The Critique of Judgement................................................................................................................................1

Immanuel Kant .........................................................................................................................................1

PREFACE ................................................................................................................................................2

INTRODUCTION..................................................................................................................................4

I. Division of Philosophy........................................................................................................................4

II. The Realm of Philosophy in General.................................................................................................6

III. The Critique of Judgement as a means of connecting the two Parts of Philosophy in a whole.......7

IV. Judgement as a Faculty by which Laws are prescribed a priori.......................................................9

V. The Principle of the formal finality of Nature is a transcendental Principle of Judgement. ............10

VI. The Association of the Feeling of Pleasure with the Concept of the Finality of Nature. ...............13

VII. The Aesthetic Representation of the Finality of Nature. ...............................................................14

VIII. The Logical Representation of the Finality of Nature.................................................................16

IX. Joinder of the Legislations of Understanding and Reason by means of Judgement......................17

FIRST MOMENT. Of the Judgement of Taste*: Moment of Quality. .......................................19

SS 1. The judgement of taste is aesthetic. .............................................................................................19

SS 2. The delight which determines the judgement of taste is independent of all interest. .................19

SS 3. Delight in the agreeable is coupled with interest. ........................................................................20

SS 4. Delight in the good is coupled with interest. ...............................................................................21

SS 5. Comparison of the three specifically different kinds of delight. ................................................22

SS 6. The beautiful is that which, apart from concepts, is represented as the Object of a

universal delight. ....................................................................................................................................23

SS 7. Comparison of the beautiful with the agreeable and the good by means of the above

characteristic..........................................................................................................................................23

SS 8. In a judgement of taste the universality of delight is only represented as subjective................24

SS 9. Investigation of the question of the relative priority in a judgement of taste of the feeling

of pleasure and the estimating of the object. .........................................................................................25

SS 10. Finality in general. .....................................................................................................................27

SS 11. The sole foundation of the judgement of taste is the form of finality of an object (or

mode of representing it). .......................................................................................................................28

SS 12. The judgement of taste rests upon a priori grounds.................................................................28

SS 13. The pure judgement of taste is independent of charm and emotion. ........................................29

SS 14 Exemplification..........................................................................................................................29

SS 15. The judgement of taste is entirely independent of the concept of perfection. ..........................31

SS 16. A judgement of taste by which an object is described as beautiful, under the condition of

a definite concept, is not pure...............................................................................................................32

SS 17. Ideal of beauty...........................................................................................................................33

SS 18. Nature of the modality in a judgement of taste.........................................................................36

SS 19. The subjective necessity attributed to a judgement of taste is conditioned. .............................36

SS 20. The condition of the necessity advanced by a judgement of taste is the idea of a common

sense. ......................................................................................................................................................37

SS 21. Have we reason for presupposing a common sense?................................................................37

SS 22. The necessity of the universal assent that is thought in a judgement of taste, is a

subjective necessity which, under the presupposition of a common sense, is represented as

objective. ................................................................................................................................................37

BOOK II. Analytic of the Sublime.......................................................................................................40

SS 23. Transition from the faculty of estimating the beautiful to that of estimating the sublime.......40

SS 24. Subdivision of an investigation of the feeling of the sublime. .................................................41

SS 25. Definition of the term "sublime"...............................................................................................42

SS 26. The estimation of the magnitude of natural things requisite for the idea of the sublime. ........43

SS 27. Quality of the delight in our estimate of the sublime...............................................................47

SS 28. Nature as Might.........................................................................................................................48

SS 29. Modality of the judgement on the sublime in nature. ...............................................................50

SS 30. The deduction of aesthetic judgements upon objects of nature must not be directed to

what we call sublime in nature, but only to the beautiful.....................................................................58

SS 31. Of the method of the deduction of judgements of taste. ...........................................................59

SS 32. First peculiarity of the judgement of taste. ................................................................................60

SS 33. Second peculiarity of the judgement of taste............................................................................61

SS 34. An objective principle of taste is not possible. ..........................................................................62

SS 35. The principle of taste is the subjective principle of the general power of judgement. .............62

SS 36. The problem of a deduction of judgements of taste..................................................................63

SS 37. What exactly it is that is asserted a priori of an object in a judgement of taste.......................63

SS 38. Deduction of judgements of taste. .............................................................................................64

SS 39. The communicability of a sensation. .........................................................................................65

SS 40. Taste as a kind of sensus communis. .........................................................................................66

SS 41. The empirical interest in the beautiful. ......................................................................................67

SS 42. The intellectual interest in the beautiful....................................................................................68

SS 43. Art in general. ............................................................................................................................71

SS 44. Fine art .......................................................................................................................................72

SS 45. Fine art is an art, so far as it has at the same time the appearance of being nature. .................73

SS 46. Fine art is the art of genius........................................................................................................73

SS 47. Elucidation and confirmation of the above explanation of genius. ..........................................74

SS 48. The relation of genius to taste...................................................................................................75

SS 49. The faculties of the mind which constitute genius....................................................................76

SS 50. The combination of taste and genius in products of fine art....................................................79

SS 51. The division of the fine arts. ......................................................................................................80

SS 52. The combination of the fine arts in one and the same product. ................................................83

SS 53. Comparative estimate of the aesthetic worth of the fine arts...................................................83

SS 54. Remark......................................................................................................................................85

SS 55.....................................................................................................................................................88

SS 56. Representation of the antinomy of taste....................................................................................89

SS 57. Solution of the antinomy of taste..............................................................................................90

SS 58. The idealism of the finality alike of nature and of art, as the unique principle of the

aesthetic judgement. ..............................................................................................................................94

SS 59. Beauty as the symbol of morality. .............................................................................................96

SS 60. APPENDIX. The methodology of taste....................................................................................98

THIRD MOMENT. Of Judgements of Taste: Moment of the relation of the Ends brought under Review in

FOURTH MOMENT. Of the Judgement of Taste: Moment of the Modality of the Delight in the Object.

The faculty of knowledge from a priori principles may be called pure reason, and the general investigation

into its possibility and bounds the Critique of Pure Reason. This is permissible although "pure reason," as was

the case with the same use of terms in our first work, is only intended to denote reason in its theoretical

employment, and although there is no desire to bring under review its faculty as practical reason and its

special principles as such. That Critique is, then, an investigation addressed simply to our faculty of knowing

things a priori. Hence it makes our cognitive faculties its sole concern, to the exclusion of the feeling of

pleasure or displeasure and the faculty of desire; and among the cognitive faculties it confines its attention to

understanding and its a priori principles, to the exclusion of judgement and reason, (faculties that also belong

to theoretical cognition,) because it turns out in the sequel that there is no cognitive faculty other than

understanding capable of affording constitutive a priori principles of knowledge. Accordingly the critique

which sifts these faculties one and all, so as to try the possible claims of each of the other faculties to a share

in the clear possession of knowledge from roots of its own, retains nothing but what understanding prescribes

a priori as a law for nature as the complex of phenomenathe form of these being similarly furnished a priori.

All other pure concepts it relegates to the rank of ideas,* which for our faculty of theoretical cognition are

transcendent; though they are not without their use nor redundant, but discharge certain functions as

regulative principles.** For these concepts serve partly to restrain the officious pretentions of understanding,

which, presuming on its ability to supply a priori the conditions of the possibility of all things which it is

capable of knowing, behaves as if it had thus determined these bounds as those of the possibility of all things

generally, and partly also to lead understanding, in its study of nature, according to a principle of

completeness, unattainable as this remains for it, and so to promote the ultimate aim of all knowledge.

*[The word is defined in SS 17 SS 57 Remark I. See Critique of Pure Reason, "Of the Conceptions of Pure

Reason" Section 1 2: "I understand by idea a necessary conception of reason, to which no corresponding

object can be discovered in the world of sense." (Ibid., Section 2.) "They contain a certain perfection,

attainable by no possible empirical cognition; and they give to reason a systematic unity, to which the unity

of experience attempts to approximate, but can never completely attain." (Ibid., "Ideal of Pure Reason").

Properly, therefore, it was understanding which, so far as it contains constitutive a priori cognitive principles,

has its special realm, and one, moreover, in our faculty of knowledge that the Critique, called in a general

way that of pure reason was intended to establish in secure but particular possession against all other

competitors. In the same way reason, which contains constitutive a priori principles solely in respect of the

faculty of desire, gets its holding assigned to it by The Critique of Practical Reason.

But now comes judgement, which in the order of our cognitive faculties forms a middle term between

understanding and reason. Has it also got independent a priori principles? If so, are they constitutive, or are

they merely regulative, thus indicating no special realm? And do they give a rule a priori to the feeling of

pleasure and displeasure, as the middle term between the faculties of cognition and desire, just as

understanding prescribes laws a priori for the former and reason for the latter? This is the topic to which the

A critique of pure reason, i.e., of our faculty of judging on a priori principles, would be incomplete if the

critical examination of judgement, which is a faculty of knowledge, and as such lays claim to independent

principles, were not dealt with separately. Still, however, its principles cannot, in a system of pure

philosophy, form a separate constituent part intermediate between the theoretical and practical divisions, but

may when needful be annexed to one or other as occasion requires. For if such a system is some day worked

out under the general name of metaphysicand its full and complete execution is both possible and of the

utmost importance for the employment of reason in all departments of its activitythe critical examination of

the ground for this edifice must have been previously carried down to the very depths of the foundations of

the faculty of principles independent of experience, lest in some quarter it might give way, and sinking,

We may readily gather, however, from the nature of the faculty of judgement (whose correct employment is

so necessary and universally requisite that it is just this faculty that is intended when we speak of sound

understanding) that the discovery of a peculiar principle belonging to itand some such it must contain in

itself a priori, for otherwise it would not be a cognitive faculty the distinctive character of which is obvious to

the most commonplace criticismmust be a task involving considerable difficulties. For this principle is one

which must not be derived from a priori concepts, seeing that these are the property of understanding, and

judgement is only directed to their application. It has, therefore, itself to furnish a concept, and one from

which, properly, we get no cognition of a thing, but which it can itself employ as a rule onlybut not as an

objective rule to which it can adapt its judgement, because, for that, another faculty of judgement would

again be required to enable us to decide whether the case was one for the application of the rule or not.

It is chiefly in those estimates that are called aesthetic, and which relate to the beautiful and sublime, whether

of nature or of art, that one meets with the above difficulty about a principle (be it subjective or objective).

And yet the critical search for a principle of judgement in their case is the most important item in a critique of

this faculty. For, although they do not of themselves contribute a whit to the knowledge of things, they still

belong wholly to the faculty of knowledge, and evidence an immediate bearing of this faculty upon the

feeling of pleasure or displeasure according to some a priori principle, and do so without confusing this

principle with what is capable of being a determining ground of the faculty of desire, for the latter has its

principles a priori in concepts of reason. Logical estimates of nature, however, stand on a different footing.

They deal with cases in which experience presents a conformity to law in things, which the understanding's

general concept of the sensible is no longer adequate to render intelligible or explicable, and in which

judgement may have recourse to itself for a principle of the reference of the natural thing to the unknowable

supersensible and, indeed, must employ some such principle, though with a regard only to itself and the

knowledge of nature. For in these cases the application of such an a priori principle for the cognition of what

is in the world is both possible and necessary, and withal opens out prospects which are profitable for

practical reason. But here there is no immediate reference to the feeling of pleasure or displeasure. But this is

precisely the riddle in the principle of judgement that necessitates a separate division for this faculty in the

critiquefor there was nothing to prevent the formation of logical estimates according to concepts (from

which no immediate conclusion can ever be drawn to the feeling of pleasure or displeasure) having been

treated, with a critical statement of its limitations, in an appendage to the theoretical part of philosophy.

The present investigation of taste, as a faculty of aesthetic judgement, not being undertaken with a view to the

formation or culture of taste (which will pursue its course in the future, as in the past, independently of such

inquiries), but being merely directed to its transcendental aspects, I feel assured of its indulgent criticism in

respect of any shortcomings on that score. But in all that is relevant to the transcendental aspect it must be

prepared to stand the test of the most rigorous examination. Yet even here I venture to hope that the difficulty

of unravelling a problem so involved in its nature may serve as an excuse for a certain amount of hardly

avoidable obscurity in its solution, provided that the accuracy of our statement of the principle is proved with

all requisite clearness. I admit that the mode of deriving the phenomena of judgement from that principle has

not all the lucidity that is rightly demanded elsewhere, where the subject is cognition by concepts, and that I

With this, then, I bring my entire critical undertaking to a close. I shall hasten to the doctrinal part, in order,

as far as possible, to snatch from my advancing years what time may yet be favourable to the task. It is

obvious that no separate division of doctrine is reserved for the faculty of judgement, seeing that, with

judgement, critique takes the place of theory; but, following the division of philosophy into theoretical and

practical, and of pure philosophy in the same way, the whole ground will be covered by the metaphysics of

Philosophy may be said to contain the principles of the rational cognition that concepts afford us of things

(not merely, as with logic, the principles of the form of thought in general irrespective of the objects), and,

thus interpreted, the course, usually adopted, of dividing it into theoretical and practical is perfectly sound.

But this makes imperative a specific distinction on the part of the concepts by which the principles of this

rational cognition get their object assigned to them, for if the concepts are not distinct they fail to justify a

division, which always presupposes that the principles belonging to the rational cognition of the several parts

Now there are but two kinds of concepts, and these yield a corresponding number of distinct principles of the

possibility of their objects. The concepts referred to are those of nature and that of freedom. By the first of

these, a theoretical cognition from a priori principles becomes possible. In respect of such cognition,

however, the second, by its very concept, imports no more than a negative principle (that of simple

antithesis), while for the determination of the will, on the other hand, it establishes fundamental principles

which enlarge the scope of its activity, and which on that account are called practical. Hence the division of

philosophy falls properly into two parts, quite distinct in their principlesa theoretical, as philosophy of

nature, and a practical, as philosophy of morals (for this is what the practical legislation of reason by the

concept of freedom is called). Hitherto, however, in the application of these expressions to the division of the

different principles, and with them to the division of philosophy, a gross misuse of the terms has prevailed;

for what is practical according to concepts of nature bas been taken as identical with what is practical

according to the concept of freedom, with the result that a division has been made under these heads of

theoretical and practical, by which, in effect, there has been no division at all (seeing that both parts might

The willfor this is what is saidis the faculty of desire and, as such, is just one of the many natural causes in

the world, the one, namely, which acts by concepts; and whatever is represented as possible (or necessary)

through the efficacy of will is called practically possible (or necessary): the intention being to distinguish its

possibility (or necessity) from the physical possibility or necessity of an effect the causality of whose cause is

not determined to its production by concepts (but rather, as with lifeless matter, by mechanism, and, as with

the lower animals, by instinct). Now, the question in respect of the practical faculty: whether, that is to say,

the concept, by which the causality of the will gets its rule, is a concept of nature or of freedom, is here left

The latter distinction, however, is essential. For, let the concept determining the causality be a concept of

nature, and then the principles are technicallypractical; but, let it be a concept of freedom, and they are

morallypractical. Now, in the division of a rational science the difference between objects that require

different principles for their cognition is the difference on which everything turns. Hence

technicallypractical principles belong to theoretical philosophy (natural science), whereas those

morallypractical alone form the second part, that is, practical philosophy (ethical science).

