In his “Grundlegung zur Metaphysik der Sitten” (The Foundation of the Metaphysics of Ethics) and “Kritik der praktischen [pg 037] Vernunft” (Critique of Practical Reason) Kant sought to establish autonomy in moral life and action. Man himself, his practical reason, is the ultimate foundation of all moral obligation; did man lead a good life out of obedience to God it would be a heteronomy unworthy of the name of “moral.” “The autonomy of the will,” he teaches, “is the sole principle of all moral laws and the duties allied to them; all arbitrary heteronomy, on the contrary, far from having any binding force, is contrary to the principle of morality of the will” (Kritik der prakt. Vern., Elementarlehre, I, 1, 4. Lehrsatz). Or, as amplified by a faithful interpreter of the master: “In the moral world the individual should be not only a member but also a ruler; he is a member of the moral order when he obeys its law; he is its ruler when he enacts the law.... The distinction between autonomy and heteronomy separates true from false ethics, the system of Kant from all other systems. All moral systems, except that of Kant, are based on the principles of heteronomy; they can have no other. And critical philosophy was the first to grasp the principle of autonomy” (Kuno Fischer, Geschichte der neuen Philosophie, IV, 2d ed., 1869, p. 114 seq.). Kant's just man no longer prays “Thy will be done”; he identifies the law with himself. Nietzsche's transcendental man is seen in the background.
Autonomy of thought is the result of the “Critique of Pure Reason,” and in spite of its inconsistency of expression, its involved sentences, its extremely tiresome style, it is and will long continue to be the text-book of modern philosophy. According to Kant our cognition consists in our fashioning the substance of our perceptions and reasoning after innate, purely subjective, views and conceptions. Time and place, and especially the abstract notions of existence and non-existence, necessity, causality, substance, have no truth independent of our thought; they are but forms and patterns according to which we are forced to picture the world. Their first matter is supplied by sense experience, such as sound, colour, feeling; but these, too, according to Kant, are not objective. Nothing then remains to our cognition that is not purely subjective, having existence in ourselves alone. Our cognition is no longer [pg 038] a reproduction, but a creation of its object; our thought is no longer subject to an external truth that may be forced upon it. “Hitherto,” says Kant, “it has been generally supposed that our cognition must be governed by objects.... Let us see if we cannot make better headway in the province of metaphysics by supposing that objects must be governed by our cognition” (Kritik der Reinen Vernunft, Vorrede zur zweiten Ausgabe).
This is, indeed, nothing but a complete falsification of human cognition. It is evident to an unbiassed mind that there must be a reason for everything, not because I so think, but I think so because such is the fact; that the multiplication table is right, not because I think so, but I must multiply according to it simply because it is right. My thought is subject to objective truth. But Kant's autonomy means emancipation from objective truth, and hence, though Kant himself held fast to the unchangeable laws of thinking and acting, he energetically opened the way for subjectivism with all its consequences. This was Kant's doing, and history credits him with it. It was one of those events which have made men famous: the giving to the ideas and sentiments of a period their scientific formula, and thereby also their apparent justification.
Schiller wrote in 1805 to W. von Humboldt: “The profound fundamental ideas of ideal philosophy remain an enduring treasure, and for this reason alone one should think himself fortunate for having lived at the present time.... Finally, we are both idealists, and should be ashamed to have it said of us that things made us and not we the things.” Fr. Paulsen gives expression to the opinion of many when he says: “Kant gives to the intellect the self-determination that is essential to it, and the position in the world which it deserves. He has raised the intellect's creative power to a position of honour: the essence of the intellect is freedom” (Immanuel Kant, 1898, p. 386). “The autonomy of reason ... we cannot give up” (Kant, Der Philosoph des Protestantismus, in Philosophia militans, 2d ed., 1901, p. 51). “It is indeed the offspring of Protestantism.” “To me it is beyond doubt,” Paulsen continues, “that the fundamental tendency of primitive Protestantism has here been carried out in all clearness” (Ibid. 43). Luther, too, found in the heart of the individual the unfailing source of truth. For that reason Kant has been called the philosopher of Protestantism.
Hence the well-known historian, J. Scherr, may not be wrong when he calls the philosophy of Kant “the foundation of granite whereon is built the freedom of the German intellect.”
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Now, indeed, we easily understand the demand for freedom of thought. It is unintelligible how an external authority, a divine revelation or infallible Church, could have ever approached man, assured him of the truth of its teaching, and laid upon him in consequence of this testimony the obligation of accepting it as true. “An external authority,” we are assured, “be it ever so great, will never succeed in arousing in us a sense of obligation; its laws, be they ever so lofty and earnest, will be deemed arbitrary, simply because they come from without” (Sabatier, La Religion et la Culture moderne, apud Fonsegrive, Die Stellung der Katholiken gegenueber der Wissenschaft, Deutsch von Schieser (1903), 10). Man accepts only what he himself has produced, what is congenial to his individuality, what is in harmony with his personal intellectual life. In the place of truth steps “personal conviction,” the shaping of one's views and ideals; in the place of unselfish submission to the truth steps the “development of one's intellectual individuality,” the “evolution of one's intellectual personality”; in a word, free-thought. Exterior authority can no longer impose an obligation. “Is there on earth,” asks Paulsen, “an instance where authority can decide for us in matters of belief and thought?” And he answers: “There is none; there cannot be on this earth an infallible teaching authority.” And why not? “Philosophy and science must refuse to recognize such an authority.... If I could believe all that the Church or the Pope teaches, this one thing I could never believe, that they are infallible; it would include a resolution, once for all, to renounce my own judgment regarding whatever they declare true or false, good or bad; it would be the utter renunciation of the use of my reason and conscience.” (Ibid. 51-53. We shall often cite the testimony of Paulsen for the purpose of illustrating modern thought, partly because he is no longer living, partly because he is quite an outspoken representative of the modern view of the world, though generally regarded as moderate. Moreover, he is without doubt one of the most widely read of the modern German philosophers.)
The demonstration of all this is quite unique. Here it is in brief: Were there an infallible authority, one which necessarily [pg 040] taught the truth, then thought and science would be irrevocably subjected to this authority: that will not do; therefore there is no such authority. Or thus: Were there an infallible teaching, then we should have to accept it without contradiction: that is impossible; therefore there is no infallibility. Hence it is clear, the protest against an infallible authority, even though divine,—for the argument holds good also in regard to such an authority,—is not based on the impossibility of teaching the truth, for the authority is supposed to be infallible, but on man's refusal to be taught. And this refusal is made in accordance with that sovereign freedom of thought which is the natural offspring of subjectivism;