151 
PHILO 
rience; judgments in which the peculiar aCts of our own 
faculties, which are originally necefi'ary to produce and 
lay the foundation of all experience, enter as elements. 
Let us figure toourfelvesa mirror endowed with perception, 
and a knowledge that external objects are reprefented in it; 
let us fuppofe it to be capable of reflecting on the phe¬ 
nomena which it exhibits to the fpeCtator, and which it 
alfo prefents to itfelf. If it could difcover the properties 
which enable it to produce thefe phenomena, it would 
poflefs two totally diftinCt kinds of reprefentations; it 
would be Confcious of the images which it reflects, and 
of the qualities which it tnuft have pofi’efl'ed prior to all 
production of images. The former would be its know¬ 
ledge a pojleriori ; but, when it reflected on itfelf thus, 
‘ My furface is plane, it is frnooth ; I am impervious to 
the rays of light;’ it would then prove itfelf pofTefled of 
notions a priori, fince thofe properties which it would re¬ 
cognize as inherent in its own ftruCture are antecedent to 
any image reflected by its furface, and are the necefi'ary 
conditions of that faculty of forming images of which it 
is fuppofed to be confcious. Let 11s carry this extrava¬ 
gant fiction Hill further. Let us imagine that our mirror 
reprefented external objeCts entirely deftitute of thick- 
nefs, all placed on the fame plane, crofling one another 
in the fame manner as their images crofs on its furface ; 
we fhall here have an example of objective reality attributed 
to modifications merely Jubje&ive. If, finally, we could 
figure it to ourfelves as analyzing and combining in dif¬ 
ferent ways the properties which it is fenfible it pofl’efles, 
though it is merely able to verify their exiftence and in- 
vefligate their ufe; deducing from thefe combinations 
fpeculative inferences relative to the organization, the 
purpofe, and the origin, of the external things which oc- 
cafion the images upon its furface; founding fyftems 
perhaps entirely on the conjectures fuggefted by the ana- 
lyfis of its own properties, thus attempting to apply them 
to a ufe totally foreign to their nature and end ; we fhould 
thus have a rude but fufficiently analogical idea of the 
nature of the reproaches which the founder of the Cri- 
tical Philosophy addrefles to human reafon, when, 
miftaking the proper diltinCtion of its laws, and thofe of 
the other intellectual faculties, a deftination which is li¬ 
mited to the acquifition and the perfecting of experience; 
it applies thofe laws to the inveftigation of objeCts placed 
out of the limits of experience, attributing to itfelf the 
right of affirming their exiftence, of afcertaining their 
qualities, and of determining their relations to man. 
“ We hope the reader will now conceive diftinCtly how 
the Phiiofopher of Kbnigfberg, in generalizing the objec¬ 
tions which Hume had directed folely againft the legiti¬ 
mate authority of the law of caufality, and in extending 
them to all thofe univerfal propofitions, without which 
our perceptions could not be organized into a body of 
experience, and which are the foundation of our know¬ 
ledge, was naturally led to aflc hitnfelf, whether it is poffible 
to prove the truth of Jj/nthetical judgments a priori. I t has 
been fliown how, in ieeking the folution of this problem, 
he was led to examine all the foundations of our know¬ 
ledge, and to explore the depths of our intellectual nature. 
The firft ftep taken by Kant in a career perfectly novel 
to the human mind, exhibited to him the univerfal and 
abfoluie propofitions in a new light; as they did not arife 
from the objeCts perceived, might they not emanate from 
the perceiving fubjeCt ? Struck with the harmony, the 
ftriCtnefs, the fupreme and unalterable authority, of thofe 
laws which govern the operations of the mind, the code 
of which was fo admirably framed by Ariftotle, that fub- 
fequent ages have but fpoiled his work, whenever they 
have pretended to enrich and improve it; Kant conceived 
this fublime idea : the mode of aCtiviry to which the un- 
derftanding is reftriCted, when it forms notions of genus 
and fpecies, judgments and fylJogifms, categorical, hypo¬ 
thetical, disjunctive, &c. is perhaps the fource of a regu¬ 
lative influence which we exercife on the immediate im- 
preffions made by external objeCts; the laws by virtue of 
SOPHY. 