All technicallypractical rules (i.e., those of art and skill generally, or even of prudence, as a skill in

exercising an influence over men and their wills) must, so far as their principles rest upon concepts, be

reckoned only as corollaries to theoretical philosophy. For they only touch the possibility of things according

to concepts of nature, and this embraces, not alone the means discoverable in nature for the purpose, but even

the will itself (as a faculty of desire, and consequently a natural faculty), so far as it is determinable on these

rules by natural motives. Still these practical rules are not called laws (like physical laws), but only precepts.

This is due to the fact that the will does not stand simply under the natural concept, but also under the concept

of freedom. In the latter connection its principles are called laws, and these principles, with the addition of

The solution of the problems of pure geometry is not allocated to a special part of that science, nor does the

art of landsurveying merit the name of practical, in contradistinction to pure, as a second part of the general

science of geometry, and with equally little, or perhaps less, right can the mechanical or chemical art of

experiment or of observation be ranked as a practical part of the science of nature, or, in fine, domestic,

agricultural, or political economy, the art of social intercourse, the principles of dietetics, or even general

instruction as to the attainment of happiness, or as much as the control of the inclinations or the restraining of

the affections with a view thereto, be denominated practical philosophynot to mention forming these latter

in a second part of philosophy in general. For, between them all, the above contain nothing more than rules of

skill, which are thus only technically practicalthe skill being directed to producing an effect which is

possible according to natural concepts of causes and effects. As these concepts belong to theoretical

philosophy, they are subject to those precepts as mere corollaries of theoretical philosophy (i.e., as corollaries

of natural science), and so cannot claim any place in any special philosophy called practical. On the other

hand, the morally practical precepts, which are founded entirely on the concept of freedom, to the complete

exclusion of grounds taken from nature for the determination of the will, form quite a special kind of

precepts. These, too, like the rules obeyed by nature, are, without qualification, called lawsthough they do

not, like the latter, rest on sensible conditions, but upon a supersensible principleand they must needs have a

separate part of philosophy allotted to them as their own, corresponding to the theoretical part, and termed

Hence it is evident that a complex of practical precepts furnished by philosophy does not form a special part

of philosophy, coordinate with the theoretical, by reason of its precepts being practicalfor that they might

be, notwithstanding that their principles were derived wholly from the theoretical knowledge of nature (as

technicallypractical rules). But an adequate reason only exists where their principle, being in no way

borrowed from the concept of nature, which is always sensibly conditioned, rests consequently on the

supersensible, which the concept of freedom alone makes cognizable by means of its formal laws, and where,

therefore, they are morallypractical, i. e., not merely precepts and its and rules in this or that interest, but

The employment of our faculty of cognition from principles, and with it philosophy, is coextensive with the

Now a division of the complex of all the objects to which those concepts are referred for the purpose, where

possible, of compassing their knowledge, may be made according to the varied competence or incompetence

Concepts, so far as they are referred to objects apart from the question of whether knowledge of them is

possible or not, have their field, which is determined simply by the relation in which their object stands to our

faculty of cognition in general. The part of this field in which knowledge is possible for us is a territory

(territorium) for these concepts and the requisite cognitive faculty. The part of the territory over which they

exercise legislative authority is the realm (ditio) of these concepts, and their appropriate cognitive faculty.

Empirical concepts have, therefore, their territory, doubtless, in nature as the complex of all sensible objects,

but they have no realm (only a dwellingplace, domicilium), for, although they are formed according to law,

they are not themselves legislative, but the rules founded on them are empirical and, consequently,

Our entire faculty of cognition has two realms, that of natural concepts and that of the concept of freedom, for

through both it prescribes laws a priori. In accordance with this distinction, then, philosophy is divisible into

theoretical and practical. But the territory upon which its realm is established, and over which it exercises its

legislative authority, is still always confined to the complex of the objects of all possible experience, taken as

no more than mere phenomena, for otherwise legislation by the understanding in respect of them is

The function of prescribing laws by means of concepts of nature is discharged by understanding and is

theoretical. That of prescribing laws by means of the concept of freedom is discharged by reason and is

merely practical. It is only in the practical sphere that reason can prescribe laws; in respect of theoretical

knowledge (of nature) it can only (as by the understanding advised in the law) deduce from given logical

consequences, which still always remain restricted to nature. But we cannot reverse this and say that where

rules are practical reason is then and there legislative, since the rules might be technically practical.

Understanding and reason, therefore, have two distinct jurisdictions over one and the same territory of

experience. But neither can interfere with the other. For the concept of freedom just as little disturbs the

legislation of nature, as the concept of nature influences legislation through the concept of freedom. That it is

possible for us at least to think without contradiction of both these jurisdictions, and their appropriate

faculties, as coexisting in the same subject, was shown by the Critique of Pure Reason, since it disposed of

Still, how does it happen that these two different realms do not form one realm, seeing that, while they do not

limit each other in their legislation, they continually do so in their effects in the sensible world? The

explanation lies in the fact that the concept of nature represents its objects in intuition doubtless, yet not as

things inthemselves, but as mere phenomena, whereas the concept of freedom represents in its object what

is no doubt a thinginitself, but it does not make it intuitable, and further that neither the one nor the other is

capable, therefore, of furnishing a theoretical cognition of its object (or even of the thinking subject) as a

thinginitself, or, as this would be, of the supersensible idea of which has certainly to be introduced as the

basis of the possibility of all those objects of experience, although it cannot itself ever be elevated or

Our entire cognitive faculty is, therefore, presented with an unbounded, but, also, inaccessible fieldthe field

of the supersensiblein which we seek in vain for a territory, and on which, therefore, we can have no realm

for theoretical cognition, be it for concepts of understanding or of reason. This field we must indeed occupy

with ideas in the interest as well of the theoretical as the practical employment of reason, but, in connection

with the laws arising from the concept of freedom, we cannot procure for these ideas any but practical reality,

which, accordingly, fails to advance our theoretical cognition one step towards the supersensible.

Albeit, then, between the realm of the natural concept, as the sensible, and the realm of the concept of

freedom, as the supersensible, there is a great gulf fixed, so that it is not possible to pass from the to the latter

(by means of the theoretical employment of reason), just as if they were so many separate worlds, the first of

which is powerless to exercise influence on the second: still the latter is meant to influence the formerthat is

to say, the concept of freedom is meant to actualize in the sensible world the end proposed by its laws; and

nature must consequently also be capable of being regarded in such a way that in the conformity to law of its

form it at least harmonizes with the possibility of the ends to be effectuated in it according to the laws of

freedom. There must, therefore, be a ground of the unity of the supersensible that lies at the basis of nature,

with what the concept of freedom contains in a practical way, and although the concept of this ground neither

theoretically nor practically attains to a knowledge of it, and so has no peculiar realm of its own, still it

renders possible the transition from the mode of thought according to the principles of the one to that

The critique which deals with what our cognitive faculties are capable of yielding a priori has properly

speaking no realm in respect of objects; for it is not a doctrine, its sole business being to investigate whether,

having regard to the general bearings of our faculties, a doctrine is possible by their means, and if so, how. Its

field extends to all their pretentions, with a view to confining them within their legitimate bounds. But what

is shut out of the division of philosophy may still be admitted as a principal part into the general critique of

our faculty of pure cognition, in the event, namely, of its containing principles which are not in themselves

III. The Critique of Judgement as a means of connecting the two Parts of Philosophy in a whole. 7

Concepts of nature contain the ground of all theoretical cognition a priori and rest, as we saw, upon the

legislative authority of understanding. The concept of freedom contains the ground of all sensuously

unconditioned practical precepts a priori, and rests upon that of reason. Both faculties, therefore, besides their

application in point of logical form to principles of whatever origin, have, in addition, their own peculiar

jurisdiction in the matter of their content, and so, there being no further (a priori) jurisdiction above them, the

But there is still further in the family of our higher cognitive faculties a middle term between understanding

and reason. This is judgement, of which we may reasonably presume by analogy that it may likewise contain,

if not a special authority to prescribe laws, still a principle peculiar to itself upon which laws are sought,

although one merely subjective a priori. This principle, even if it has no field of objects appropriate to it as its

realm, may still have some territory or other with a certain character, for which just this very principle alone

But in addition to the above considerations there is yet (to judge by analogy) a further ground, upon which

judgement may be brought into line with another arrangement of our powers of representation, and one that

appears to be of even greater importance than that of its kinship with the family of cognitive faculties. For all

faculties of the soul, or capacities, are reducible to three, which do not admit of any further derivation from a

common ground: the faculty of knowledge, the feeling of pleasure or displeasure, and the faculty of desire.*

For the faculty of cognition understanding alone is legislative, if (as must be the case where it is considered

on its own account free of confusion with the faculty of desire) this faculty, as that of theoretical cognition, is

referred to nature, in respect of which alone (as phenomenon) it is possible for us to prescribe laws by means

of a priori concepts of nature, which are properly pure concepts of understanding. For the faculty of desire, as

a higher faculty operating under the concept of freedom, only reason (in which alone this concept has a place)

prescribes laws a priori. Now between the faculties of knowledge and desire stands the feeling of pleasure,

just as judgement is intermediate between understanding and reason. Hence we may, provisionally at least,

assume that judgement likewise contains an a priori principle of its own, and that, since pleasure or

displeasure is necessarily combined with the faculty of desire (be it antecedent to its principle, as with the

lower desires, or, as with the higher, only supervening upon its determination by the moral law), it will effect

a transition from the faculty of pure knowledge, i.e., from the realm of concepts of nature, to that of the

concept of freedom, just as i its logical employment it makes possible the transition from understanding to

*Where one has reason to suppose that a relation subsists between concepts that are used as empirical

principles and the faculty of pure cognition a priori, it is worth while attempting, in consideration of this

connection, to give them a transcendental definitiona definition, that is, by pure categories, so far as these

by themselves adequately indicate the distinction of the concept in question from others. This course follows

that of the mathematician, who leaves the empirical data of his problem indeterminate, and only brings their

relation in pure synthesis under the concepts of pure arithmetic, and thus generalizes his solution.I have

been taken to task for adopting a similar procedure and fault had been found with my definition of the faculty

of desire as a faculty which by means of its representations is the cause of the cause of the actuality of the

objects of those representations: for mere wishes would still be desires, and yet in their case every one is

ready to abandon all claim to being able by means of them alone to call their object into existence. But this

proves no more than the presence of desires in man by which he is in contradiction with himself. For in such

a case he seeks the production of the object by means of his representation alone, without any hope of its

being effectual, since he is conscious that his mechanical powers (if I may so call those which are not

psychological), which would have to be determined by that representation, are either unequal to the task of

realizing the object (by the intervention of means, therefore) or else are addressed to what is quite impossible,

as, for example, to undo the past (O mihi praeteritos, etc.) or, to be able to annihilate the interval that, with

III. The Critique of Judgement as a means of connecting the two Parts of Philosophy in a whole. 8

intolerable delay, divides us from the wished for moment. Now, conscious as we are in such fantastic

desires of the inefficiency of our representations (or even of their futility), as causes of their objects, there is

still involved in every wish a reference of the same as cause, and therefore the representation of its causality,

and this is especially discernible where the wish, as longing, is an affection. For such affections, since they

dilate the heart and render it inert and thus exhaust its powers, show that a strain is kept on being exerted and

reexerted on these powers by the representations, but that the mind is allowed continually to relapse and get

languid upon recognition of the impossibility before it. Even prayers for the aversion of great, and, so far as

we can see, inevitable evils, and many superstitious means for attaining ends impossible of attainment by

natural means, prove the causal reference of representations to their objectsa causality which not even the

consciousness of inefficiency for producing the effect can deter from straining towards it. But why our nature

should be furnished with a propensity to consciously vain desires is a teleological problem of anthropology. It

would seem that were we not to be determined to the exertion of our power before we had assured ourselves

of the efficiency of our faculty for producing an object, our power would remain to a large extent unused. For

as a rule we only first learn to know our powers by making trial of them. This deceit of vain desires is

Hence, despite the fact of philosophy being only divisible into two principal parts, the theoretical and the

practical, and despite the fact of all that we may have to say of the special principles of judgement having to

be assigned to its theoretical part, i.e., to rational cognition according to concepts of nature: still the Critique

of Pure Reason, which must settle this whole question before the above system is taken in hand, so as to

substantiate its possibility, consists of three parts: the Critique of pure understanding, of pure judgement, and

of pure reason, which faculties are called pure on the ground of their being legislative a priori.

Judgement in general is the faculty of thinking the particular as contained under the universal. If the universal

(the rule, principle, or law) is given, then the judgement which subsumes the particular under it is

determinant. This is so even where such a judgement is transcendental and, as such, provides the conditions a

priori in conformity with which alone subsumption under that universal can be effected. If, however, only the

particular is given and the universal has to be found for it, then the judgement is simply reflective.

The determinant judgement determines under universal transcendental laws furnished by understanding and

is subsumptive only; the law is marked out for it a priori, and it has no need to devise a law for its own

guidance to enable it to subordinate the particular in nature to the universal. But there are such manifold

forms of nature, so many modifications, as it were, of the universal transcendental concepts of nature, left

undetermined by the laws furnished by pure understanding a priori as above mentioned, and for the reason

that these laws only touch the general possibility of a nature (as an object of sense), that there must needs also

be laws in this behalf. These laws, being empirical, may be contingent as far as the light of our understanding

goes, but still, if they are to be called laws (as the concept of a nature requires), they must be regarded as

necessary on a principle, unknown though it be to us, of the unity of the manifold. The reflective judgement

which is compelled to ascend from the particular in nature to the universal stands, therefore, in need of a

principle. This principle it cannot borrow from experience, because what it has to do is to establish just the

unity of all empirical principles under higher, though likewise empirical, principles, and thence the possibility

of the systematic subordination of higher and lower. Such a transcendental principle, therefore, the reflective

judgement can only give as a law from and to itself. It cannot derive it from any other quarter (as it would

then be a determinant judgement). Nor can it prescribe it to nature, for reflection on the laws of nature adjusts

itself to nature, and not nature to the conditions according to which we strive to obtain a concept of ita

Now the principle sought can only be this: as universal laws of nature have their ground in our understanding,

which prescribes them to nature (though only according to the universal concept of it as nature), particular

empirical laws must be regarded, in respect of that which is left undetermined in them by these universal

laws, according to a unity such as they would have if an understanding (though it be not ours) had supplied

them for the benefit of our cognitive faculties, so as to render possible a system of experience according to

particular natural laws. This is not to be taken as implying that such an understanding must be actually

assumed (for it is only the reflective judgement which avails itself of this idea as a principle for the purpose

of reflection and not for determining anything); but this faculty rather gives by this means a law to itself alone

Now the concept of an object, so far as it contains at the same time the ground of the actuality of this object,

is called its end, and the agreement of a thing with that constitution of things which is only possible according

to ends, is called the finality of its form. Accordingly the principle of judgement, in respect of the form of the

things of nature under empirical laws generally, is the finality of nature in its multiplicity. In other words, by

this concept nature is represented as if an understanding contained the ground of the unity of the manifold of

The finality of nature is, therefore, a particular a priori concept, which bas its origin solely in the reflective

judgement. For we cannot ascribe to the products of nature anything like a reference of nature in them to

ends, but we can only make use of this concept to reflect upon them in respect of the nexus of phenomena in

naturea nexus given according to empirical laws. Furthermore, this concept is entirely different from

practical finality (in human art or even morals), though it is doubtless thought after this analogy.

