is seen in us at its highest development; in other words, it is the
direct consciousness of the law of =Causality=--a consciousness
which precedes all experience, being constituted by the very form
of the understanding, whose essential nature is, in fact, therein
contained. On it depends in the first place the intuitive perception of
the external world; for the senses by themselves are only capable of
=impression=, a thing which is very far from being =intuitive
perception=; indeed, the former is nothing but the material of the
latter: _νοῡς ὁρᾷ, καὶ νοῡς ἀκούει, τ'ἄλλα κωϕὰ καὶ τυϕλά._ (The mind
sees, the mind hears; everything else is deaf and blind.) =Intuitive
perception= is the result of our directly referring the impressions
of the sense-organs to their cause, which, exactly because of this
act of the intelligence, presents itself as an =external object=
under the mode of intuition proper to us, _i.e._, in =space=.
This is a proof that the Law of Causality is known to us _a priori_,
and does not arise from experience, since experience itself, inasmuch
as it presupposes intuitive perception, is only possible through the
same law. All the higher qualities of the intellect, all cleverness,
sagacity, penetration, acumen are directly proportional to the
exactness and fulness with which the workings of Causality in all its
relations are grasped; for all knowledge of the =connection=
of things, in the widest sense of the word, is based on the
comprehension of this law, and the clearness and accuracy with which
it is understood is the measure of one man's superiority to another
in =understanding=, shrewdness, cunning. On the other hand, the
epithet =reasonable= has at all times been applied to the man who
does not allow himself to be guided by intuitive impressions, but by
=thoughts= and =conceptions=, and who therefore always sets
to work logically after due reflection and forethought. Conduct of this
sort is everywhere known as =reasonable=. Not that this by any
means implies uprightness and love for one's fellows. On the contrary,
it is quite possible to act in the most reasonable way, that is,
according to conclusions scientifically deduced, and weighed with the
nicest exactitude; and yet to follow the most selfish, unjust, and even
iniquitons maxims. So that never before Kant did it occur to any one
to identify just, virtuous, and noble conduct with =reasonable=;
the two lines of behaviour have always been completely separated, and
kept apart. The one depends on the =kind of motivation=; the
other on the difference in fundamental principles. Only after Kant
(because he taught that virtue has its source in Pure Reason) did the
virtuous and the reasonable become one and the same thing, despite the
usage of these words which all languages have adopted--a usage which
is not fortuitous, but the work of universal, and therefore uniform,
human judgment. "Reasonable" and "vicious" are terms that go very