OP KNOWLEDGE. 343 



applied mathematics ; and, if not, on what foundation 

 had this belief to rest ? Mere experience could not 

 give to knowledge the characteristics of universality 

 and necessity it could not make it generally valid or 

 convincing. The question then presented itself, how 

 does some of the knowledge we possess, viz., mathe- 

 matical knowledge, arrive at this generality and con- 

 vincing evidence ? Leibniz had suggested that empirical 

 knowledge did not consist merely of a collection of 

 sensations, but that there was the intellect itself which 

 collected them. And with Kant the problem of know- 

 ledge took the form of asking : What does the intellect 

 supply so as to bring into the casual material gained by 

 experience, the logical qualities of universality and 

 certainty ? And this question was asked with an eye 

 to the higher interests of the human inind, the truths 

 of morality and religion. 



By formulating the problem in this way, Kant issued, 

 as it were, the programme of philosophical thought not 

 only for his age but down to the present day. It is, 

 however, well to recognise that, so far as the theory of 

 knowledge is concerned, he was not in a position, nor 

 in possession of the necessary preliminaries, to carry out 

 his programme successfully. This has been done, to 

 some extent, by thinkers in all the three countries 

 since his time. In Germany, and largely also in France, 

 it has been done mainly under the influence of Kant's 

 own doctrine ; in this country as we have seen above 

 an independent beginning was made by John Stuart Mill, 

 who, probably only through the study of Hamilton's philo- 

 sophy, was induced to lay his account with Kantian ideas. 