A transcendental principle is one through which we represent a priori the universal condition under which

alone things can become objects of our cognition generally. A principle, on the other band, is called

metaphysical where it represents a priori the condition under which alone objects whose concept has to be

given empirically may become further determined a priori. Thus the principle of the cognition of bodies as

substances, and as changeable substances, is transcendental where the statement is that their change must

have a cause: but it is metaphysical where it asserts that their change must have an external cause. For, in the

first case, bodies need only be thought through ontological predicates (pure concepts of understanding) e.g.,

as substance, to enable the proposition to be cognized a priori; whereas, in the second case, the empirical

concept of a body (as a movable thing in space) must be introduced to support the proposition, although, once

this is done, it may be seen quite a priori that the latter predicate (movement only by means of an external

cause) applies to body. In this way, as I shall show presently, the principle of the finality of nature (in the

multiplicity of its empirical laws) is a transcendental principle. For the concept of objects, regarded as

standing under this principle, is only the pure concept of objects of possible empirical cognition generally,

and involves nothing empirical. On the other band, the principle of practical finality, implied in the idea of

the determination of a free will, would be a metaphysical principle, because the concept of a faculty of desire,

as will, has to be given empirically, i.e., is not included among transcendental predicates. But both these

principles are, none the less, not empirical, but a priori principles; because no further experience is required

for the synthesis of the predicate with the empirical concept of the subject of their judgements, but it may be

That the concept of a finality of nature belongs to transcendental principles is abundantly evident from the

maxims of judgement upon which we rely a priori in the investigation of nature, and which yet have to do

with no more than the possibility of experience, and consequently of the knowledge of naturebut of nature

not merely in a general way, but as determined by a manifold of particular laws. These maxims crop up

frequently enough in the course of this science, though only in a scattered way. They are aphorisms of

metaphysical wisdom, making their appearance in a number of rules the necessity of which cannot be

V. The Principle of the formal finality of Nature is a transcendental Principle of Judgement. 10

demonstrated from concepts. "Nature takes the shortest way (lex parsimoniae); yet it makes no leap, either in

the sequence of its changes, or in the juxtaposition of specifically different forms (lex continui in natura); its

vast variety in empirical laws is for all that, unity under a few principles (principia praeter necessitatem non

If we propose to assign the origin of these elementary rules, and attempt to do so on psychological lines, we

go straight in the teeth of their sense. For they tell us, not what happens, i.e., according to what rule our

powers of judgement actually discharge their functions, and how we judge, but how we ought to judge; and

we cannot get this logical objective necessity where the principles are merely empirical. Hence the finality of

nature for our cognitive faculties and their employment, which manifestly radiates from them, is a

transcendental principle of judgements, and so needs also a transcendental deduction, by means of which the

ground for this mode of judging must be traced to the a priori sources of knowledge.

Now, looking at the grounds of the possibility of an experience, the first thing, of course, that meets us is

something necessarynamely, the universal laws apart from which nature in general (as an object of sense)

cannot be thought. These rest on the categories, applied to the formal conditions of all intuition possible for

us, so far as it is also given a priori. Under these laws, judgement is determinant; for it bas nothing else to do

than to subsume under given laws. For instance, understanding says: all change has its cause (universal law of

nature); transcendental judgement has nothing further to do than to furnish a priori the condition of

subsumption under the concept of understanding placed before it: this we get in the succession of the

determinations of one and the same thing. Now for nature in general, as an object of possible experience, that

law is cognized as absolutely necessary. But besides this formal timecondition, the objects of empirical

cognition are determined, or, so far as we can judge a priori, are determinable, in divers ways, so that

specifically differentiated natures, over and above what they have in common as things of nature in general,

are further capable of being causes in an infinite variety of ways; and each of these modes must, on the

concept of a cause in general, have its rule, which is a law, and, consequently, imports necessity: although

owing to the constitution and limitations of our faculties of cognition we may entirely fail to see this

necessity. Accordingly, in respect of nature's merely empirical laws, we must think in nature a possibility of

an endless multiplicity of empirical laws, which yet are contingent so far as our insight goes, i.e., cannot be

cognized a priori. In respect of these we estimate the unity of nature according to empirical laws, and the

possibility of the unity of experience, as a system according to empirical laws, to be contingent. But, now,

such a unity is one which must be necessarily presupposed and assumed, as otherwise we should not have a

thoroughgoing connection of empirical cognition in a whole of experience. For the universal laws of nature,

while providing, certainly, for such a connection among things generically, as things of nature in general, do

not do so for them specifically as such particular things of nature. Hence judgement is compelled, for its own

guidance, to adopt it as an a priori principle, that what is for human insight contingent in the particular

(empirical) laws of nature contains nevertheless unity of law in the synthesis of its manifold in an

intrinsically possible experienceunfathomable, though still thinkable, as such unity may, no doubt, be for us.

Consequently, as the unity of law in a synthesis, which is cognized by us in obedience to a necessary aim (a

need of understanding), though recognized at the same time as contingent, is represented as a finality of

objects (here of nature), so judgement, which, in respect of things under possible (yet to be discovered)

empirical laws, is merely reflective, must regard nature in respect of the latter according to a principle of

finality for our cognitive faculty, which then finds expression in the above maxims of judgement. Now this

transcendental concept of a finality of nature is neither a concept of nature nor of freedom, since it attributes

nothing at all to the object, i.e., to nature, but only represents the unique mode in which we must proceed in

our reflection upon the objects of nature with a view to getting a thoroughly interconnected whole of

experience, and so is a subjective principle, i.e., maxim, of judgement. For this reason, too, just as if it were a

lucky chance that favoured us, we are rejoiced (properly speaking, relieved of a want) where we meet with

such systematic unity under merely empirical laws: although we must necessarily assume the presence of

such a unity, apart from any ability on our part to apprehend or prove its existence.

V. The Principle of the formal finality of Nature is a transcendental Principle of Judgement. 11

In order to convince ourselves of the correctness of this deduction of the concept before us, and the necessity

of assuming it as a transcendental principle of cognition, let us just bethink ourselves of the magnitude of the

task. We have to form a connected experience from given perceptions of a nature containing a maybe endless

multiplicity of empirical laws, and this problem has its seat a priori in our understanding. This understanding

is no doubt a priori in possession of universal laws of nature, apart from which nature would be incapable of

being an object of experience at all. But over and above this it needs a certain order of nature in its particular

rules which are only capable of being brought to its knowledge empirically, and which, so far as it is

concerned are contingent. These rules, without which we would have no means of advance from the universal

analogy of a possible experience in general to a particular, must be regarded by understanding as laws, i.e., as

necessaryfor otherwise they would not form an order of naturethough it be unable to cognize or ever get an

insight into their necessity. Albeit, then, it can determine nothing a priori in respect of these (objects), it must,

in pursuit of such empirical socalled laws, lay at the basis of all reflection upon them an a priori principle, to

the effect, namely, that a cognizable order of nature is possible according to them. A principle of this kind is

expressed in the following propositions. There is in nature a subordination of genera and species

comprehensible by us: Each of these genera again approximates to the others on a common principle, so that

a transition may be possible from one to the other, and thereby to a higher genus: While it seems at outset

unavoidable for our understanding to assume for the specific variety of natural operations a like number of

various kinds of causality, yet these may all be reduced to a small number of principles, the quest for which is

our business; and so forth. This adaptation of nature to our cognitive faculties is presupposed a priori by

judgement on behalf of its reflection upon it according to empirical laws. But understanding all the while

recognizes it objectively as contingent, and it is merely judgement that attributes it to nature as transcendental

finality, i.e., a finality in respect of the subject's faculty of cognition. For, were it not for this presupposition,

we should have no order of nature in accordance with empirical laws, and, consequently, no guidingthread

for an experience that has to be brought to bear upon these in all their variety, or for an investigation of them.

For it is quite conceivable that, despite all the uniformity of the things of nature according to universal laws,

without which we would not have the form of general empirical knowledge at all, the specific variety of the

empirical laws of nature, with their effects, might still be so great as to make it impossible for our

understanding to discover in nature an intelligible order, to divide its products into genera and species so as to

avail ourselves of the principles of explanation and comprehension of one for explaining and interpreting

another, and out of material coming to hand in such confusion (properly speaking only infinitely multiform

and illadapted to our powerof apprehension) to make a consistent context of experience.

Thus judgement, also, is equipped with an a priori principle for the possibility of nature, but only in a

subjective respect. By means of this it prescribes a law, not to nature (as autonomy), but to itself (as

heautonomy), to guide its reflection upon nature. This law may be called the law of the specification of nature

in respect of its empirical laws. It is not one cognized a priori in nature, but judgement adopts it in the

interests of a natural order, cognizable by our understanding, in the division which it makes of nature's

universal laws when it seeks to subordinate to them a variety of particular laws. So when it is said that nature

specifies its universal laws on a principle of finality for our cognitive faculties, i.e., of suitability for the

human understanding and its necessary function of finding the universal for the particular presented to it by

perception, and again for varieties (which are, of course, common for each species) connection in the unity of

principle, we do not thereby either prescribe a law to nature, or learn one from it by observationalthough the

principle in question may be confirmed by this means. For it is not a principle of the determinant but merely

of the reflective judgement. All that is intended is that, no matter what is the order and disposition of nature

in respect of its universal laws, we must investigate its empirical laws throughout on that principle and the

maxims founded thereon, because only so far as that principle applies can we make any headway in the

V. The Principle of the formal finality of Nature is a transcendental Principle of Judgement. 12

The conceived harmony of nature in the manifold of its particular laws with our need of finding universality

of principles for it must, so far as our insight goes, be deemed contingent, but withal indispensable for the

requirements of our understanding, and, consequently, a finality by which nature is in accord with our aim,

but only so far as this is directed to knowledge. The universal laws of understanding, which are equally laws

of nature, are, although arising from spontaneity, just as necessary for nature as the laws of motion applicable

to matter. Their origin does not presuppose any regard to our cognitive faculties, seeing that it is only by their

means that we first come by any conception of the meaning of a knowledge of things (of nature), and they of

necessity apply to nature as object of our cognition in general. But it is contingent, so far as we can see, that

the order of nature in its particular laws, with their wealth of at least possible variety and heterogeneity

transcending all our powers of comprehension, should still in actual fact be commensurate with these powers.

To find out this order is an undertaking on the part of our understanding, which pursues it with a regard to a

necessary end of its own, that, namely, of introducing into nature unity of principle. This end must, then, be

attributed to nature by judgement, since no law can be here prescribed to it by understanding.

The attainment of every aim is coupled with a feeling of pleasure. Now where such attainment has for its

condition a representation a priorias here a principle for the reflective judgement in generalthe feeling of

pleasure also is determined by a ground which is a priori and valid for all men: and that, too, merely by virtue

of the reference of the object to our faculty of cognition. As the concept of finality here takes no cognizance

whatever of the faculty of desire, it differs entirely from all practical finality of nature.

As a matter of fact, we do not, and cannot, find in ourselves the slightest effect on the feeling of pleasure

from the coincidence of perceptions with the laws in accordance with the universal concepts of nature (the

categories), since in their case understanding necessarily follows the bent of its own nature without ulterior

aim. But, while this is so, the discovery, on the other hand, that two or more empirical heterogeneous laws of

nature are allied under one principle that embraces them both, is the ground of a very appreciable pleasure,

often even of admiration, and such, too, as does not wear off even though we are already familiar enough

with its object. It is true that we no longer notice any decided pleasure in the comprehensibility of nature, or

in the unity of its divisions into genera and species, without which the empirical concepts, that afford us our

knowledge of nature in its particular laws, would not be possible. Still it is certain that the pleasure appeared

in due course, and only by reason of the most ordinary experience being impossible without it, bas it become

gradually fused with simple cognition, and no longer arrests particular attention. Something, then, that makes

us attentive in our estimate of nature to its finality for our understandingan endeavour to bring, where

possible, its heterogeneous laws under higher, though still always empirical, lawsis required, in order that,

on meeting with success, pleasure may be felt in this their accord with our cognitive faculty, which accord is

regarded by us as purely contingent. As against this, a representation of nature would be altogether

displeasing to us, were we to be forewarned by it that, on the least investigation carried beyond the

commonest experience, we should come in contact with such a heterogeneity of its laws as would make the

union of its particular laws under universal empirical laws impossible for our understanding. For this would

conflict with the principle of the subjectively final specification of nature in its genera, and with our own

Yet this presupposition of judgement is so indeterminate on the question of the extent of the prevalence of

that ideal finality of nature for our cognitive faculties, that if we are told that a more searching or enlarged

knowledge of nature, derived from observation, must eventually bring us into contact with a multiplicity of

laws that no human understanding could reduce to a principle, we can reconcile ourselves to the thought. But

still we listen more gladly to others who hold out to us the hope that the more intimately we come to know

the secrets of nature, or the better we are able to compare it with external members as yet unknown to us, the

VI. The Association of the Feeling of Pleasure with the Concept of the Finality of Nature. 13

more simple shall we find it in its principles, and the further our experience advances the more harmonious

shall we find it in the apparent heterogeneity of its empirical laws. For our judgement makes it imperative

upon us to proceed on the principle of the conformity of nature to our faculty of cognition, so far as that

principle extends, without decidingfor the rule is not given to us by a determinant judgementwhether

bounds are anywhere set to it or not. For, while in respect of the rational employment of our cognitive

faculty, bounds may be definitely determined, in the empirical field no such determination of bounds is

That which is purely subjective in the representation of an object, i.e., what constitutes its reference to the

subject, not to the object, is its aesthetic quality. On the other hand, that which in such a representation

serves, or is available, for the determination of the object (for or purpose of knowledge), is its logical validity.

In the cognition of an object of sense, both sides are presented conjointly. In the senserepresentation of

external things, the quality of space in which we intuite them is the merely subjective side of my

representation of them (by which what the things are in themselves as objects is left quite open), and it is on

account of that reference that the object in being intuited in space is also thought merely as phenomenon. But

despite its purely subjective quality, space is still a constituent of the knowledge of things as phenomena.

