empirical basis for Morals, he rejects all internal, and still more decidedly all external, experience., Accordingly he founds--and I call special attention to this--his moral principle not on any provable _fact of consciousness_, such as an inner natural disposition, nor yet upon any objective relation of things in the external world. No! That would be an empirical foundation. Instead of this, _pure conceptions a priori_, _i.e._, conceptions, which so far contain nothing derived from internal or external experience, and thus are simply shells without kernels--these are to be made the basis of Morals. Let us consider the full meaning of such a position. Human consciousness as well as the whole external world, together with all the experience and all the facts they comprise, are swept from under our feet. We have nothing to stand upon. And what have we to hold to? Nothing but a few entirely abstract, entirely unsubstantial conceptions, floating in the air equally with ourselves. It is from these, or, more correctly, from the mere form of their connection with judgments made, that a _Law_ is declared to proceed, which by so-called =absolute necessity= is supposed to be valid, and to be strong enough to lay bit and bridle on the surging throng of human desires, on the storm of passion, on the giant might of _egoism_. We shall see if such be the case. With this preconceived notion that the basis of Morals must be necessarily and strictly a priori, and entirely free from everything empirical, another of Kant's favourite ideas is closely connected. The moral principle that he seeks to establish is, he says, a =synthetic proposition a priori, of merely formal contents=, and hence exclusively a matter of =Pure Reason=; and accordingly, as such, to be regarded as valid =not only for men=, but for =all possible rational beings=; indeed he declares it to hold good for man "on this account alone," _i.e._, because _per accidens_ man comes under the category of rational beings. Here lies the cause of his basing the Moral principle not on any feeling, but on =pure Reason= (which knows nothing but itself and the statement of its antithesis). So that this =pure Reason= is taken, not as it really and exclusively is--an intellectual faculty of man--but =as a self-existent hypostatic essence=, yet without the smallest authority; the pernicious effects of such example and precedent being sufficiently shown in the pitiful philosophy of the present day. Indeed, this view of Morals as existing not for men, as men, but for all rational beings, as such, is with Kant a principle so firmly established, an idea so favourite, that he is never tired of repeating it at every opportunity.