176 W. L. COURTNEY, M.A., LL.D., ON 
purely historical view, we look at what happened to philo- 
sophy after him, we shall see that there was some doubt, 
some difference of opinion, as to the exact result of the 
system of their predecessor. On which of the two portions 
of the Kantian philosophy was the chief stress to be laid? 
Were we to begin from the standpoint of the Critique of the 
practical reason, or from that of the Critique of the pure 
reason? Are we to believe the intimations of the moral 
consciousness, or to accept the negative judgments of the 
logical understanding? As a mere matter of history, 
this doubt led to two absolutely different lines of 
philosophical thought. The culmination of the one is to 
be found in Hegel; an admirable treatment of the other 
issue is to be found in Lange’s History of Materialism. 
Let us not, however, entangle ourselves to-night with the 
historical issues, but treat, for the sake of our own pur- 
poses, the work of Kant in relation to what I have already 
defined as scepticism. Observe, to begin with, two points. 
As you are doubtless aware, so far as morality is concerned, 
according to the Kantian system, we have to deal with 
what he called the practical reason, while in logic our 
business is with the pure or speculative reason. Now at 
one moment in the evolution of his system, Kant asks 
himself the question, “ Which of these two is to be pre- 
ferred?” It is as though he were endeavouring to determine 
which is to be the ultimate guide of a man in life, or which 
has most illuminating power, in the relations in which man 
stands to the universe of things. And he gives a perfectly 
frank and positive reply. The practical reason is allowed 
to have the supremacy over the speculative. The specula- 
tive is not to be allowed to carry out its destructive conclu- 
sions too far; it 1s, in point of fact, to adopt that attitude of 
suspense, or of disengagement, seeing the difficulties of the 
task which it has set itself, perfectly conscious of the 
objections which can be levelled against any and every 
ultimate idea, but also prepared to let the matter alone, to 
see whether, from any other source, greater illumination 
can be derived than from such intimations as it is itself able 
to offer. Whence is to be derived this further illumination ? 
Here, too, the answer is plain; from the practical reason, from 
reason as exercised in the sphere of morals; ethics being a 
matter of more intimate concern to aman than logic. Let us 
look at the case from another point of view. In what aspect 
ought man to be considered? Purely ag a thinking creature, 