Sensation (here external) also agrees in expressing a merely subjective side of our representations of external

things, but one which is properly their matter (through which we are given something with real existence),

just as space is the mere a priori form of the possibility of their intuition; and so sensation is, none the less,

But that subjective side of a representation which is incapable of becoming an element of cognition, is the

pleasure or displeasure connected with it; for through it I cognize nothing in the object of the representation,

although it may easily be the result of the operation of some cognition or other. Now the finality of a thing, so

far as represented in our perception of it, is in no way a quality of the object itself (for a quality of this kind is

not one that can be perceived), although it may be inferred from a cognition of things. In the finality,

therefore, which is prior to the cognition of an object, and which, even apart from any desire to make use of

the representation of it for the purpose of a cognition, is yet immediately connected with it, we have the

subjective quality belonging to it that is incapable of becoming a constituent of knowledge. Hence we only

apply the term final to the object on account of its representation being immediately coupled with the feeling

of pleasure: and this representation itself is an aesthetic representation of the finality. The only question is

If pleasure is connected with the mere apprehension (apprehensio) of the form of an object of intuition, apart

from any reference it may have to a concept for the purpose of a definite cognition, this does not make the

representation referable to the object, but solely to the subject. In such a case, the pleasure can express

nothing but the conformity of the object to the cognitive faculties brought into play in the reflective

judgement, and so far as they are in play, and hence merely a subjective formal finality of the object. For that

apprehension of forms in the imagination can never take place without the reflective judgement, even when it

has no intention of so doing, comparing them at least with its faculty of referring intuitions to concepts. If,

now, in this comparison, imagination (as the faculty of intuitions a priori) is undesignedly brought into accord

with understanding (as the faculty of concepts), by means of a given representation, and a feeling of pleasure

is thereby aroused, then the object must be regarded as final for the reflective judgement. A judgement of this

kind is an aesthetic judgement upon the finality of the object, which does not depend upon any present

concept of the object, and does not provide one. When the form of an object (as opposed to the matter of its

representation, as sensation) is, in the mere act of reflecting upon it, without regard to any concept to be

obtained from it, estimated as the ground of a pleasure in the representation of such an object, then this

pleasure is also judged to be combined necessarily with the representation of it, and so not merely for the

subject apprehending this form, but for all in general who pass judgement. The object is then called beautiful;

and the faculty of judging by means of such a pleasure (and so also with universal validity) is called taste. For

since the ground of the pleasure is made to reside merely in the form of the object for reflection generally,

consequently not in any sensation of the object, and without any reference, either, to any concept that might

have something or other in view, it is with the conformity to law in the empirical employment of judgement

generally (unity of imagination and understanding) in the subject, and with this alone, that the representation

of the object in reflection, the conditions of which are universally valid a priori, accords. And, as this

accordance of the object with the faculties of the subject is contingent, it gives rise to a representation of a

finality on the part of the object in respect of the cognitive faculties of the subject.

Here, now, is a pleasure whichas is the case with all pleasure or displeasure that is not brought about

through the agency of the concept of freedom (i.e., through the antecedent determination of the higher faculty

of desire by means of pure reason)no concepts could ever enable us to regard as necessarily connected with

the representation of an object. It must always be only through reflective perception that it is cognized as

conjoined with this representation. As with all empirical judgements, it is, consequently, unable to announce

objective necessity or lay claim to a priori validity. But, then, the judgement of taste in fact only lays claim,

like every other empirical judgement, to be valid for every one, and, despite its inner contingency this is

always possible. The only point that is strange or out of the way about it is that it is not an empirical concept,

but a feeling of pleasure (and so not a concept at all), that is yet exacted from every one by the judgement of

taste, just as if it were a predicate united to the cognition of the object, and that is meant to be conjoined with

A singular empirical judgement, as for example, the judgement of one who perceives a movable drop of

water in a rockcrystal, rightly looks to every one finding the fact as stated, since the judgement has been

formed according to the universal conditions of the determinant judgement under the laws of a possible

experience generally. In the same way, one who feels pleasure in simple reflection on the form of an object,

without having any concept in mind, rightly lays claim to the agreement of every one, although this

judgement is empirical and a singular judgement. For the ground of this pleasure is found in the universal,

though subjective, condition of reflective judgements, namely the final harmony of an object (be it a product

of nature or of art) with the mutual relation of the faculties of cognition (imagination and understanding),

which are requisite for every empirical cognition. The pleasure in judgements of taste is, therefore, dependent

doubtless on an empirical representation, and cannot be united a priori to any concept (one cannot determine

a priori what object will be in accordance with taste or notone must find out the object that is so); but then it

is only made the determining ground of this judgement by virtue of our consciousness of its resting simply

upon reflection and the universal, though only subjective, conditions of the harmony of that reflection with

This is why judgements of taste are subjected to a critique in respect of their possibility. For their possibility

presupposes an a priori principle, although that principle is neither a cognitive principle for understanding nor

Susceptibility to pleasure arising from reflection on the forms of things (whether of nature or of art) betokens,

however, not only a finality on the part of objects in their relation to the reflective judgement in the subject,

in accordance with the concept of nature, but also, conversely, a finality on the part of the subject, answering

to the concept of freedom, in respect of the form, or even formlessness of objects. The result is that the

aesthetic judgement refers not merely, as a judgement of taste, to the beautiful, but also, as springing from a

higher intellectual feeling, to the sublime. Hence the abovementioned Critique of Aesthetic judgement must

There are two ways in which finality may be represented in an object given in experience. It may be made to

turn on what is purely subjective. In this case the object is considered in respect of its form as present in

apprehension (apprehensio) prior to any concept; and the harmony of this form with the cognitive faculties,

promoting the combination of the intuition with concepts for cognition generally, is represented as a finality

of the form of the object. Or, on the other hand, the representation of finality may be made to turn on what is

objective, in which case it is represented as the harmony of the form of the object with the possibility of the

thing itself according to an antecedent concept of it containing the ground of this form. We have seen that the

representation of the former kind of finality rests on the pleasure immediately felt in mere reflection on the

form of the object. But that of the latter kind of finality, as it refers the form of the object, not to the subject's

cognitive faculties engaged in its apprehension, but to a definite cognition of the object under a given

concept, bas nothing to do with a feeling of pleasure in things, but only understanding and its estimate of

them. Where the concept of an object is given, the function of judgement, in its employment of that concept

for cognition, consists in presentation (exhibitio), i. e., in placing beside the concept an intuition

corresponding to it. Here it may be that our own imagination is the agent employed, as in the case of art,

where we realize a preconceived concept of an object which we set before ourselves as an end. Or the agent

may be nature in its technic (as in the case of organic bodies), when we read into it our own concept of an end

to assist our estimate of its product. In this case what is represented is not a mere finality of nature in the form

of the thing, but this very product as a natural end. Although our concept that nature, in its empirical laws, is

subjectively final in its forms is in no way a concept of the object, but only a principle of judgement for

providing itself with concepts in the vast multiplicity of nature, so that it may be able to take its bearings, yet,

on the analogy of an end, as it were a regard to our cognitive faculties is here attributed to nature. Natural

beauty may, therefore, be looked on as the presentation of the concept of formal, i. e., merely subjective,

finality and natural ends as the presentation of the concept of a real, i.e., objective, finality. The former of

these we estimate by taste (aesthetically by means of the feeling of pleasure), the latter by understanding and

On these considerations is based the division of the Critique of judgement into that of the aesthetic and the

teleological judgement. By the first is meant the faculty of estimating formal finality (otherwise called

subjective) by the feeling of pleasure or displeasure, by the second, the faculty of estimating the real finality

In a Critique of judgement the part dealing with aesthetic judgement is essentially relevant, as it alone

contains a principle introduced by judgement completely a priori as the basis of its reflection upon nature.

This is the principle of nature's formal finality for our cognitive faculties in its particular (empirical) lawsa

principle without which understanding could not feel itself at home in nature: whereas no reason is assignable

a priori, nor is so much as the possibility of one apparent from the concept of nature as an object of

experience, whether in its universal or in its particular aspects, why there should be objective ends of nature,

i. e., things only possible as natural ends. But it is only judgement that, without being itself possessed a priori

of a principle in that behalf, in actually occurring cases (of certain products) contains the rule for making use

of the concept of ends in the interest of reason, after that the above transcendental principle has already

prepared understanding to apply to nature the concept of an end (at least in respect of its form).

But the transcendental principle by which a finality of nature in its subjective reference to our cognitive

faculties, is represented in the form of a thing as a principle of its estimation, leaves quite undetermined the

question of where and in what cases we have to make our estimate of the object as a product according to a

principle of finality, instead of simply according to universal laws of nature. It resigns to the aesthetic

judgement the task of deciding the conformity of this product (in its form) to our cognitive faculties as a

question of taste (a matter which the aesthetic judgement decides, not by any harmony with concepts, but by

feeling). On the other hand, judgement as teleologically employed assigns the determinate conditions under

which something (e. g., an organized body) is to be estimated after the idea of an end of nature. But it can

adduce no principle from the concept of nature, as an object of experience, to give it its authority to ascribe a

priori to nature a reference to ends, or even only indeterminately to assume them from actual experience in

the case of such products. The reason of this is that, in order to be able merely empirically to cognize

objective finality in a certain object, many particular experiences must be collected and reviewed under the

unity of their principle. Aesthetic judgement is, therefore, a special faculty of estimating according to a rule,

but not according to concepts. The teleological is not a special faculty, but only general reflective judgement

proceeding, as it always does in theoretical cognition, according to concepts, but in respect of certain objects

of nature, following special principlesthose, namely, of a judgement that is merely reflective and does not

determine objects. Hence, as regards its application, it belongs to the theoretical part of philosophy, and on

account of its special principles, which are not determinant, as principles belonging to doctrine have to be, it

must also form a special part of the Critique. On the other hand, the aesthetic judgement contributes nothing

to the cognition of its objects. Hence it must only be allocated to the Critique of the judging subject and of its

faculties of knowledge so far as these are capable of possessing a priori principles, be their use (theoretical or

practical) otherwise what it maya Critique which is the propaedeutic of all philosophy.

Understanding prescribes laws a priori for nature as an object of sense, so that we may have a theoretical

knowledge of it in a possible experience. Reason prescribes laws a priori for freedom and its peculiar

causality as the supersensible in the subject, so that we may have a purely practical knowledge. The realm of

the concept of nature under the one legislation, and that of the concept of freedom under the other, are

completely cut off from all reciprocal influence, that they might severally (each according to its own

principles) exert upon the other, by the broad gulf that divides the supersensible from phenomena. The

concept of freedom determines nothing in respect of the theoretical cognition of nature; and the concept of

nature likewise nothing in respect of the practical laws of freedom. To that extent, then, it is not possible to

throw a bridge from the one realm to the other. Yet although the determining grounds of causality according

to the concept of freedom (and the practical rule that this contains) have no place in nature, and the sensible

cannot determine the supersensible in the subject; still the converse is possible (not, it is true, in respect of the

knowledge of nature, but of the consequences arising from the supersensible and bearing on the sensible). So

much indeed is implied in the concept of a causality by freedom, the operation of which, in conformity with

the formal laws of freedom, is to take effect in the word. The word cause, however, in its application to the

supersensible only signifies the ground that determines the causality of things of nature to an effect in

conformity with their appropriate natural laws, but at the same time also in unison with the formal principle

of the laws of reasona ground which, while its possibility is impenetrable, may still be completely cleared of

the charge of contradiction that it is alleged to involve.* The effect in accordance with the concept of freedom

is the final end which (or the manifestation of which in the sensible world) is to exist, and this presupposes

the condition of the possibility of that end in nature (i. e., in the nature of the subject as a being of the sensible

world, namely, as man). It is so presupposed a priori, and without regard to the practical, by judgement. This

faculty, with its concept of a finality of nature, provides us with the mediating concept between concepts of

nature and the concept of freedoma concept that makes possible the transition from the pure theoretical

[legislation of understanding] to the pure practical [legislation of reason] and from conformity to law in

accordance with the former to final ends according to the latter. For through that concept we cognize the

possibility of the final end that can only be actualized in nature and in harmony with its laws.

*One of the various supposed contradictions in this complete distinction of the causality of nature from that

through freedom is expressed in the objection that when I speak of hindrances opposed by nature to causality

according to laws of freedom (moral laws) or of assistance lent to it by nature, I am all the time admitting an

influence of the former upon the latter. But the misinterpretation is easily avoided, if attention is only paid to

IX. Joinder of the Legislations of Understanding and Reason by means of Judgement. 17

the meaning of the statement. The resistance or furtherance is not between nature and freedom, but between

the former as phenomenon and the effects of the latter as phenomena in the world of sense. Even the causality

of freedom (of pure and practical reason) is the causality of a natural cause subordinated to freedom (a

causality of the subject regarded as man, and consequently as a phenomenon), and one, the ground of whose

determination is contained in the intelligible, that is thought under freedom, in a manner that is not further or

otherwise explicable (just as in the case of that intelligible that forms the supersensible substrate of nature.)

Understanding, by the possibility of its supplying a priori laws for nature, furnishes a proof of the fact that

nature is cognized by us only as phenomenon, and in so doing points to its having a supersensible substrate;

but this substrate it leaves quite undetermined. judgement by the a priori principle of its estimation of nature

according to its possible particular laws provides this supersensible substrate (within as well as without us)

with determinability through the intellectual faculty. But reason gives determination to the same a priori by

its practical law. Thus judgement makes possible the transition from the realm of the concept of nature to that

In respect of the faculties of the soul generally, regarded as higher faculties, i.e., as faculties containing an

autonomy, understanding is the one that contains the constitutive a priori principles for the faculty of

cognition (the theoretical knowledge of nature). The feeling pleasure and displeasure is provided for by the

judgement in its independence from concepts and from sensations that refer to the determination of the

faculty of desire and would thus be capable of being immediately practical. For the faculty of desire there is

reason, which is practical without mediation of any pleasure of whatsoever origin, and which determines for

it, as a higher faculty, the final end that is attended at the same time with pure intellectual delight in the

object. judgement's concept of a finality of nature falls, besides, under the head of natural concepts, but only

as a regulative principle of the cognitive facultiesalthough the aesthetic judgement on certain objects (of

nature or of art) which occasions that concept, is a constitutive principle in respect of the feeling of pleasure

or displeasure. The spontaneity in the play of the cognitive faculties whose harmonious accord contains the

ground of this pleasure, makes the concept in question, in its consequences, a suitable mediating link

connecting the realm of the concept of nature with that of the concept of freedom, as this accord at the same

time promotes the sensibility of the mind for or moral feeling. The following table may facilitate the review

*It has been thought somewhat suspicious that my divisions in pure philosophy should almost always come

out threefold. But it is due to the nature of the case. If a division is to be a priori it must be either analytic,

according to the law of contradictionand then it is always twofold (quodlibet ens est aut A aut non A)Or

else it is synthetic. If it is to be derived in the latter case from a priori concepts (not, as in mathematics, from

the a priori intuition corresponding to the concept), then, to meet the requirements of synthetic unity in

general, namely (1) a condition, (2) a conditioned, (3) the concept arising from the union of the conditioned

IX. Joinder of the Legislations of Understanding and Reason by means of Judgement. 18

FIRST PART CRITIQUE OF AESTHETIC JUDGEMENT SECTION I. ANALYTIC OF AESTHETIC JUDGEMENT. BOOK I. Analytic of the Beautiful. FIRST MOMENT. Of the Judgement of Taste*: Moment of Quality.