which the various judgments difplayed in the trratifes of 
Logic are formed, are perhaps the very laws according to 
which the mind feizes individual objeCts by intuition, 
becomes familiar with them, and combines the percep¬ 
tions of them into a body of experience; in a word, the 
intellectual laws are the laws of the phenomenal world ; 
the laws of the mind are the law's of nature, fo far as it 
can ever be known to man. This opening profpeCt, 
which a mere man of wit and ingenuity, had it occurred 
to him, would have abandoned at the firft glance as an 
idle extravagance, prefented itfelf to the penetrating and 
comprehenfive genius of Kant in all its importance, and 
in all its fertility of new refources for the perfecting of 
philofophy. The inftant it was clearly reprefented to 
his mind, it infpired him with the hope of undertaking 
with more fuccefs than all who had preceded him, the 
feparation of what is purely fubjeCtive in our knowledge 
from its fubjeCtive part. From this moment he faw that 
he was deftined to accomplilh in the fpeculative fciences 
afimilar revolution to that which his illuftrious country¬ 
man, Copernicus of Pruflia, had produced in natural phi¬ 
lofophy ; a parallel, the idea of which was firft conceived 
by Kant himfelf, and which, being Angularly calculated to 
characterize his philofophical reform, deferves a moment’s 
attention. 
“ What was the ancient definition of Truth, the objeCt 
of all metaphyfical theories? Truth, it was laid, is the 
agreement of our reprefentations with the things repre¬ 
fented. But how is this agreement to be eftabliflied ? 
How are we are to afcertain that it actually exifts ? 
Ariftotle and Locke, on the one hand ; Plato, Defcartes, 
and Leibnitz, on the other, follow different tracks, and 
purlue different methods. The former feek in our fen- 
fations the faithful image of the objeCts, and ftudy the 
impreflions of them to difcover the truth there, as it were 
in the faCt ; while their rivals apply to the thinking being 
itfelf, and dare to interrogate the divinity in order to ob¬ 
tain authentic information refpeCling the eflence of things 
and their real qualities. But, whatever may be the dif- 
cordance of their refults, there is more apparent than real 
difference in the methods of thefe philofophers. They 
all begin with the object, in order to arrive at the fubjefd; 
even when they feem to attend firft to the latter, it is only 
in fo far as it is itfelf an objeCt, and in its abfolute quali¬ 
ties, that they view it: it is not in its knowing faculty , its 
laws and relations, that they endeavour firft to appreciate. 
All of them begin by enquiring, What are the things? and 
they then try to determine what man can know concern¬ 
ing them. Kant reverfes the procefs; he feeks firft to 
acquire a juft idea of the knowing faculty, in order thence 
to conclude what the things known by that faculty may be, 
in confequence of its peculiar organization. It is ob¬ 
vious, that this method is diametrically oppolite to that 
of the philofophers who preceded Kant. With him, it is 
not man who is modified by the impreflion of objeCls, the 
conception of which is moulded upon their forms, and 
follows their movements, in confequence either of their 
direCt influence, or of the will of their Supreme Author ; 
but it is the objects which adapt themfelves to the faculties' 
of the human intellect, and which it modifies and incor¬ 
porates into the fyftem of its own knowledge. In this 
view of the fubjeCi, we muft renounce the ordinary defi¬ 
nition of Truth ; we (hall no longer feek it in the agree¬ 
ment of the thing with its reprefentation, but in that 
which mult fubfilt between the fenfible phenomena and 
the fundamental laws of the intellect: truth then will no 
more be the exaCt caft of an objeCt than the head of An- 
tinous funk in the feal is the faithful image of the pro¬ 
jecting wax or fulphur which has received its impreflion. 
We fhall thus no longer revolve round the things, but, 
making ourfelves their centre, we caufe them to revolve 
round us. This is the Copernican revolution. 
“To difpute the originality of the views adopted by the 
founder of the new fchool, it is not fufficient to ftate that 
the molt eminent fceptics, idealilts, and metaphylicians, 
who 
