Kant's Critical Philosophy - Vol Ii

KANTS CRITICAL PHILOSOPHY FOR ENGLISH READERS J. 1. MAUAFFY, D. D., C. V. O. IKONOsrol I RIM IV COI 1, , HI. I IN AND J. H. BERNARD. D. D., D. C. L. THIRD EDITION VOL. II THE PROLEGOMENA TRANSLYTKD, WITH NOTES AND APPENDICES MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED ST. MARTINS STREET, LONDON COPYRIGHT First Edition published Ehewhcrc. Second Edition, 1889. Third Edition, 1915. PREFACE THE following translation of Kants Prolegomena to any Future Metapliysic is not the first which has been laid before the English public. Richardson published a translation in I 8 i 8, which is now so rare that Mr. Lewes, though his knowledge of this sort of literature was exceedingly wide, seemed to be unaware of its existence. 1 When I had completed part of the task, I chanced to find a copy of this book, which is full of errors and inaccuracies, but yet has merit enough to have escaped oblivion, had the author published it at a time when anything whatever was known in England about Kants philosophy. I was tempted to use it in some sections as the basis of the present work, in order to relieve myself of the tedium of writing out the whole translation. But so many corrections were necessary that it hardly saved me any trouble, and probably my book may not have been improved by putting the new wine into the old bottles. Still I am answerable for the general correctness of the following translation, and believe that, clumsy as it may be, it is far more readable than Kants original. 1 Hist, of Phil. ii. p. 441, note. V PREFACE There are at least twice as many full stops as in the German sundry missing verbs and prdnouns have been supplied, and I have done what I could to make the terms more precise without damaging thefaithfulness of the reproduction. There is also recently published a good version by Mr. Bax, who had the advantage of using the First Edition of the present work, which appeared in 1872. I need say nothing here of the scope of the Prolegomena, as Kant himself has explained it in his Introduction, but lay special stress on the fact, that while prior in time to the Second Edition of the Kritik, and professedly expounding the First Edition, its attitude is completely that of the Second Edition on the great question of idealism. When Schopen hauers school talk of Kants supposed change of opinion between 1781 and 1787, they should be reminded that in 1783 he wrote the Prolegomena, not to refute, but to explain his original Rritik y and that in no work has he spoken out more precisely against absolute idealism. Most of the terms used do not require any special explanation, but the following points may be worth noticing. As in Vol. I., knowledge and cognition are both used, and used synonymously, on account of the convenience and precision of the forms cognitive and cognise, while the Saxon word is clearer to most readers. I have frequently printed the word Reason with a capital, where it means a PREFACE vii special faculty, as distinguished from the under standing, but as Kant himself often passes back to the wider meaning, it was impossible to distinguish all the individual occurrences of the more special meaning and to do more than call attention to the distinction. In the case of another word I have taken a liberty which appears to be an improvement on the original. While Kant uses Begrtffzs synony mous with our concept, he also uses it for those vaguer mental representations which areunder no category, as, for example, God and Infinity. In these cases I have used the word notion, as being vaguer than concept, and may call the readers atten tion to the curious fact that the Germans are not supplied with a special word to indicate a vaguer thought than a concept. Kants Vorstellung includes intuitions, his Idee has a quite special meaning...