*The definition of taste here relied upon is that it is the faculty of estimating the beautiful. But the discovery

of what is required for calling an object beautiful must be reserved for the analysis of judgements of taste. In

my search for the moments to which attention is paid by this judgement in its reflection, I have followed the

guidance of the logical functions of judging (for a judgement of taste always involves a reference to

understanding). I have brought the moment of quality first under review, because this is what the aesthetic

If we wish to discern whether anything is beautiful or not, we do not refer the representation of it to the object

by means of understanding with a view to cognition, but by means of the imagination (acting perhaps in

conjunction with understanding) we refer the representation to the subject and its feeling of pleasure or

displeasure. The judgement of taste, therefore, is not a cognitive judgement, and so not logical, but is

aestheticwhich means that it is one whose determining ground cannot be other than subjective. Every

reference of representations is capable of being objective, even that of sensations (in which case it signifies

the real in an empirical representation). The one exception to this is the feeling of pleasure or displeasure.

This denotes nothing in the object, but is a feeling which the subject has of itself and of the manner in which

To apprehend a regular and appropriate building with one's cognitive faculties, be the mode of representation

clear or confused, is quite a different thing from being conscious of this representation with an accompanying

sensation of delight. Here the representation is referred wholly to the subject, and what is more to its feeling

of lifeunder the name of the feeling of pleasure or displeasureand this forms the basis of a quite separate

faculty of discriminating and estimating, that contributes nothing to knowledge. All it does is to compare the

given representation in the subject with the entire faculty of representations of which the mind is conscious in

the feeling of its state. Given representations in a judgement may be empirical, and so aesthetic; but the

judgement which is pronounced by their means is logical, provided it refers them to the object. Conversely,

be the given representations even rational, but referred in a judgement solely to the subject (to its feeling),

The delight which we connect with the representation of the real existence of an object is called interest. Such

a delight, therefore, always involves a reference to the faculty of desire, either as its determining ground, or

else as necessarily implicated with its determining ground. Now, where the question is whether something is

beautiful, we do not want to know, whether we, or any one else, are, or even could be, concerned in the real

existence of the thing, but rather what estimate we form of it on mere contemplation (intuition or reflection).

If any one asks me whether I consider that the palace I see before me is beautiful, I may, perhaps, reply that I

do not care for things of that sort that are merely made to be gaped at. Or I may reply in the same strain as

that Iroquois sachem who said that nothing in Paris pleased him better than the eatinghouses. I may even go

a step further and inveigh with the vigour of a Rousseau against the vigour of a great against the vanity of the

of the people on such superfluous things. Or, in fine, I may quite easily persuade myself that if I found myself

on an uninhabited island, without hope of ever again coming among men, and could conjure such a palace

into existence by a mere wish, I should still not trouble to do so, so long as I had a hut there that was

comfortable enough for me. All this may be admitted and approved; only it is not the point now at issue. All

one wants to know is whether the mere representation of the object is to my liking, no matter how indifferent

I may be to the real existence of the object of this representation. It is quite plain that in order to say that the

FIRST PART CRITIQUE OF AESTHETIC JUDGEMENT SECTION I. ANALYTIC OF AESTHETIC JUDGEMENT. BOOK I. Analytic of the Beautiful. FIRST MOMENT. Of the Judgement of Taste*: Moment of Quality. 19

object is beautiful, and to show that I have taste, everything turns on the meaning which I can give to this

representation, and not on any factor which makes me dependent on the real existence of the object. Every

one must allow that a judgement on the beautiful which is tinged with the slightest interest, is very partial and

not a pure judgement of taste. One must not be in the least prepossessed in favour of the real existence of the

thing, but must preserve complete indifference in this respect, in order to play the part of judge in matters of

This proposition, which is of the utmost importance, cannot be better explained than by contrasting the pure

disinterested* delight which appears in the judgement of taste with that allied to an interestespecially if we

can also assure ourselves that there are no other kinds of interest beyond those presently to be mentioned.

*A judgement upon an object of our delight may be wholly disinterested but withal very interesting, i.e., it

relies on no interest, but it produces one. Of this kind are all pure moral judgements. But, of themselves

judgements of taste do not even set up any interest whatsoever. Only in society is it interesting to have

That is agreeable which the senses find pleasing in sensation. This at once affords a convenient opportunity

for condemning and directing particular attention to a prevalent confusion of the double meaning of which

the word sensation is capable. All delight (as is said or thought) is itself sensation (of a pleasure).

Consequently everything that pleases, and for the very reason that it pleases, is agreeableand according to its

different degrees, or its relations to other agreeable sensations, is attractive, charming, delicious, enjoyable,

etc. But if this is conceded, then impressions of sense, which determine inclination, or principles of reason,

which determine the will, or mere contemplated forms of intuition, which determine judgement, are all on a

par in everything relevant to their effect upon the feeling of pleasure, for this would be agreeableness in the

sensation of one's state; and since, in the last resort, all the elaborate work of our faculties must issue in and

unite in the practical as its goal, we could credit our faculties with no other appreciation of things and the

worth of things, than that consisting in the gratification which they promise. How this is attained is in the end

immaterial; and, as the choice of the means is here the only thing that can make a difference, men might

indeed blame one another for folly or imprudence, but never for baseness or wickedness; for they are all, each

according to his own way of looking at things, pursuing one goal, which for each is the gratification in

When a modification of the feeling of pleasure or displeasure is termed sensation, this expression is given

quite a different meaning to that which it bears when I call the representation of a thing (through sense as a

receptivity pertaining to the faculty of knowledge) sensation. For in the latter case the representation is

referred to the object, but in the former it is referred solely to the subject and is not available for any

Now in the above definition the word sensation is used to denote an objective representation of sense; and, to

avoid continually running the risk of misinterpretation, we shall call that which must always remain purely

subjective, and is absolutely incapable of forming a representation of an object, by the familiar name of

feeling. The green colour of the meadows belongs to objective sensation, as the perception of an object of

sense; but its agreeableness to subjective sensation, by which no object is represented; i.e., to feeling, through

which the object is regarded as an object of delight (which involves no cognition of the object).

Now, that a judgement on an object by which its agreeableness is affirmed, expresses an interest in it, is

evident from the fact that through sensation it provokes a desire for similar objects, consequently the delight

presupposes, not the simple judgement about it, but the bearing its real existence has upon my state so far as

affected by such an object. Hence we do not merely say of the agreeable that it pleases, but that it gratifies. I

do not accord it a simple approval, but inclination is aroused by it, and where agreeableness is of the liveliest

type a judgement on the character of the object is so entirely out of place that those who are always intent

only on enjoyment (for that is the word used to denote intensity of gratification) would fain dispense with all

That is good which by means of reason commends itself by its mere concept. We call that good for something

which only pleases as a means; but that which pleases on its own account we call good in itself. In both cases

the concept of an end is implied, and consequently the relation of reason to (at least possible) willing, and

thus a delight in the existence of an object or action, i.e., some interest or other.

To deem something good, I must always know what sort of a thing the object is intended to be, i. e., I must

have a concept of it. That is not necessary to enable me to see beauty in a thing. Flowers, free patterns, lines

aimlessly intertwiningtechnically termed foliagehave no signification, depend upon no definite concept,

and yet please. Delight in the beautiful must depend upon the reflection on an object precursory to some (not

definitely determined) concept. It is thus also differentiated from the agreeable, which rests entirely upon

In many cases, no doubt, the agreeable and the good seem convertible terms. Thus it is commonly said that

all (especially lasting) gratification is of itself good; which is almost equivalent to saying that to be

permanently agreeable and to be good are identical. But it is readily apparent that this is merely a vicious

confusion of words, for the concepts appropriate to these expressions are far from interchangeable. The

agreeable, which, as such, represents the object solely in relation to sense, must in the first instance be

brought under principles of reason through the concept of an end, to be, as an object of will, called good. But

that the reference to delight is wholly different where what gratifies is at the same time called good, is evident

from the fact that with the good the question always is whether it is mediately or immediately good, i. e.,

useful or good in itself; whereas with the agreeable this point can never arise, since the word always means

Even in everyday parlance, a distinction is drawn between the agreeable and the good. We do not scruple to

say of a dish that stimulates the palate with spices and other condiments that it is agreeable owning all the

while that it is not good: because, while it immediately satisfies the senses, it is mediately displeasing, i. e., in

the eye of reason that looks ahead to the consequences. Even in our estimate of health, this same distinction

may be traced. To all that possess it, it is immediately agreeableat least negatively, i. e., as remoteness of all

bodily pains. But, if we are to say that it is good, we must further apply to reason to direct it to ends, that is,

we must regard it as a state that puts us in a congenial mood for all we have to do. Finally, in respect of

happiness every one believes that the greatest aggregate of the pleasures of life, taking duration as well as

number into account, merits the name of a true, nay even of the highest, good. But reason sets its face against

this too. Agreeableness is enjoyment. But if this is all that we are bent on, it would be foolish to be

scrupulous about the means that procure it for uswhether it be obtained passively by the bounty of nature or

actively and by the work of our own hands. But that there is any intrinsic worth in the real existence of a man

who merely lives for enjoyment, however busy he may be in this respect, even when in so doing he serves

othersall equally with himself intent only on enjoymentas an excellent means to that one end, and does so,

moreover, because through sympathy he shares all their gratificationsthis is a view to which reason will

never let itself be brought round. Only by what a man does heedless of enjoyment, in complete freedom, and

independently of what he can procure passively from the hand of nature, does be give to his existence, as the

real existence of a person, an absolute worth. Happiness, with all its plethora of pleasures, is far from being

*An obligation to enjoyment is a patent absurdity. And the same, then, must also be said of a supposed

obligation to actions that have merely enjoyment for their aim, no matter how spiritually this enjoyment may

be refined in thought (or embellished), and even if it be a mystical, socalled heavenly, enjoyment.

But, despite all this difference between the agreeable and the good, they both agree in being invariably

coupled with an interest in their object. This is true, not alone of the agreeable, SS 3, and of the mediately

good, i, e., the useful, which pleases as a means to some pleasure, but also of that which is good absolutely

and from every point of view, namely the moral good which carries with it the highest interest. For the good

is the object of will, i. e., of a rationally determined faculty of desire). But to will something, and to take a

Both the agreeable and the good involve a reference to the faculty of desire, and are thus attended, the former

with a delight pathologically conditioned (by stimuli), the latter with a pure practical delight. Such delight is

determined not merely by the representation of the object, but also by the represented bond of connection

between the subject and the real existence of the object. It is not merely the object, but also its real existence,

that pleases. On the other hand, the judgement of taste is simply contemplative, i. e., it is a judgement which

is indifferent as to the existence of an object, and only decides how its character stands with the feeling of

pleasure and displeasure. But not even is this contemplation itself directed to concepts; for the judgement of

taste is not a cognitive judgement (neither a theoretical one nor a practical), and hence, also, is not grounded

The agreeable, the beautiful, and the good thus denote three different relations of representations to the

feeling of pleasure and displeasure, as a feeling in respect of which we distinguish different objects or modes

of representation. Also, the corresponding expressions which indicate our satisfaction in them are different

The agreeable is what GRATIFIES a man; the beautiful what simply PLEASES him; the good what is

ESTEEMED (approved), i.e., that on which he sets an objective worth. Agreeableness is a significant factor

even with irrational animals; beauty has purport and significance only for human beings, i.e., for beings at

once animal and rational (but not merely for them as rationalintelligent beingsbut only for them as at once

animal and rational); whereas the good is good for every rational being in generala proposition which can

only receive its complete justification and explanation in the sequel. Of all these three kinds of delight, that of

taste in the beautiful may be said to be the one and only disinterested and free delight; for, with it, no interest,

whether of sense or reason, extorts approval. And so we may say that delight, in the three cases mentioned, is

related to inclination, to favour, or to respect. For FAVOUR is the only free liking. An object of inclination,

and one which a law of reason imposes upon our desire, leaves us no freedom to turn anything into an object

of pleasure. All interest presupposes a want, or calls one forth; and, being a ground determining approval,

So far as the interest of inclination in the case of the agreeable goes, every one says "Hunger is the best sauce;

and people with a healthy appetite relish everything, so long as it is something they can eat." Such delight,

consequently, gives no indication of taste having anything to say to the choice. Only when men have got all

they want can we tell who among the crowd has taste or not. Similarly there may be correct habits (conduct)

without virtue, politeness without goodwill, propriety without honour, etc. For where the moral law dictates,

there is, objectively, no room left for free choice as to what one has to do; and to show taste in the way one

carries out these dictates, or in estimating the way others do so, is a totally different matter from displaying

the moral frame of one's mind. For the latter involves a command and produces a need of something, whereas

moral taste only plays with the objects of delight without devoting itself sincerely to any.

Taste is the faculty of estimating an object or a mode of representation by means of a delight or aversion

This definition of the beautiful is deducible from the foregoing definition of it as an object of delight apart

from any interest. For where any one is conscious that his delight in an object is with him independent of

interest, it is inevitable that he should look on the object as one containing a ground of delight for all men.

For, since the delight is not based on any inclination of the subject (or on any other deliberate interest), but

the subject feels himself completely free in respect of the liking which he accords to the object, he can find as

reason for his delight no personal conditions to which his own subjective self might alone be party. Hence he

must regard it as resting on what he may also presuppose in every other person; and therefore he must believe

that he has reason for demanding a similar delight from every one. Accordingly he will speak of the beautiful

as if beauty were a quality of the object and the judgement logical (forming a cognition of the object by

concepts of it); although it is only aesthetic, and contains merely a reference of the representation of the

object to the subject; because it still bears this resemblance to the logical judgement, that it may be

presupposed to be valid for all men. But this universality cannot spring from concepts. For from concepts

there is no transition to the feeling of pleasure or displeasure (save in the case of pure practical laws, which,

however, carry an interest with them; and such an interest does not attach to the pure judgement of taste). The

result is that the judgement of taste, with its attendant consciousness of detachment from all interest, must

involve a claim to validity for all men, and must do so apart from universality attached to objects, i.e., there

As regards the agreeable, every one concedes that his judgement, which he bases on a private feeling, and in

which he declares that an object pleases him, is restricted merely to himself personally. Thus he does not take

it amiss if, when he says that Canarywine is agreeable, another corrects the expression and reminds him that

he ought to say: "It is agreeable to me." This applies not only to the taste of the tongue, the palate, and the

throat, but to what may with any one be agreeable to eye or ear. A violet colour is to one soft and lovely: to

another dull and faded. One man likes the tone of wind instruments, another prefers that of string instruments.

To quarrel over such points with the idea of condemning another's judgement as incorrect when it differs

from our own, as if the opposition between the two judgements were logical, would be folly. With the

agreeable, therefore, the axiom holds good: Every one has his own taste (that of sense).

The beautiful stands on quite a different footing. It would, on the contrary, be ridiculous if any one who

plumed himself on his taste were to think of justifying himself by saying: "This object (the building we see,

the dress that person has on, the concert we hear, the poem submitted to our criticism) is beautiful for me."

