In consequence, what we know, and what our sciences of experience study, is neither a world of things simply given to us as brute facts from without, nor yet a world of mere sensations. On the contrary, what we know is the world of experience as our active intelli gence inevitably interprets experience. Hence we know, not inevitably in themselves," but "phe nomena," and not mere "data" of experience, but experiences as interpreted by the active constructive work of our intelligence.
Meanwhile, our intelligence, upon its higher levels, is indeed not content with this mere interpretation of the contents of sense; but — still in its own spontaneous way—defines ideals of objects and of laws which far tran scend — according, to our own conception— the facts of experience. The "Reason" proper, as distinct from the "Understanding" (that is, from the intelligence which merely interprets and renders coherent our experience), is the part or aspect of our intelligence which is con cerned with these other and "transcendent" objects. The objects of the "Reason" proper, are objects which no human experience can reach or exemplify, and which we therefore conceive as lying beyond any possible experi ence. Such objects are God, the human ego itself, in its true nature, the cosmos in its en tirety and the moral law. Such objects we cannot, in any scientific sense, "know,' just be cause our knowledge is limited to our inter• pretation of experience — an interpretation due to the functions and to the categories of our lower intelligence, i.e., of our "understanding.' Yet if the "transcendent" objects of the "pure Reason" cannot be "known," they nevertheless can be and must be "postulated,' by virtue of a certain active and spontaneous "faith" which the Reason warrants. For these "transcendent* objects have for us a moral value and give a meaning to life.
We "know,' then, "phenomena." Our "Reason," meanwhile, gives us "faith" in cer tain "Ideas" which relate to the "transcendent" objects. This faith is not knowledge, but is rationally warranted. It is the office of phil osophy to bring to consciousness the "cate gories" in terms of which we inevitably inter pret phenomena,. and so organize our experience and get our science. It is also the office of philosophy to discover and define the "Ideas" in terms of which we just as inevitably organ ize our moral conduct and give meaning to our practical life.
So, for Kant, this view of philosophy dif fers from the view of older philosophy in limiting our inquiries to the business of inter preting experience and organising life. The philosopher then, is above all concerned with the universe, as the human Self, that is, as the Self which is, in type, the same in all of us, sees the universe, acknowledges it, and gives to it, in the form in which we experience its presence, the type of rational coherence. Any
world which is not the world as the Self views it, is unknowable, and is a world of "things in themselves.' Hegel, in common with the other post ICantian German idealists, builds upon the basis of this. Kantian analysis of knowledge and of reason. His dependence upon Kant is shown by the very fact of his frequent and persistent criticism of that philosopher's positions. That Hegel's results are in one sense far removed from those of Kant becomes obvious upon a very brief consideration. But that, however much Kant's doctrine is transformed in Hegel's system, it is still Kant whose views are the principal ones thus transformed, is also cer tain. The relation can be made more explicit by the following statement of the contrast be tween Kant and Hegel: 1. The result of Kant's philosophy is that the accessible world is the world as the rational nature of the human Self requires us to inter it. This result lies at the basis of Hegel's doctrine. But Hegel transforms it by dropping out of consideration, the adjective °accessible,' as being superfluous. It is useless to talk of a world of unknowable or inaccessible "things in themselves,"•as Kant does. The world of reason is simply the world. There is nothing to know except what the nature of our intelligence requires us to acknowledge. Discover the secret of reason and you have discovered the secret of the universe. This is the first char acteristic thesis of Hegel's idealism. "Behind the curtain which is said to hide the inner nature of things," says Hegel in the (Phenom enology,' "there is nothing, unless we ourselves 4, go behind that curtain.' 2. Kant furthermore divides the work of our intelligence between the activity of the °Under standing," which interprets special experi ences, and the "Ideas" of that "Reason," which "postulates* our relations to ultimate reality. Hegel accepts this distinction as valid within its limits, but not as any absolute distinction. Our intelligence may and often does fix its at tention upon fragments of knowledge. In that case it "abstracts ') from the whole meaning of its own life, and thereby becomes ipso facto an "abstract thinking' or "understanding" of this or that object or law. Such abstractions are useful and inevitable. But they are not final. The truth, however, is in Hegel's phrase, simply "the whole." Only that form of reason therefore which is concerned with the whole meaning of life is genuinely philosophical. But since this meaning is, after all, our own mean ing, the meaning of the Self, it need not be simply a matter of "Postulates.' It can be known to us.