xxviii KANT'S UNIVERSAL NATURAL HISTORY 



Philosopher,' by Geo. F. Becker, in the American 

 Journal of Science, Vol. v., February, 1 898, to which 

 my attention has been called by Lord Kelvin, and 

 which shows clear and complete knowledge of the 

 subject, founded on direct study of Kant's works. 

 Mr. Becker sums up his excellent review thus : 

 * In his preface to his theory of the heavens, Kant 

 says : " I seek to evolve the present state of the 

 universe from the simplest condition of nature by 

 means of mechanical laws alone." After more than 

 one hundred years of rapid progress in science, it 

 cannot be denied that his attempt was astonishingly 

 successful.' 



This may suffice here, without adding further 

 detail, to establish the statement with which we 

 started, that ' Kant's Cosmogony never stood so 

 high in the estimation of the scientific world as it 

 does to-day.' 1 



1 Our most distinguished recent philosophical expounders of Kant 

 have also referred to Kant's early scientific work ; e.g. Dr. Edward 

 Caird, 'The Critical Philosophy of Immanuel Kant' (Early Essays 

 on Physics,Vo\. I., p. 103), 1889; Dr. Hutchison Stirling, Art. 'Kant' 

 in Chambers' Encyclopedia, New Edition, 1890; and Dr. Adamson, 

 Art. 'Kant 'in the Encyclopedia Britannica, 9th Edition, 1881. Dr. 

 Adamson, with keen discernment of the scientific trend of all Kant's 

 thought, says, relevantly and well, that Kant 'combined in a quite 

 unusual degree knowledge of physical science with speculative acute- 

 ness and devotion to philosophy. No other thinker of modern times 

 has been throughout his work so penetrated with the conceptions of 

 physical science ; no other has been able to hold with such firmness the 

 balance between empirical and speculative ideas.' 