For if it merely pleases him, be must not call it beautiful. Many things may for him possess charm and

agreeablenessno one cares about that; but when he puts a thing on a pedestal and calls it beautiful, he

demands the same delight from others. He judges not merely for himself, but for all men, and then speaks of

beauty as if it were a property of things. Thus he says the thing is beautiful; and it is not as if he counted on

others agreeing in his judgement of liking owing to his having found them in such agreement on a number of

occasions, but he demands this agreement of them. He blames them if they judge differently, and denies them

taste, which he still requires of them as something they ought to have; and to this extent it is not open to men

to say: "Every one has his own taste." This would be equivalent to saying that there is no such thing at all as

SS 6. The beautiful is that which, apart from concepts, is represented as the Object of a universal delight. 23

taste, i. e., no aesthetic judgement capable of making a rightful claim upon the assent of all men.

Yet even in the case of the agreeable, we find that the estimates men form do betray a prevalent agreement

among them, which leads to our crediting some with taste and denying it to others, and that, too, not as an

organic sense but as a critical faculty in respect of the agreeable generally. So of one who knows how to

entertain his guests with pleasures (of enjoyment through all the senses) in such a way that one and all are

pleased, we say that he has taste. But the universality here is only understood in a comparative sense; and the

rules that apply are, like all empirical rules, general only, not universal, the latter being what the judgement of

taste upon the beautiful deals or claims to deal in. It is a judgement in respect of sociability so far as resting

on empirical rules. In respect of the good, it is true that judgements also rightly assert a claim to validity for

every one; but the good is only represented as an object of universal delight by means of a concept, which is

This particular form of the universality of an aesthetic judgement, which is to be met in a judgement of taste,

is a significant feature, not for the logician certainly, but for the transcendental philosopher. It calls for no

small effort on his part to discover its origin, but in return it brings to light a property of our cognitive faculty

First, one must get firmly into one's mind that by the judgement of taste (upon the beautiful) the delight in an

object is imputed to every one, yet without being founded on a concept (for then it would be the good), and

that this claim to universality is such an essential factor of a judgement by which we describe anything as

beautiful, that were it not for its being present to the mind it would never enter into any one's head to use this

expression, but everything that pleased without a concept would be ranked as agreeable. For in respect of the

agreeable, every one is allowed to have his own opinion, and no one insists upon others agreeing with his

judgement of taste, which is what is invariably done in the judgement of taste about beauty. The first of these

I may call the taste of sense, the second, the taste of reflection: the first laying down judgements merely

private, the second, on the other hand, judgements ostensibly of general validity (public), but both alike being

aesthetic (not practical) judgements about an object merely in respect of the bearings of its representation on

the feeling of pleasure or displeasure. Now it does seem strange that while with the taste of sense it is not

alone experience that shows that its judgement (of pleasure or displeasure in something) is not universally

valid, but every one willingly refrains from imputing this agreement to others (despite the frequent actual

prevalence of a considerable consensus of general opinion even in these judgements), the taste of reflection,

which, as experience teaches, has often enough to put up with a rude dismissal of its claims to universal

validity of its judgement (upon the beautiful), can (as it actually does) find it possible for all that to formulate

judgements capable of demanding this agreement in its universality. Such agreement it does in fact require

from every one for each of its judgements of taste the persons who pass these judgements not quarreling over

the possibility of such a claim, but only failing in particular cases to come to terms as to the correct

First of all we have here to note that a universality which does not rest upon concepts of the object (even

though these are only empirical) is in no way logical, but aesthetic, i. e., does not involve any objective

quantity of the judgement, but only one that is subjective. For this universality I use the expression general

validity, which denotes the validity of the reference of a representation, not to the cognitive faculties, but to

the feeling of pleasure or displeasure for every subject. (The same expression, however, may also be

employed for the logical quantity of the judgement, provided we add objective universal validity, to

SS 8. In a judgement of taste the universality of delight is only represented as subjective. 24

Now a judgement that has objective universal validity has always got the subjective also, i.e., if the

judgement is valid for everything which is contained under a given concept, it is valid also for all who

represent an object by means of this concept. But from a subjective universal validity, i. e., the aesthetic, that

does not rest on any concept, no conclusion can be drawn to the logical; because judgements of that kind

have no bearing upon the object. But for this very reason the aesthetic universality attributed to a judgement

must also be of a special kind, seeing that it does not join the predicate of beauty to the concept of the object

taken in its entire logical sphere, and yet does extend this predicate over the whole sphere of judging subjects.

In their logical quantity, all judgements of taste are singular judgements. For, since I must present the object

immediately to my feeling of pleasure or displeasure, and that, too, without the aid of concepts, such

judgements cannot have the quantity of judgements with objective general validity. Yet by taking the singular

representation of the object of the judgement of taste, and by comparison converting it into a concept

according to the conditions determining that judgement, we can arrive at a logically universal judgement. For

instance, by a judgement of the taste I describe the rose at which I am looking as beautiful. The judgement,

on the other hand, resulting from the comparison of a number of singular representations: "Roses in general

are beautiful," is no longer pronounced as a purely aesthetic judgement, but as a logical judgement founded

on one that is aesthetic. Now the judgement, "The rose is agreeable" (to smell) is also, no doubt, an aesthetic

and singular judgement, but then it is not one of taste but of sense. For it has this point of difference from a

judgement of taste, that the latter imports an aesthetic quantity of universality, i.e., of validity for everyone

which is not to be met with in a judgement upon the agreeable. It is only judgements upon the good which,

while also determining the delight in an object, possess logical and not mere aesthetic universality; for it is as

involving a cognition of the object that "they are valid of it, and on that account valid for everyone.

In forming an estimate of objects merely from concepts, all representation of beauty goes by the board. There

can, therefore, be no rule according to which any one is to be compelled to recognize anything as beautiful.

Whether a dress, a house, or a flower is beautiful is a matter upon which one declines to allow one's

judgement to be swayed by any reasons or principles. We want to get a look at the object with our own eyes,

just as if our delight depended on sensation. And yet, if upon so doing, we call the object beautiful, we

believe ourselves to be speaking with a universal voice, and lay claim to the concurrence of everyone,

whereas no private sensation would be decisive except for the observer alone and his liking.

Here, now, we may perceive that nothing is postulated in the judgement of taste but such a universal voice in

respect of delight that it is not mediated by concepts; consequently, only the possibility of an aesthetic

judgement capable of being at the same time deemed valid for everyone. The judgement of taste itself does

not postulate the agreement of everyone (for it is only competent for a logically universal judgement to do

this, in that it is able to bring forward reasons); it only imputes this agreement to everyone, as an instance of

the rule in respect of which it looks for confirmation, not from concepts, but from the concurrence of others.

The universal voice is, therefore, only an idea resting upon grounds the investigation of which is here

postponed. It may be a matter of uncertainty whether a person who thinks he is laying down a judgement of

taste is, in fact, judging in conformity with that idea; but that this idea is what is contemplated in his

judgement, and that, consequently, it is meant to be a judgement of taste, is proclaimed by his use of the

expression "beauty." For himself he can be certain on the point from his mere consciousness of the separation

of everything belonging to the agreeable and the good from the delight remaining to him; and this is all for

which be promises himself the agreement of everyonea claim which, under these conditions, he would also

be warranted in making, were it not that he frequently sinned against them, and thus passed an erroneous

SS 9. Investigation of the question of the relative priority in a judgement of taste of the feeling of pleasure and the estimating of the object. 25

The solution of this problem is the key to the Critique of taste, and so is worthy of all attention.

Were the pleasure in a given object to be the antecedent, and were the universal communicability of this

pleasure to be all that the judgement of taste is meant to allow to the representation of the object, such a

sequence would be selfcontradictory. For a pleasure of that kind would be nothing but the feeling of mere

agreeableness to the senses, and so, from its very nature, would possess no more than private validity, seeing

that it would be immediately dependent on the representation through which the object is given.

Hence it is the universal capacity for being communicated incident to the mental state in the given

representation which, as the subjective condition of the judgement of taste, must be, fundamental, with the

pleasure in the object as its consequent. Nothing, however, is capable of being universally communicated but

cognition and representation so far as appurtenant to cognition. For it is only as thus appurtenant that the

representation is objective, and it is this alone that gives it a universal point of reference with which the

power of representation of every one is obliged to harmonize. If, then, the determining ground of the

judgement as to this universal communicability of the representation is to be merely subjective, that is to say,

to be conceived independently of any concept of the object, it can be nothing else than the mental state that

presents itself in the mutual relation of the powers of representation so far as they refer a given representation

The cognitive powers brought into play by this representation are here engaged in a free play, since no

definite concept restricts them to a particular rule of cognition. Hence the mental state in this representation

must be one of a feeling of the free play of the powers of representation in a given representation for a

cognition in general. Now a representation, whereby an object is given, involves, in order that it may become

a source of cognition at all, imagination for bringing together the manifold of intuition, and understanding for

the unity of the concept uniting the representations. This state of free play of the cognitive faculties attending

a representation by which an object is given must admit of universal communication: because cognition, as a

definition of the object with which given representations (in any subject whatever) are to accord, is the one

As the subjective universal communicability of the mode of representation in a judgement of taste is to

subsist apart from the presupposition of any definite concept, it can be nothing else than the mental state

present in the free play of imagination and understanding (so far as these are in mutual accord, as is requisite

for cognition in general); for we are conscious that this subjective relation suitable for a cognition in general

must be just as valid for every one, and consequently as universally communicable, as is any indeterminate

Now this purely subjective (aesthetic) estimating of the object, or of the representation through which it is

given, is antecedent to the pleasure in it, and is the basis of this pleasure in the harmony of the cognitive

faculties. Again, the abovedescribed universality of the subjective conditions of estimating objects forms the

sole foundation of this universal subjective validity of the delight which we connect with the representation

That an ability to communicate one's mental state, even though it be only in respect of our cognitive faculties,

is attended with a pleasure, is a fact which might easily be demonstrated from the natural propensity of

mankind to social life, i.e., empirically and psychologically. But what we have here in view calls for

something more than this. In a judgement of taste, the pleasure felt by us is exacted from every one else as

necessary, just as if, when we call something beautiful, beauty was to be regarded as a quality of the object

forming part of its inherent determination according to concepts; although beauty is for itself, apart from any

reference to the feeling of the subject, nothing. But the discussion of this question must be reserved until we

have answered the further one of whether, and how, aesthetic judgements are possible a priori.

SS 9. Investigation of the question of the relative priority in a judgement of taste of the feeling of pleasure and the estimating of the object. 26

At present we are exercised with the lesser question of the way in which we become conscious, in a

judgement of taste, of a reciprocal subjective common accord of the powers of cognition. Is it aesthetically by

sensation and our mere internal sense? Or is it intellectually by consciousness of our intentional activity in

Now if the given representation occasioning the judgement of taste were a concept which united

understanding and imagination in the estimate of the object so as to give a cognition of the object, the

consciousness of this relation would be intellectual (as in the objective schematism of judgement dealt with in

the Critique). But, then, in that case the judgement would not be laid down with respect to pleasure and

displeasure, and so would not be a judgement of taste. But, now, the judgement of taste determines the object,

independently of concepts, in respect of delight and of the predicate of beauty. There is, therefore, no other

way for the subjective unity of the relation in question to make itself known than by sensation. The

quickening of both faculties (imagination and understanding) to an indefinite, but yet, thanks to the given

representation, harmonious activity, such as belongs to cognition generally, is the sensation whose universal

communicability is postulated by the judgement of taste. An objective relation can, of course, only be

thought, yet in so far as, in respect of its conditions, it is subjective, it may be felt in its effect upon the mind,

and, in the case of a relation (like that of the powers of representation to a faculty of cognition generally)

which does not rest on any concept, no other consciousness of it is possible beyond that through sensation of

its effect upon the mind an effect consisting in the more facile play of both mental powers (imagination and

understanding) as quickened by their mutual accord. A representation which is singular and independent of

comparison with other representations, and, being such, yet accords with the conditions of the universality

that is the general concern of understanding, is one that brings the cognitive faculties into that proportionate

accord which we require for all cognition and which we therefore deem valid for every one who is so

constituted as to judge by means of understanding and sense conjointly (i.e., for every man).

Let us define the meaning of "an end" in transcendental terms (i.e., without presupposing anything empirical,

such as the feeling of pleasure). An end is the object of a concept so far as this concept is regarded as the

cause of the object (the real ground of its possibility); and the causality of a concept in respect of its object is

finality (forma finalis). Where, then, not the cognition of an object merely, but the object itself (its form or

real existence) as an effect, is thought to be possible only through a concept of it, there we imagine an end.

The representation of the effect is here the determining ground of its cause and takes the lead of it. The

consciousness of the causality of a representation in respect of the state of the subject as one tending to

preserve a continuance of that state, may here be said to denote in a general way what is called pleasure;

whereas displeasure is that representation which contains the ground for converting the state of the

The faculty of desire, so far as determinable only through concepts, i.e., so as to act in conformity with the

representation of an end, would be the Will. But an object, or state of mind, or even an action may, although

its possibility does not necessarily presuppose the representation of an end, be called final simply on account

of its possibility being only explicable and intelligible for us by virtue of an assumption on our part of

fundamental causality according to ends, i.e., a will that would have so ordained it according to a certain

represented rule. Finality, therefore, may exist apart from an end, in so far as we do not locate the causes of

this form in a will, but yet are able to render the explanation of its possibility intelligible to ourselves only by

deriving it from a will. Now we are not always obliged to look with the eye of reason into what we observe

(i.e., to consider it in its possibility). So we may at least observe a finality of form, and trace it in

objectsthough by reflection onlywithout resting it on an end (as the material of the nexus finalis).

Whenever an end is regarded as a source of delight, it always imports an interest as determining ground of the

judgement on the object of pleasure. Hence the judgement of taste cannot rest on any subjective end as its

ground. But neither can any representation of an objective end, i.e., of the possibility of the object itself on

principles of final connection, determine the judgement of taste, and, consequently, neither can any concept

of the good. For the judgement of taste is an aesthetic and not a cognitive judgement, and so does not deal

with any concept of the nature or of the internal or external possibility, by this or that cause, of the object, but

simply with the relative bearing of the representative powers so far as determined by a representation.

Now this relation, present when an object is characterized as beautiful, is coupled with the feeling of

pleasure. This pleasure is by the judgement of taste pronounced valid for every one; hence an agreeableness

attending the representation is just as incapable of containing the determining ground of the judgement as the

representation of the perfection of the object or the concept of the good. We are thus left with the subjective

finality in the representation of an object, exclusive of any end (objective or subjective)consequently the

bare form of finality in the representation whereby an object is given to us, so far as we are conscious of it as

that which is alone capable of constituting the delight which, apart from any concept, we estimate as

universally communicable, and so of forming the determining ground of the judgement of taste.

To determine a priori the connection of the feeling of pleasure or displeasure as an effect, with some

representation or other (sensation or concept) as its cause, is utterly impossible; for that would be a causal

relation which (with objects of experience) is always one that can only be cognized a posteriori and with the

help of experience. True, in the Critique of Practical Reason we did actually derive a priori from universal

moral concepts the feeling of respect (as a particular and peculiar modification of this feeling which does not

strictly answer either to the pleasure or displeasure which we receive from empirical objects). But there we

were further able to cross the border of experience and call in aid a causality resting on a supersensible

attribute of the subject, namely that of freedom. But even there it was not this feeling exactly that we deduced

from the idea of the moral as cause, but from this was derived simply the determination of the will. But the

mental state present in the determination of the will by any means is at once in itself a feeling of pleasure and

identical with it, and so does not issue from it as an effect. Such an effect must only be assumed where the

concept of the moral as a good precedes the determination of the will by the law; for in that case it would be

futile to derive the pleasure combined with the concept from this concept as a mere cognition.

