ought to realize it. But happiness is the harmony of all physical nature with one's end. Now the acting, rational being is not the cause of nature, and there is no necessary connection between virtue and liappiness. Therefore the supposition of a supreme Moral Cause of nature, a Holy Will, is necessary in order to connect necessarily the two elements of the sumrnum lonum. We must therefore predicate moral attributes of God. Thus the moral law leads through the conception of the sumrmim honum to relig- ion. The moral laws are recognized as Divine commands, not in the sense that they are right because God wills them, but because lie is holy, and His will is in accordance with them. Now in the first place, God stands in such a doctrine in too exter- nal and superficial a relation to Kthics. He is brought in merely in order to get over a difficulty in harmonizing the elements of the snmmnrn bonum. The categories of Moral obligation and Kight- iicss can be explained without Uim. This leaves us with a tiieory of freedom which is caprice, and instead of explaining moral obli- gation explains it away. On the contrary we know that the imperative speaks to us with all the constraint of an Absolute Will commanding our own, and cannot be explained as our noumenal self determining our phenomenal self. God, with Kant, becomes the moral governor because lie has a holy will which perfectly obeys this principle of Kightne.ss which is external to and above Ilim. All this difficulty arises bccau.se Kant thinks that if we ex])lained the moral law by God's will it would make it arbitrary. He does not seem to see another alternative, that God's will and nature cannot be in opposition. God must will these laws because *Kaiit, Criliijue of Practical Reason, Bk. ii, cliap. ii f Kant, Critiqtu of Practical Reason, Abbot's Iranslatiou, Bk. ii, chap, ii, §5. ■iO they are the expression of His nature. It is the fact of the deter- iniuism of the divine will wiiicli makes a necessity of the Christian Mystery in the Incarnation and Atonement. Surely as far as arbi- trariness is concerned nothing could be more so than Kant's theory. It is just because God is the ratio cssendi of all the ethical catego- ries that we ascribe to Him a moral nature. The objection that we can have no " intuition of tlic divine perfection " could be urged only if God were entirely liiffcrcnt from us and out of all relation to us. But it has been seen that the Self-revealing Spirit which a true Metaphysics gives us, can be like us because we have been formed in His image. It is this truth that makes all knowledge possible, and Agnosticism must be the result of denying it. In order to know nature, we must determine our series of states of con- sciousness in lime in relation to a relating and unifying self-con- sciousness which cannot be i)art of the series ; and this in turn must be a true copy of that self-consciousness which makes nature possi- ble. If then our noumenal self carry with it a moral ideal so must God also be conceived as possessed of moral attributes. But oven passing any defects in Kant's theory, we may ask. Upon what does it all rest? What is his ground for asserting that the Practical Reason opens up the noumenal sphere ? Kant says* that it is not opened to knowledge. Freedom, God and Immortality are not matters of knowledge but only deducible from the Moral law, which is the one jjoint wliere the noumenal world enters our con- sciousness. But we may well ask what special right it has to this unique position. Examination of consciousness will show us that the necessity accompanying our theoretical principles is just asstrong and true, just as universal. It would seem, then, that we must admit the validity of our theoretical principles in the noumenal sphere, or else become agnostic in Ethics also. Kant's position is not logical. He is not logically constructive. Yet through all, this was liis aim, this was the spirit of his whole system. The ruling categories of eighteenth-century thought were those of individualism, mechanism, and sensationalism. I'hese had such a liold on the human mind that it seemed as if Philosophy was to bo forever imjiossible. Knowledge must be explained mechanically and sensationally, or its possibility denied. Morality must be reduced to physical necessity, or at best to a calculus of prudence. Keligion was an empty name. Kant lived and thought just at this time. He gives noble expression to the power and worth of the human spirit. He illumines everything with the light of self-con- sciousness. He brings out the a •priori elements in knowledge. He places morality above prudence. He causes the great movement *K:int, Critique of rraciical Rcaton, Preface. 47 of (lerman Idealism. In short lie makes possible the whole intel- lectual life of the nineteenth century. lie ri.ses, an intellectual giant, tearing himself from the fetters of the preceding thought ; and though he is held back half chained, as it were, by the very bonds whose power he fought so nobly to break, and did break, yet the first step was the hardest to take, and he must be classed with the world's great thinkers whose influence has been positive and constructive. He will always be, as Dr. Stirling says, "der ehrliche Kant." Princeton. C. Wistar HodRE, Jr. DATE DUE DEMCO 38-297