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Immanuel Kant

Immanuel Kant Quotes

Philosopher

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Famous Immanuel Kant Quotes

“Even if a civil society were to be dissolved by the consent of all its members (e.g., if a people inhabiting an island decided to separate and disperse throughout the world), the last murderer remaining in prison would first have to be executed, so that each has done to him what his deeds deserve and blood guilt does not cling to the people for not having insisted upon this punishment; for otherwise the people can be regarded as collaborators in his public violation of justice.”

PeopleIfsWorldFirstsDoeDoneLastsJusticeBloodMembersDeserveDecidedPrisonGuiltDeedsPunishmentIslandsConsentMurdererViolationCivil SocietyCollaborators
Book:Practical Philosophy
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“Moral Teleology supplies the deficiency in physical Teleology , and first establishes a Theology ; because the latter, if it did not borrow from the former without being observed, but were to proceed consistently, could only found a Demonology , which is incapable of any definite concept.”

IfsFirstsFoundMoralConceptsTheologyFormerLatterConsistentlyIncapableDefiniteSuppliesDeficiency
Book:THE THREE CRITIQUES: The Critique of Pure Reason, The Critique of Practical Reason & The Critique of Judgment: The Base Plan for Transcendental Philosophy, The Theory of Moral Reasoning and The Critiques of Aesthetic and Teleological Judgment
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“This spirit of freedom is expanding even where it must struggle against the external obstacles of governments that misunderstand their own function. Such governments are illuminated by the example that the existence of freedom need not give cause for the least concern regarding public order and harmony in the commonwealth. If only they refrain from inventing artifices to keep themselves in it, men will gradually raise themselves from barbarism.”

IfsMenNeedsGivingGovernmentSpiritOrderCausesExistenceStruggleExampleConcernFunctionHarmonyRaisesObstaclesExpandingInventingRefrainBarbarismCommonwealthArtifice
Book:Perpetual Peace and Other Essays: on Politics, History, and Morals
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“Two things fill the mind with ever new and increasing admiration and awe, the more often and steadily we reflect upon them: the starry heavens above me and the moral law within me. I do not seek or conjecture either of them as if they were veiled obscurities or extravagances beyond the horizon of my vision; I see them before me and connect them immediately with the consciousness of my existence.”

IfsMindTwoLawHeavenExistenceConsciousnessMoralVisionTwo ThingsAweAdmirationHorizonObscurityExtravaganceMoral LawConjectureBeyond The Horizon
Author:Immanuel Kant
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“Enlightenment is man's leaving his self-caused immaturity. Immaturity is the incapacity to use one's intelligence without the guidance of another. Such immaturity is self-caused if it is not caused by lack of intelligence, but by lack of determination and courage to use one's intelligence without being guided by another. Sapere Aude! Have the courage to use your own intelligence! is therefore the motto of the enlightenment.”

IfsMenSelfUseEnlightenmentDeterminationLeavingGuidanceMottoImmaturityIncapacity
Author:Immanuel Kant
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“Laziness and cowardice explain why so many men. . . remain under a life-long tutelage and why it is so easy for some men to set themselves up as the guardians of all the rest. . . If I have a book which understands for me, a pastor who has a conscience for me, a doctor who decides my diet, I need not trouble myself. If I am willing to pay, I need not think. Others will do it for me.”

IfsThinkingMenNeedsLongBookEasyPayTroubleWillingConscienceDoctorsDietsCowardiceLazinessPastorGuardianLong LifeDoctor WhoTutelage
Author:Immanuel Kant
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“We come no nearer the infinitude of the creative power of God, if we enclose the space of its revelation within a sphere described with the radius of the Milky Way, than if we were to limit it to a ball an inch in diameter. All that is finite, whatever has limits and a definite relation to unity, is equally far removed from the infinite... Eternity is not sufficient to embrace the manifestations of the Supreme Being, if it is not combined with the infinitude of space.”

IfsWayGodScienceSpaceCreativeCreationLimitsBallsEternityRelationInfiniteEmbraceUnitySupremeManifestationSufficientRevelationsSpheresInchesDefiniteFinitePower Of GodCreative PowerSupreme BeingMilky WayRadius
Book:Kant's cosmogony as in his essay on the retardation of the rotation of the earth and his Natural history and theory of the heavens: With introduction, appendices, and a portrait of Thomas Wright of Durham
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“Ours is an age of criticism, to which everything must be subjected. The sacredness of religion, and the authority of legislation, are by many regarded as grounds for exemption from the examination by this tribunal, But, if they are exempted, and cannot lay claim to sincere respect, which reason accords only to that which has stood the test of a free and public examination.”

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Book:The Critique of Pure Reason
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“If you punish a child for being naughty, and reward him for being good, he will do right merely for the sake of the reward; and when he goes out into the world and finds that goodness is not always rewarded, nor wickedness always punished, he will grow into a man who only thinks about how he may get on in the world, and does right or wrong according as he finds advantage to himself.”

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Book:On Education
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“Enlightenment is man's emergence from his self-imposed nonage. Nonage is the inability to use one's own understanding without another's guidance. This nonage is self-imposed if its cause lies not in lack of understanding but in indecision and lack of courage to use one's own mind without another's guidance. Dare to know!”

IfsKnowsMenMindSelfUseLyingCausesUnderstandingCourageEnlightenmentDareGuidanceInabilityEmergenceIndecisionLack Of Understanding
Author:Immanuel Kant
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“Even the song of birds, which we can bring under no musical rule, seems to have more freedom, and therefore more for taste, than a song of a human being which is produced in accordance with all the rules of music; for we very much sooner weary of the latter, if it is repeated often and at length. Here, however, we probably confuse our participation in the mirth of a little creature that we love, with the beauty of its song; for if this were exactly imitated by man (as sometimes the notes of the nightingale are) it would seem to our ear quite devoid of taste.”

IfsMenHumansLittlesSometimesSeemsSongHuman BeingsTasteCreaturesBirdEarsNotesMusicalLatterLengthWearyParticipationMirthNightingales
Book:The Critique of Judgement
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“If it were possible for us to have so deep an insight into a man's character as shown both in inner and in outer actions, that every, even the least, incentive to these actions and all external occasions which affect them were so known to us that his future conduct could be predicted with as great a certainty as the occurrence of a solar or lunar eclipse, we could nevertheless still assert that the man is free.”

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Author:Immanuel Kant
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