Now the pleasure in aesthetic judgements stands on a similar footing: only that here it is merely

contemplative and does not bring about an interest in the object; whereas in the moral judgement it is

practical, The consciousness of mere formal finality in the play of the cognitive faculties of the subject

attending a representation whereby an object is given, is the pleasure itself, because it involves a determining

ground of the subject's activity in respect of the quickening of its cognitive powers, and thus an internal

causality (which is final) in respect of cognition generally, but without being limited to a definite cognition,

and consequently a mere form of the subjective finality of a representation in an aesthetic judgement. This

SS 11. The sole foundation of the judgement of taste is the form of finality of an object (or mode of representing it). 28

pleasure is also in no way practical, neither resembling that form the pathological ground of agreeableness

nor that from the intellectual ground of the represented good. But still it involves an inherent causality, that,

namely, of preserving a continuance of the state of the representation itself and the active engagement of the

cognitive powers without ulterior aim. We dwell on the contemplation of the beautiful because this

contemplation strengthens and reproduces itself. The case is analogous (but analogous only) to the way we

linger on a charm in the representation of an object which keeps arresting the attention, the mind all the while

Every interest vitiates the judgement of taste and robs it of its impartiality. This is especially so where,

instead of, like the interest of reason, making finality take the lead of the lead of the feeling of pleasure, it

grounds it upon this feelingwhich is what always happens in aesthetic judgements upon anything so far as it

gratifies or pains. Hence judgements so influenced can either lay no claim at all to a universally valid delight,

or else must abate their claim in proportion as sensations of the kind in question enter into the determining

grounds of taste. Taste that requires an added element of charm and emotion for its delight, not to speak of

adopting this as the measure of its approval, has not yet emerged from barbarism.

And yet charms are frequently not alone ranked with beauty (which ought properly to be a question merely of

the form) as supplementary to the aesthetic universal delight, but they have been accredited as intrinsic

beauties, and consequently the matter of delight passed off for the form. This is a misconception which, like

many others that have still an underlying element of truth, may be removed by a careful definition of these

A judgement of taste which is uninfluenced by charm or emotion (though these may be associated with the

delight in the beautiful), and whose determining ground, therefore, is simply finality of form, is a pure

Aesthetic, just like theoretical (logical) judgements, are divisible into empirical and pure. The first are those

by which agreeableness or disagreeableness, the second those by which beauty is predicated of an object or

its mode of representation. The former are judgements of sense (material aesthetic judgements), the latter (as

A judgement of taste, therefore, is only pure so far as its determining ground is tainted with no merely

empirical delight. But such a taint is always present where charm or emotion have a share in the judgement

Here now there is a recrudescence of a number of specious pleas that go the length of putting forward the

case that charm is not merely a necessary ingredient of beauty, but is even of itself sufficient to merit the

name of beautiful. A mere colour, such as the green of a plot of grass, or a mere tone (as distinguished from

sound or noise), like that of a violin, is described by most people as in itself beautiful, notwithstanding the

fact that both seem to depend merely on the matter of the representations in other words, simply on

sensationwhich only entitles them to be called agreeable. But it will at the same time be observed that

sensations of colour as well as of tone are only entitled to be immediately regarded as beautiful where, in

either case, they are pure. This is a determination which at once goes to their form, and it is the only one

which these representations possess that admits with certainty of being universally communicated. For it is

not to be assumed that even the quality of the sensations agrees in all subjects, and we can hardly take it for

granted that the agreeableness of a colour, or of the tone of a musical instrument, which we judge to be

preferable to that of another, is given a like preference in the estimate of every one.

Assuming vibrations vibration sound, and, what is most important, that the mind not alone perceives by sense

their effect in stimulating the organs, but also, by reflection, the regular play of the impressions (and

consequently the form in which different representations are united)which I, still, in no way doubtthen

colour and tone would not be mere sensations. They would be nothing short of formal determinations of the

unity of a manifold of sensations, and in that case could even be ranked as intrinsic beauties.

But the purity of a simple mode of sensation means that its uniformity is not disturbed or broken by any

foreign sensation. It belongs merely to the form; for abstraction may there be made from the quality of the

mode of such sensation (what colour or tone, if any, it represents). For this reason, all simple colours are

regarded as beautiful so far as pure. Composite colours have not this advantage, because, not being simple,

there is no standard for estimating whether they should be called pure or impure.

But as for the beauty ascribed to the object on account of its form, and the supposition that it is capable of

being enhanced by charm, this is a common error and one very prejudicial to genuine, uncorrupted, sincere

taste. Nevertheless charms may be added to beauty to lend to the mind, beyond a bare delight, an adventitious

interest in the representation of the object, and thus to advocate taste and its cultivation. This applies

especially where taste is as yet crude and untrained. But they are positively subversive of the judgement of

taste, if allowed to obtrude themselves as grounds of estimating beauty. For so far are they from contributing

to beauty that it is only where taste is still weak and untrained that, like aliens, they are admitted as a favour,

In painting, sculpture, and in fact in all the formative arts, in architecture and horticulture, so far as fine arts,

the design is what is essential. Here it is not what gratifies in sensation but merely what pleases by its form,

that is the fundamental prerequisite for taste. The colours which give brilliancy to the sketch are part of the

charm. They may no doubt, in their own way, enliven the object for sensation, but make it really worth

looking at and beautiful they cannot. Indeed, more often than not the requirements of the beautiful form

restrict them to a very narrow compass, and, even where charm is admitted, it is only this form that gives

All form of objects of sense (both of external and also, mediately, of internal sense) is either figure or play. In

the latter case it is either play of figures (in space: mimic and dance), or mere play of sensations (in time).

The charm of colours, or of the agreeable tones of instruments, may be added: but the design in the former

and the composition in the latter constitute the proper object of the pure judgement of taste. To say that the

purity alike of colours and of tones, or their variety and contrast, seem to contribute to beauty, is by no means

to imply that, because in themselves agreeable, they therefore yield an addition to the delight in the form and

one on a par with it. The real meaning rather is that they make this form more clearly, definitely, and

completely intuitable, and besides stimulate the representation by their charm, as they excite and sustain the

Even what is called ornamentation (parerga), i.e., what is only an adjunct and not an intrinsic constituent in

the complete representation of the object, in augmenting the delight of taste does so only by means of its

form. Thus it is with the frames of pictures or the drapery on statues, or the colonnades of palaces. But if the

ornamentation does not itself enter into the composition of the beautiful formif it is introduced like a gold

frame merely to win approval for the picture by means of its charmit is then called finery and takes away

Emotiona sensation where an agreeable feeling is produced merely by means of a momentary check

followed by a more powerful outpouring of the vital forceis quite foreign to beauty. Sublimity (with which

the feeling of emotion is connected) requires, however, a different standard of estimation from that relied

upon by taste. A pure judgement of taste has, then, for its determining ground neither charm nor emotion, in a

Objective finality can only be cognized by means of a reference of the manifold to a definite end, and hence

only through a concept. This alone makes it clear that the beautiful, which is estimated on the ground of a

mere formal finality, i.e., a finality apart from an end, is wholly independent of the representation of the

good. For the latter presupposes an objective finality, i.e., the reference of the object to a definite end.

Objective finality is either external, i.e., the utility, or internal, i. e., the perfection, of the object. That the

delight in an object on account of which we call it beautiful is incapable of resting on the representation of its

utility, is abundantly evident from the two preceding articles; for in that case, it would not be an immediate

delight in the object, which latter is the essential condition of the judgement upon beauty. But in an objective,

internal finality, i.e., perfection, we have what is more akin to the predicate of beauty, and so this has been

held even by philosophers of reputation to be convertible with beauty, though subject to the qualification:

where it is thought in a confused way. In a critique of taste it is of the utmost importance to decide whether

For estimating objective finality we always require the concept of an end, and, where such finality has to be,

not an external one (utility), but an internal one, the concept of an internal end containing the ground of the

internal possibility of the object. Now an end is in general that, the concept of which may be regarded as the

ground of the possibility of the object itself. So in order to represent an objective finality in a thing we must

first have a concept of what sort of a thing it is to be. The agreement of the manifold in a thing with this

concept (which supplies the rule of its synthesis) is the qualitative perfection of the thing. Quantitative

perfection is entirely distinct from this. It consists in the completeness of anything after its kind, and is a mere

concept of quantity (of totality). In its case the question of what the thing is to be is regarded as definitely

disposed of, and we only ask whether it is possessed of all the requisites that go to make it such. What is

formal in the representation of a thing, i.e., the agreement of its manifold with a unity (i.e., irrespective of

what it is to be), does not, of itself, afford us any cognition whatsoever of objective finality. For since

abstraction is made from this unity as end (what the thing is to be), nothing is left but the subjective finality

of the representations in the mind of the subject intuiting. This gives a certain finality of the representative

state of the subject, in which the subject feels itself quite at home in its effort to grasp a given form in the

imagination, but no perfection of any object, the latter not being here thought through any concept. For

instance, if in a forest I light upon a plot of grass, round which trees stand in a circle, and if I do not then form

any representation of an end, as that it is meant to be used, say, for country dances, then not the least hint of a

concept of perfection is given by the mere form. To suppose a formal objective finality that is yet devoid of

an end, i.e., the mere form of a perfection (apart from any matter or concept of that to which the agreement

relates, even though there was the mere general idea of a conformity to law) is a veritable contradiction.

Now the judgement of taste is an aesthetic judgement, one resting on subjective grounds. No concept can be

its determining ground, and hence not one of a definite end. Beauty, therefore, as a formal subjective finality,

involves no thought whatsoever of a perfection of the object, as a wouldbe formal finality which yet, for all

that, is objective: and the distinction between the concepts of the beautiful and the good, which represents

both as differing only in their logical form, the first being merely a confused, the second a clearly defined,

concept of perfection, while otherwise alike in content and origin, all goes for nothing: for then there would

be no specific difference between them, but the judgement of taste would be just as much a cognitive

judgement as one by which something is described as goodjust as the man in the street, when be says that

SS 15. The judgement of taste is entirely independent of the concept of perfection. 31

deceit is wrong, bases his judgement on confused, but the philosopher on clear grounds, while both appeal in

reality to identical principles of reason. But I have already stated that an aesthetic judgement is quite unique,

and affords absolutely no (not even a confused) knowledge of the object. It is only through a logical

judgement that we get knowledge. The aesthetic judgement, on the other hand, refers the representation, by

which an object is given, solely to the subject, and brings to our notice no quality of the object, but only the

final form in the determination of the powers of representation engaged upon it. The judgement is called

aesthetic for the very reason that its determining ground cannot be a concept, but is rather the feeling (of the

internal sense) of the concert in the play of the mental powers as a thing only capable of being felt. If, on the

other band, confused concepts, and the objective judgement based on them, are going to be called aesthetic,

we shall find ourselves with an understanding judging by sense, or a sense representing its objects by

conceptsa mere choice of contradictions. The faculty of concepts, be they confused or be they clear, is

understanding; and although understanding has (as in all judgements) its role in the judgement of taste, as an

aesthetic judgement, its role there is not that of a faculty for cognizing an object, but of a faculty for

determining that judgement and its representation (without a concept) according to its relation to the subject

and its internal feeling, and for doing so in so far as that judgement is possible according to a universal rule.

There are two kinds of beauty: free beauty (pulchritudo vaga), or beauty which is merely dependent

(pulchritudo adhaerens). The first presupposes no concept of what the object should be; the second does

presuppose such a concept and, with it, an answering perfection of the object. Those of the first kind are said

to be (selfsubsisting) beauties of this thing or that thing; the other kind of beauty, being attached to a

concept (conditioned beauty), is ascribed to objects which come under the concept of a particular end.

Flowers are free beauties of nature. Hardly anyone but a botanist knows the true nature of a flower, and even

he, while recognizing in the flower the reproductive organ of the plant, pays no attention to this natural end

when using his taste to judge of its beauty. Hence no perfection of any kindno internal finality, as something

to which the arrangement of the manifold is relatedunderlies this judgement. Many birds (the parrot, the

hummingbird, the bird of paradise), and a number of crustacea, are selfsubsisting beauties which are not

appurtenant to any object defined with respect to its end, but please freely and on their own account. So

designs a la grecque, foliage for framework or on wallpapers, etc., have no intrinsic meaning; they represent

nothingno object under a definite conceptand are free beauties. We may also rank in the same class what in

music are called fantasias (without a theme), and, indeed, all music that is not set to words.

In the estimate of a free beauty (according to mere form) we have the pure judgement of taste. No concept is

here presupposed of any end for which the manifold should serve the given object, and which the latter,

therefore, should representan incumbrance which would only restrict the freedom of the imagination that, as

But the beauty of man (including under this head that of a man, woman, or child), the beauty of a horse, or of

a building (such as a church, palace, arsenal, or summerhouse), presupposes a concept of the end that

defines what the thing has to be, and consequently a concept of its perfection; and is therefore merely

appendant beauty. Now, just as it is a clog on the purity of the purity of the judgement of taste to have the

agreeable (of sensation) joined with beauty to which properly only the form is relevant, so to combine the

good with beauty (the good, namely, of the manifold to the thing itself according to its end) mars its purity.

Much might be added to a building that would immediately please the eye, were it not intended for a church.

