134 quotes
Thoughts without content are empty, intuitions without concepts are blind. The understanding can intuit nothing, the senses can think nothing. Only through their unison can knowledge arise.
Critique of Pure Reason (1781)
The means employed by Nature to bring about the development of all the capacities of men is their antagonism in society, so far as this is, in the end, the cause of a lawful order among men.
Idea for a Universal History from a Cosmopolitan Point of View (1784)
There is … only a single categorical imperative and it is this: Act only on that maxim through which you can at the same time will that it should become a universal law.
Metaphysics of Morals (1797)
A whole from necessary substances is impossible. The whole, therefore, of substances is a whole of contingent things, and the world consists essentially of only contingent things.
Kant's Inaugural Dissertation (1770)
In the natural state no concept of God can arise, and the false one which one makes for himself is harmful. Hence the theory of natural religion can be true only where there is no science; therefore it cannot bind all men together.
The Educational Theory of Immanuel Kant (1904)
The public use of a man's reason must be free at all times, and this alone can bring enlightenment among men...
What is Enlightenment? (1784)
Idea for a General History with a Cosmopolitan Purpose (1784), Proposition 6.
Act so as to treat humanity, whether in your own person or in that of another, at all times also as an end, and not only as a means.
Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals (1785)
The veneration of mighty invisible beings, which was extorted from helpless man through natural fear rooted in the sense of his impotence …
Religion within the Limits of Reason Alone (1793)
Good and strong will. Mechanism must precede science (learning). Also in morals and religion? Too much discipline makes one narrow and kills proficiency. Politeness belongs, not to discipline, but to polish, and thus comes last.
The Educational Theory of Immanuel Kant (1904)
There is nothing at all in the world that one can think of, or even out of it, that can be held good without qualification, except a good will. (Ch. 1)
Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals (1785)
The mind intent upon resolving as well as compounding the concept of a composite demands and presumes boundaries in which it may acquiesce in the former as well as in the latter direction.
Kant's Inaugural Dissertation (1770)
All thought must, directly or indirectly, by way of certain characters, relate ultimately to intuitions, and therefore, with us, to sensibility, because in no other way can an object be given to us.
Critique of Pure Reason (1781)
Democracy is necessarily despotism, as it establishes an executive power contrary to the general will; all being able to decide against one whose opinion may differ, the will of all is therefore not that of all: which is contradictory and opposite to liberty.
Nature has willed that man should, by himself, produce everything that goes beyond the mechanical ordering of his animal existence, and that he should partake of no other happiness or perfection than that which he himself, independently of instinct, has created by his own reason.
Idea for a Universal History from a Cosmopolitan Point of View (1784)
The concept of space, therefore, is a pure intuition, being a singular concept, not made up by sensations, but itself the fundamental form of all external sensation.
Kant's Inaugural Dissertation (1770)
The universal and lasting establishment of peace constitutes not merely a part, but the whole final purpose and end of the science of right as viewed within the limits of reason.
Eternal Peace (1795)
Enlightenment is man’s emergence from his self-imposed immaturity. Immaturity is the inability to use one’s understanding without guidance from another. This immaturity is self-imposed when its cause lies not in lack of understanding, but in lack of resolve and courage to use it without guidance from another.
What is Enlightenment? (1784)
Here as elsewhere human reason in its pure use, so long as it was not critically examined, has first tried all possible wrong ways before it succeeded in finding the one true way.
Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals (1785)
A philosophical attempt to work out a universal history according to a natural plan directed to achieving the civic union of the human race must be regarded as possible and, indeed, as contributing to this end of Nature.
Idea for a Universal History from a Cosmopolitan Point of View (1784)