THE ALLEGED SCEPTICISM OF KANT. 201 
THE AUTHOR’S REPLY. 
I have read, with attention, the remarks made upon my paper 
by various critics. My only object was to present, as faithfully 
as I was able, what seemed to me to be the intention of Kant, 
in his Critique of Practical Reason, in order to defend him from 
a special charge. I do not wholly identify myself with his 
doctrines, nor do I desire to maintain, in all their detail, his 
particular arguments on the being of God. 
I observe, however, that one or two of those who have been 
good enough to send comments on my paper have fallen foul of 
Kant’s treatment of the teleologicalargument. There is, of course, 
a narrower form of the design argument, as well as a wider one. 
That the whole universe bears the traces of intelligence is a 
proposition which, so far as I can see, no sane thinker attempts 
to attack. It must be remembered, however, that this is not the 
form of the design argument which Kant had in mind. I should 
think that historically there was no doubt that the attempt to 
explain the structures of creation in detail, solely on the ground of 
the purpose they were supposed to fulfil, led science and know- 
ledge on the wrong track. When Aristotle made use of a similar 
argument, he was much embarrassed by the existence of such awk- 
ward things in creation as whirlwinds and morasses, and other 
matters. It is in reference to some such state of mind as this, I 
imagine, that Kant attacks the use of the teleological argument. 
It is clear that, when we admire any ordinary product of human 
skill—such, for instance, as a cleverly constructed watch or piece 
of machinery—our admiration is largely based on the fact that, in 
the case before us, the artist, engineer or workman has been able 
to conquer certain difficulties of his material in accomplishing his 
result. The fact that he has to deal with a form of matter which 
is not of itself either helpful or useful, is of the very essence of our 
admiration for his skill. This will, I think, explain why Kant 
believes the teleological argument to be based on a purely human 
analogy. The idea is that matter is one thing, and the artist or 
engineer another, and that the human agent has to accept the 
‘material in which he works as something extraneous to him, aud 
