iv THE KANTIAN CRITICISM 377 



God was the synthesis of all concepts, the idea of 

 ideas. But modern science turns on laws, that is, on 

 relations. Now, a relation is a bond established by a 

 mind between two or more terms. A relation is 

 nothing outside of the intellect that relates. The 

 universe, therefore, can only be a system of laws if 

 phenomena have passed beforehand through the filter 

 of an intellect. Of course, this intellect might be that 

 of a being infinitely superior to man, who would found 

 the materiality of things at the same time that he 

 bound them together : such was the hypothesis of 

 Leibniz and of Spinoza. But it is not necessary to go 

 so far, and, for the effect we have here to obtain, the 

 human intellect is enough : such is precisely the Kantian 

 solution. Between the dogmatism of a Spinoza or a 

 Leibniz and the criticism of Kant there is just the same 

 distance as between &quot; it may be maintained that &quot; 

 and &quot; it suffices that .&quot; Kant stops this dogmatism 

 on the incline that was making it slip too far toward the 

 Greek metaphysics ; he reduces to the strict minimum 

 the hypothesis which is necessary in order to suppose 

 the physics of Galileo indefinitely extensible. True, 

 when he speaks of the human intellect, he means 

 neither yours nor mine : the unity of nature comes 

 indeed from the human understanding that unifies, 

 but the unifying function that operates here is im 

 personal. It imparts itself to our individual con 

 sciousnesses, but it transcends them. It is much less 

 than a substantial God ; it is, however, a little more 

 than the isolated work of a man or even than the 

 collective work of humanity. It does not exactly lie 

 within man ; rather, man lies within it, as in an 

 atmosphere of intellectuality which his consciousness 

 breathes. It is, if we will, a formal God, something 



