276 



PHILOSOPHICAL THOUGHT. 



arguments and speculations which have been put forth 

 from these different and distinct sides. They com- 

 prise the philosophical treatment of the problem of 

 the spirit or the religious problem. 



Recent studies in Kantian philosophy, notably those 

 of the late Professor Paulsen of Berlin, have em- 

 phasised the fact that Kant's primary interest in the 

 whole of his philosophy was a religious interest, the 

 reconciliation of faith and knowledge, of religion and 

 science. 1 This is acknowledged, as Paulsen has shown, 

 not only by those who with him esteem the labours 

 of Kant, but also by those who condemn him, be 

 it that they, with Haeckel, consider that Kant has 

 sacrificed the philosophical to the religious, or, with 

 Willmann, that he has sacrificed the religious to the 

 philosophical interest. 2 The religious interest for Kant 



1 See supra, vol. iiL pp. 340-342, 

 and especially the quotations given 

 in the notes. 



2 The following extract from 

 Paulsen's Introduction ('Immanuel 

 Kant,' 4th ed., 1904, p. 8 sqq. ) is 

 interesting, and may serve in the 

 place of fuller references to the 

 two writers named in the text : 

 "The negative dogmatism or nat- 

 uralism with its verdict on Kant 

 is represented in our times by E. 

 Haeckel. In his ' Weltratsel ' Kant 

 appears as the genuine representa- 

 tive of a retrograde academic phil- 

 osophy which coquettes with the 

 supernaturalism of an obsolete 

 clerical belief ; depending upon the 

 latter in order to find in the dark 

 regions of transcendental philos- 

 ophy a hiding - place from the 

 intruding natural sciences, the 

 ultimate compelling motive being 

 found in a regard for the 

 ' powers that be,' who see in 



pure truth, as naturalistic monism 

 teaches it, a danger for the State 

 or for their own governing posi- 

 tion ; 'the fear of the Lord,' not 

 of the Heavenly One, is considered 

 to be the original source of a fav- 

 oured ' dualism ' ; as also Kant is 

 said to have been brought, in his 

 later days, to reintroduce the three 

 main spectres God, Freedom, and 

 Immortality after having, in his 

 younger days, already recognised 

 the truth of 'Monism.' . . . Not 

 less contemptuous is the verdict 

 of positive dogmatism. Especially 

 scholastic philosophy, roused again 

 into a semblance of life, directs 

 its many - voiced chorus of attack 

 against the critical philosophy as 

 the root of unbelief and of all 

 evil. Criticism as the fundamental 

 form of subjective, erroneous, and 

 destructive idealism is contrasted 

 with Thomism as the fundamental 

 form of constructive idealism. 



