TRANSLATOR'S INTRODUCTION Ixiii 



cation of the literal truth of the Mosaic Cosmo- 

 gony. In all this ' farrago ' Kant found himself at 

 home only with Epicurus. But he quotes a re- 

 markable sentence from it vindicating Descartes 

 and his successors from theological blame because 

 of their bold attempts to explain the formation of 

 the Heavenly Bodies by merely Natural Laws ; and 

 he claims for himself the same right of freedom 

 and independence in his own investigation. 



2. Kant and Descartes. The Middle Ages, the 

 transition from the ancient to the modern world, 

 were entirely ruled by the ecclesiastical authority 

 of the so-called Mosaic Cosmogony. But the 

 revolution of thought which was effected by mani- 

 fold causes, and which is exhibited most emphati- 

 cally in the Theology of the Reformation, received 

 its clearest philosophical expression in Descartes, the 

 founder of the Modern Philosophy, and the first 

 methodical expounder of the absolute freedom of 

 Reason. Descartes, the inventor of Analytical 

 Geometry, was as great in mathematical science 

 as in pure philosophy, and ' there can be no doubt 

 that the first germ of the Nebular hypothesis is to 

 be found in Descartes' Principles of Philosophy, 

 published in 1644 (43 years before Newton's Prin- 

 cipiay x The still crude Cosmogony of Descartes 

 is best known in connection with his hypothesis 

 of Vortices ', or whirling movements, arising in the 



1 Descartes' Principles of Philosophy , Pt. III., sect. 52, 122; cf. Geo. 

 F. Becker, I.e. Professor Veitch translated only the first three sections 

 of Pt. in. 



