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“ART. II. — Critick of Pure Reason; translated from the Original of IMMANUEL KANT. London: William Pickering. 1838. 8vo. pp. 655,” The North American Review, vol. 49, no. 104 (July 1839), pp. 44–68; selection from pp. 54–5.
[Alexander Hill Everett]
Alexander Hill Everett (1790–1847) was educated at Harvard College, graduating top of his class in 1806. He studied law under John Quincy Adams, and accompanied Adams to Russia as his private secretary in 1809. From 1818 to 1825 Everett was charge d’affaires in the Netherlands; from 1825–9, U.S. minister to Spain. Everett had been an editor of the North American Review from 1830 to 1835 and was a frequent contributor to various American journals. In the selection from his review of Immanuel Kant’s Critick of Pure Reason reprinted below, Everett draws a line of influence from Hume’s scepticism to transcendental philosophy. Everett’s authorship is attributed in William Cushing, Index to the North American Review (Cambridge, 1878), p. 127. On Everett see J. Chris Arndt, “Alexander Hill Everett,” ANB, vol. 7, pp. 628–9.
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The writings of Kant gave utterance to the philosophical tendencies of his country and age, and the speculatists who succeeded him owe much of their success to a similar adoption of the prevailing sentiments of the thinking public into their respective systems. Under the guise of a new faith, they created a philosophy of unbelief; under a dogmatical mask, they proclaimed what was, at least in reference to revelation, a theory of total skepticsm. This fact, though commonly admitted, so far as it relates to the opinions of Fichte, Shelling, and Hegel, is denied in respect to the creator of the transcendental philosophy. But the denial only shows how imperfectly, out of the limits of his own country, his system is understood. The speculations of Hume, as he repeatedly admits, gave the first hint for the formation of his new scheme of belief; “they first interrupted my dogmatical slumber, and gave a wholly different direction to my inquiries in the field of speculative philosophy.” Though commonly understood as aiming at the refutation of his predecessor, he extended, in fact, the sphere of Hume’s skeptical arguments, generalizing them so far that they covered the whole field of knowledge.
“I first inquired, whether the objection of Hume might not be universal, and soon found, that the idea of the connexion between cause and effect is far from being the only one by which the understanding, a priori, thinks of the union of things; but rather, that metaphysics are entirely made up of such conceptions. I endeavoured to ascertain their number, and when, guided by a single principle, I had succeeded in the attempt, I proceeded to inquire into the objective validity of these ideas; for I was now more than ever convinced, that they were not drawn from experience, as Hume had supposed, but that they came from the pure understanding.” — Prolegomena zu einer jeden künftigen Metaphysik. Vorrede, p. 13.
That this expansion of Hume’s principles, though conducted on a different method, leads to the same skeptical conclusions that he deduced from them, will be more clearly seen in the development of the theory. The impression that it led to very different results, is founded on the arrogant pretensions of the new school, and the difficulty of analyzing the system far enough to detect its real character. The name of Transcendentalism seems to imply, that it is the scheme of a higher philosophy, rising above the objects of sense, and over-leaping the narrow limits within which the exercise of our faculties had formerly been confined; when, in fact, its leading doctrine is, that our knowledge is necessarily restricted to objects within the domain of experience, — that all super-sensual ideas are to us characterless and devoid of meaning, and in attempting to cognize them the reason is involved in endless contradictions. We do not state this fact as in itself a reproach upon the speculations of Kant, but only to correct the unfounded notions, which most persons among us entertain, of their character and tendency. All innovations in the theory of science, all new views in philosophy, must stand or fall on their logical and intrinsic merits. There may be a presumption against them from the degrading conception which they offer of human nature; but this is insufficient to justify their immediate rejection. Of two hypotheses, the more ennobling is not necessarily the true one, and too great advantage is given to the skeptic, by a hasty preference awarded to it, before the grounds on which it rests are satisfactorily determined. Our business is with argument, and not with declamation.