EMMANUEL KANT.

EMMANUEL KANT, the illustrious founder of the philosophical school which succeeded that of Liebnitz, was a native of Königsberg, in Prussia, where he was born on the 22d of April, 1724. His father was a saddler, and of Scotch descent. The elder Kant is described as a man of superior intelligence and inflexible moral character. His wife was an estimable woman, pious and devoted in her ministrations. "I never,” said Emmanuel Kant, “saw or heard in my father's family any thing inconsistent with honor, propriety, or truth." From his earliest days he was thus placed on the right path. Bred in the love of truth, and with such examples of moral worth before him, it is not remarkable that he became eminent for his good life as for his great mind.

At the proper age he received the usual instruction of the common schools, and as he displayed diligence and capacity, it was determined that his studies should be continued in the higher seminaries. Here he pursued a peaceful course of severe, systematic, and persevering study. He learned all that could be learned in the circle of language, history, and science. He carried into each department of this extensive field that scrutinizing spirit and that avidity for knowledge which afford no rest to the mind until it has explored the whole surface of the ground and examined its nature, sounded its depth, ascertained the limits of the portion already cultivated, and determined what yet remains to be accomplished.

Kant's life was purely scholastic. His intellectual career began and ended at the University. For his offices and his fortune he was indebted solely to the usual course of academic advancement. He supported himself first as a teacher in private families; in 1755 he became doctor of philosophy, and for fifteen years was only one of the privatim docentes without salary, although his lectures were much frequented; in 1766 he was made under-librarian, with a miserable support, and obtained at last, in 1770, the chair of professor of logic and metaphysics. In 1786-88 he was rector of the University; in 1787 inscribed among the members

of the Academy of Berlin, and died without seeing any dignity added to his title of professor, excepting that of Senior of the Philosophical Faculty. This was his worldly career, and concerning it Madame de Stäel has remarked that there is scarcely another example, except among the Greeks, of a life so rigorously philosophical. He lived to a great age, and never once quitted the snows of murky Königsberg. There he passed a calm and happy existence, meditating, professing, and writing. He had mastered all the sciences; he had studied languages, and cultivated literature. He lived and died a type of the German professor: he rose, smoked, took his coffee, wrote, lectured, and took his daily walk at precisely the same hour. The Cathedral clock, it was said, was not more punctual in its movements than Emmanuel Kant. Mathematics and physics principally occupied his attention at first, and the success with which he pursued these studies was soon made manifest in various publications. He became renowned as a profound logician and natural philosopher. An instance of his wonderful powers of speculative reasoning and deduction was the prediction of the existence of the planet Uranus long before it was known by astronomers. He argued that it should be in a certain position, and Herschel, whose attention was thus directed to the subject, found it there. Other conjectures on the system of the world, the Milky Way, the nebulæ, the ring of Saturn, were also confirmed by the same eminent astronomer thirty years after they had been uttered by the illustrious subject of this sketch.

Kant's fame as the greatest philosopher and metaphysician of the age dates from the publication of his "Critique of Pure Reason" (1781), an examination of the faculty of knowledge, of the powers which concur in its exercise, of their laws, of the play of their operations, and of the effects thence resulting for man, relatively to the impressions which he receives, to the judgments which he makes, to the conceptions which he forms, and to the ideas to which reason elevates itself. This work was the product of twelve years' meditation, although written in five months. The novelty of its views, the toughness of its terminology and style, for some time obscured its real value. When it became known, all Germany went wild with the new philosophy. Almost every "chair" was filled by a Kantist. Endless books and pamphlets came from the press, defending or attacking the principles of the

critical philosophy. Kant had likened himself to Copernicus; his disciples likened him both to Copernicus and Newton. He had not only changed the whole science of metaphysics, as Copernicus had changed the science of astronomy, but had also consummated the science he had originated. Kant published many other works, in the smallest of which the profoundest meditations are to be found.

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He became famous, and had to endure the penalty of popularity. Bores from all parts of the world broke in upon his privacy. It was with the greatest reluctance that he satisfied the curiosity of his visitors, for he was modest and simple to a fault. In the latter part of his life he would only show himself for a few minutes at the door of his study, and express to his visitors his astonishment at their curiosity. He would then return to his private friends and say, "I have seen to-day some noble virtuosi." never spoke of his philosophy; and while it was the subject of conversation among the most enlightened men in all the countries where the language and literature of Germany prevail, from his house it was entirely banished. It is said that he hardly ever read any of the works in which, during twenty years, his principles (we have refrained from referring to them on account of the utter impossibility of merely indicating their scope in a brief article) were attacked, defended, developed, and applied to all the branches. of human knowledge.

The greatest enjoyment of the latter years of his life was to invite to his table a few intimate friends, and discuss with them the events of the French Revolution, in which he took great interest. His gay and instructive conversation was in the highest degree delightful. His manners were simple and pure. Owing to the smallness of his income, he was unable to take upon himself the responsibilities of a wife and family, although he was far from being indifferent to the charms and graces of the opposite sex. On the 24th of February, 1804, this intellectual giant passed to the land of shadows. He was fully conscious of the approaching dissolution, and nearly the last words he uttered were these: "I do not fear death; I know how to die. I assure you, before God, that if I knew that this night was to be my last, I would

raise my hands and say, God be praised. The case would be far different if I had ever caused the misery of any one of his creatures."

Kant was of small stature, and fine, delicate complexion. He was distinguished by the strictest veracity, and by an extreme attention to avoid every thing which could give pain, if the interests of truth did not require it. He was affable, benevolent without ostentation, and thankful for any attentions which he received. During his last illness he was frequently so much moved by the attentions of an old male servant, that it was with the greatest difficulty the latter could prevent his master from kissing his hand. It was discovered after his death that, although a poor man all his life, he had been in the habit of dispensing more than eleven hundred florins annually out of his small earnings to poor relations and indigent families..

"Such," says Professor Stapfer (to whom we are indebted for the materials of this sketch), "was the extraordinary man who has agitated the human mind to a greater depth than any of the philosophers of the same rank before him. The opinions on the permanent result of his analysis of the human faculties are naturally exceedingly diverse. His faithful disciples-of whom the number, it is true, is much diminished-regard him as the Newton, or, at least, the Kepler of the intellectual world. Beyond his own school, many ascribe to his principles that revival of patriotic and generous sentiments, that return of vigor of mind, and that disinterested zeal, which have of late years manifested themselves in Germany, so much to the honor of the nation, to the success of her independence, and advantage of the moral sciences. A numerous party accuse him of having created a barbarous terminology, making unnecessary innovations for the purpose of enveloping himself in an obscurity almost impenetrable—of having produced systems absurd and dangerous, and increased the uncertainty respecting the most important interests of man; of having, by the illusion of talent, turned the attention of youth from positive studies to consume their time in vain speculations; of having, by his transcendental idealism, conducted his rigidly consequent disciples, some to absolute idealism, others to skepticism, others, again, to a new species of Spinosism, and all to systems equally absurd and dangerous. They farther accuse his doctrine of being in itself a tissue of extravagant hypothesis and contradictory theories, of which the result is to make us regard man as a creature discordant and fantastic. They accuse him, finally, of having, by his demanding more than stoical efforts, produced in

the mind discouragement and uncertainty, much more than the germs of active virtue, confidence, and security. There is, undoubtedly, exaggeration in both these extreme opinions. The disciples of Socrates departed still farther from his doctrines than those of Kant have from the principles of criticism; yet who will deny the merit of Socrates, or his salutary influence?"

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