A figure might be beautified with all manner of flourishes and light but regular lines, as is done by the New

Zealanders with their tattooing, were we dealing with anything but the figure of a human being. And here is

SS 16. A judgement of taste by which an object is described as beautiful, under the condition of a definite concept, is not pure. 32

one whose rugged features might be softened and given a more pleasing aspect, only he has got to be a man,

Now the delight in the manifold of a thing, in reference to the internal end that determines its possibility, is a

delight based on a concept, whereas delight in the beautiful is such as does not presuppose any concept, but is

immediately coupled with the representation through which the object is given (not through which it is

thought). If, now, the judgement of taste in respect of the latter delight is made dependent upon the end

involved in the former delight as a judgement of reason, and is thus placed under a restriction, then it is no

Taste, it is true, stands to gain by this combination of intellectual delight with the aesthetic. For it becomes

fixed, and, while not universal, it enables rules to be prescribed for it in respect of certain definite final

objects. But these rules are then not rules of taste, but merely rules for establishing a union of taste with

reason, i.e., of the beautiful with the goodrules by which the former becomes available as an intentional

instrument in respect of the latter, for the purpose of bringing that temper of the mind which is

selfsustaining and of subjective universal validity to the support and maintenance of that mode of thought

which, while possessing objective universal validity, can only be preserved by a resolute effort. But, strictly

speaking, perfection neither gains by beauty, nor beauty by perfection. The truth is rather this, when we

compare the representation through which an object is given to us with the object (in respect of what it is

meant to be) by means of a concept, we cannot help reviewing it also in respect of the sensation in the

subject. Hence there results a gain to the entire faculty of our representative power when harmony prevails

In respect of an object with a definite internal end, a judgement of taste would only be pure where the person

judging either has no concept of this end, or else makes abstraction from it in his judgement. But in cases like

this, although such a person should lay down a correct judgement of taste, since he would be estimating the

object as a free beauty, he would still be found fault with by another who saw nothing in its beauty but a

dependent quality (i.e., who looked to the end of the object) and would be accused by him of false taste,

though both would, in their own way, be judging correctly: the one according to what he had present to his

senses, the other according to what was present in his thoughts. This distinction enables us to settle many

disputes about beauty on the part of critics; for we may show them how one side is dealing with free beauty,

and the other with that which is dependent: the former passing a pure judgement of taste, the latter one that is

There can be no objective rule of taste by which what is beautiful may be defined by means of concepts. For

every judgement from that source is aesthetic, i.e., its determining ground is the feeling of the subject, and not

any concept of an object. It is only throwing away labour to look for a principle of taste that affords a

universal criterion of the beautiful by definite concepts; because what is sought is a thing impossible and

inherently contradictory. But in the universal communicability of the sensation (of delight or aversion)a

communicability, too, that exists apart from any conceptin the accord, so far as possible, of all ages and

nations as to this feeling in the representation of certain objects, we have the empirical criterion, weak indeed

and scarce sufficient to raise a presumption, of the derivation of a taste, thus confirmed by examples, from

grounds deep seated and shared alike by all men, underlying their agreement in estimating the forms under

For this reason some products of taste are looked on as exemplarynot meaning thereby that by imitating

others taste may be acquired. For taste must be an original faculty; whereas one who imitates a model, while

showing skill commensurate with his success, only displays taste as himself a critic of this model.* Hence it

follows that the highest model, the archetype of taste, is a mere idea, which each person must beget in his

own consciousness, and according to which he must form his estimate of everything that is an object of taste,

or that is an example of critical taste, and even of universal taste itself. Properly speaking, an idea signifies a

concept of reason, and an ideal the representation of an individual existence as adequate to an idea. Hence

this archetype of tastewhich rests, indeed, upon reason's indeterminate idea of a maximum, but is not,

however, capable of being represented by means of concepts, but only in an individual presentationmay

more appropriately be called the ideal of the beautiful. While not having this ideal in our possession, we still

strive to beget it within us. But it is bound to be merely an ideal of the imagination, seeing that it rests, not

upon concepts, but upon the presentationthe faculty of presentation being the imagination. Now, how do we

arrive at such an ideal of beauty? Is it a priori or empirically? Further, what species of the beautiful admits of

*Models of taste with respect to the arts of speech must be composed in a dead and learned language; the

first, to prevent their having to suffer the changes that inevitably overtake living ones, making dignified

expressions become degraded, common ones antiquated, and ones newly coined after a short currency

obsolete: the second to ensure its having a grammar that is not subject to the caprices of fashion, but has fixed

First of all, we do well to observe that the beauty for which an ideal has to be sought cannot be a beauty that

is free and at large, but must be one fixed by a concept of objective finality. Hence it cannot belong to the

object of an altogether pure judgement of taste, but must attach to one that is partly intellectual. In other

words, where an ideal is to have place among the grounds upon which any estimate is formed, then beneath

grounds of that kind there must lie some idea of reason according to determinate concepts, by which the end

underlying the internal possibility of the object is determined a priori. An ideal of beautiful flowers, of a

beautiful suite of furniture, or of a beautiful view, is unthinkable. But, it may also be impossible to represent

an ideal of a beauty dependent on definite ends, e.g., a beautiful residence, a beautiful tree, a beautiful garden,

etc., presumably because their ends are not sufficiently defined and fixed by their concept, with the result that

their finality is nearly as free as with beauty that is quite at large. Only what has in itself the end of its real

existenceonly man that is able himself to determine his ends by reason, or, where he has to derive them

from external perception, can still compare them with essential and universal ends, and then further

pronounce aesthetically upon their accord with such ends, only he, among all objects in the world, admits,

therefore, of an ideal of beauty, just as humanity in his person, as intelligence, alone admits of the ideal of

Two factors are here involved. First, there is the aesthetic normal idea, which is an individual intuition (of the

imagination). This represents the norm by which we judge of a man as a member of a particular animal

species. Secondly, there is the rational idea. This deals with the ends of humanity so far as capable of

sensuous representation, and converts them into a principle for estimating his outward form, through which

these ends are revealed in their phenomenal effect. The normal idea must draw from experience the

constituents which it requires for the form of an animal of a particular kind. But the greatest finality in the

construction of this formthat which would serve as a universal norm for forming an estimate of each

individual of the species in questionthe image that, as it were, forms an intentional basis underlying the

technic of nature, to which no separate individual, but only the race as a whole, is adequate, has its seat

merely in the idea of the judging subject. Yet it is, with all its proportions, an aesthetic idea, and, as such,

capable of being fully presented in concreto in a model image. Now, how is this effected? In order to render

the process to some extent intelligible (for who can wrest nature's whole secret from her?), let us attempt a

It is of note that the imagination, in a manner quite incomprehensible to us, is able on occasion, even after a

long lapse of time, not alone to recall the signs for concepts, but also to reproduce the image and shape of an

object out of a countless number of others of a different, or even of the very same, kind. And, further, if the

mind is engaged upon comparisons, we may well suppose that it can in actual fact, though the process is

unconscious, superimpose as it were one image upon another, and from the coincidence of a number of the

same kind arrive at a mean contour which serves as a common standard for all. Say, for instance, a person has

seen a thousand fullgrown men. Now if he wishes to judge normal size determined upon a comparative

estimate, then imagination (to my mind) allows a great number of these images (perhaps the whole thousand)

to fall one upon the other, and, if I may be allowed to extend to the case the analogy of optical presentation,

in the space where they come most together, and within the contour where the place is illuminated by the

greatest concentration of colour, one gets a perception of the average size, which alike in height and breadth

is equally removed from the extreme limits of the greatest and smallest statures; and this is the stature of a

beautiful man. (The same result could be obtained in a mechanical way, by taking the measures of all the

thousand, and adding together their heights, and their breadths [and thicknesses], and dividing the sum in

each case by a thousand.) But the power of imagination does all this by means of a dynamical effect upon the

organ of internal sense, arising from the frequent apprehension of such forms. If, again, for our average man

we seek on similar lines for the average head, and for this the average nose, and so on, then we get the figure

that underlies the normal idea of a beautiful man in the country where the comparison is instituted. For this

reason a Negro must necessarily (under these empirical conditions) have a different normal idea of the beauty

of forms from what a white man has, and the Chinaman one different from the European. And the. process

would be just the same with the model of a beautiful horse or dog (of a particular breed). This normal idea is

not derived from proportions taken from experience as definite rules: rather is it according to this idea that

rules forming estimates first become possible. It is an intermediate between all singular intuitions of

individuals, with their manifold variationsa floating image for the whole genus, which nature has set as an

archetype underlying those of her products that belong to the same species, but which in no single case she

seems to have completely attained. But the normal idea is far from giving the complete archetype of beauty in

the genus. It only gives the form that constitutes the indispensable condition of all beauty, and, consequently,

only correctness in the presentation of the genus. It is, as the famous "Doryphorus" of Polycletus was called,

the rule (and Myron's "Cow" might be similarly employed for its kind). It cannot, for that very reason,

contain anything specifically characteristic; for otherwise it would not be the normal idea for the genus.

Further, it is not by beauty that its presentation pleases, but merely because it does not contradict any of the

conditions under which alone a thing belonging to this genus can be beautiful. The presentation is merely

*It will be found that a perfectly regular face one that a painter might fix his eye on for a modelordinarily

conveys nothing. This is because it is devoid of anything characteristic, and so the idea of the race is

expressed in it rather than the specific qualities of a person. The exaggeration of what is characteristic in this

way, i.e., exaggeration violating the normal idea (the finality of the race), is called caricature. Also

experience shows that these quite regular faces indicate as a rule internally only a mediocre type of man;

presumablyif one may assume that nature in its external form expresses the proportions of the internal

because, where none of the mental qualities exceed the proportion requisite to constitute a man free from

faults, nothing can be expected in the way of what is called genius, in which nature seems to make a

departure from its wonted relations of the mental powers in favour of some special one.

But the ideal of the beautiful is still something different from its normal idea. For reasons already stated it is

only to be sought in the human figure. Here the ideal consists in the expression of the moral, apart from

which the object would not please at once universally and positively (not merely negatively in a presentation

academically correct). The visible expression of moral ideas that govern men inwardly can, of course, only be

drawn from experience; but their combination with all that our reason connects with the morally good in the

idea of the highest finalitybenevolence, purity, strength, or equanimity, etc.may be made, as it were,

visible in bodily manifestation (as effect of what is internal), and this embodiment involves a union of pure

ideas of reason and great imaginative power, in one who would even form an estimate of it, not to speak of

being the author of its presentation. The correctness of such an ideal of beauty is evidenced by its not

permitting any sensuous charm to mingle with the delight in its object, in which it still allows us to take a

great interest. This fact in turn shows that an estimate formed according to such a standard can never be

purely aesthetic, and that one formed according to an ideal of beauty cannot be a simple judgement of taste.

Beauty is the form of finality in an object, so far as perceived in it apart from the representation of an end.*

*As telling against this explanation, the instance may be adduced that there are things in which we see a form

suggesting adaptation to an end, without any end being cognized in themas, for example, the stone

implements frequently obtained from sepulchral tumuli and supplied with a hole, as if for [inserting] a

handle; and although these by their shape manifestly indicate a finality, the end of which is unknown, they

are not on that account described as beautiful. But the very fact of their being regarded as artproducts

involves an immediate recognition that their shape is attributed to some purpose or other and to a definite

end. For this reason there is no immediate delight whatever in their contemplation. A flower, on the other

hand, such as a tulip, is regarded as beautiful, because we meet with a certain finality in its perception, which,

I may assert in the case of every representation that the synthesis of a pleasure with the representation (as a

cognition) is at least possible. Of what I call agreeable I assert that it actually causes pleasure in me. But what

we have in mind in the case of the beautiful is a necessary reference on its part to delight. However, this

necessity is of a special kind. It is not a theoretical objective necessitysuch as would let us cognize a priori

that every one will feel this delight in the object that is called beautiful by me. Nor yet is it a practical

necessity, in which case, thanks to concepts of a pure rational will in which free agents are supplied with a

rule, this delight is the necessary consequence of an objective law, and simply means that one ought

absolutely (without ulterior object) to act in a certain way. Rather, being such a necessity as is thought in an

aesthetic judgement, it can only be termed exemplary. In other words it is a necessity of the assent of all to a

judgement regarded as exemplifying a universal rule incapable of formulation. Since an aesthetic judgement

is not an objective or cognitive judgement, this necessity is not derivable from definite concepts, and so is not

apodeictic. Much less is it inferable from universality of experience (of a thoroughgoing agreement of

judgements about the beauty of a certain object). For, apart from the fact that experience would hardly furnish

evidences sufficiently numerous for this purpose, empirical judgements do not afford any foundation for a

The judgement of taste exacts agreement from every one; and a person who describes something as beautiful

insists that every one ought to give the object in question his approval and follow suit in describing it as

beautiful. The ought in aesthetic judgements, therefore, despite an accordance with all the requisite data for

passing judgement, is still only pronounced conditionally. We are suitors for agreement from every one else,

because we are fortified with a ground common to all. Further, we would be able to count on this agreement,

provided we were always assured of the correct subsumption of the case under that ground as the rule of

Were judgements of taste (like cognitive judgements) in possession of a definite objective principle, then one

who in his judgement followed such a principle would claim unconditioned necessity for it. Again, were they

devoid of any principle, as are those of the mere taste of sense, then no thought of any necessity on their part

would enter one's head. Therefore they must have a subjective principle, and one which determines what

pleases or displeases, by means of feeling only and not through concepts, but yet with universal validity.

Such a principle, however, could only be regarded as a common sense. This differs essentially from common

understanding, which is also sometimes called common sense (sensus communis): for the judgement of the

latter is not one by feeling, but always one by concepts, though usually only in the shape of obscurely

The judgement of taste, therefore, depends on our presupposing the existence of a common sense. (But this is

not to be taken to mean some external sense, but the effect arising from the free play of our powers of

cognition.) Only under the presupposition, I repeat, of such a common sense, are we able to lay down a

Cognitions and judgements must, together with their attendant conviction, admit of being universally

communicated; for otherwise a correspondence with the object would not be due to them. They would be a

conglomerate constituting a mere subjective play of the powers of representation, just as scepticism would

have it. But if cognitions are to admit of communication, then our mental state, i.e., the way the cognitive

powers are attuned for cognition generally, and, in fact, the relative proportion suitable for a representation

(by which an object is given to us) from which cognition is to result, must also admit of being universally

communicated, as, without this, which is the subjective condition of the act of knowing, knowledge, as an

effect, would not arise. And this is always what actually happens where a given object, through the

intervention of sense, sets the imagination at work in arranging the manifold, and the imagination, in turn, the

understanding in giving to this arrangement the unity of concepts. But this disposition of the cognitive

powers has a relative proportion differing with the diversity of the objects that are given. However, there

must be one in which this internal ratio suitable for quickening (one faculty by the other) is best adapted for

both mental powers in respect of cognition (of given objects) generally; and this disposition can only be

determined through feeling (and not by concepts). Since, now this disposition itself must admit of being

universally communicated, and hence also the feeling of it (in the case of a given representation), while

again, the universal communicability of a feeling presupposes a common sense: it follows that our

assumption of it is well founded. And here, too, we do not have to take our stand on psychological

observations, but we assume a common sense as the necessary condition of the universal communicability of

our knowledge, which is presupposed in every logic and every principle of knowledge that is not one of

In all judgements by which we describe anything as beautiful, we tolerate no one else being of a different

opinion, and in taking up this position we do not rest our judgement upon concepts, but only on our feeling.

Accordingly we introduce this fundamental feeling not as a private feeling, but as a public sense. Now, for

this purpose, experience cannot be made the ground of this common sense, for the latter is invoked to justify

SS 20. The condition of the necessity advanced by a judgement of taste is the idea of a common sense. 37

judgements containing an "ought." The assertion is not that every one will fall in with our judgement, but

rather that every one ought to agree with it. Here I put forward my judgement of taste as an example of the

judgement of common sense, and attribute to it on that account exemplary validity. Hence common sense is a

mere ideal norm. With this as presupposition, a judgement that accords with it, as well as the delight in an

object expressed in that judgement, is rightly converted into a rule for everyone. For the principle, while it is

only subjective, being yet assumed as subjectively universal (a necessary idea for everyone), could, in what

concerns the consensus of different judging subjects, demand universal assent like an objective principle,

This indeterminate norm of a common sense is, as a matter of fact, presupposed by us; as is shown by our

presuming to lay down judgements of taste. But does such a common sense in fact exist as a constitutive

principle of the possibility of experience, or is it formed for us as a regulative principle by a still higher

principle of reason, that for higher ends first seeks to beget in us a common sense? Is taste, in other words, a

natural and original faculty, or is it only the idea of one that is artificial and to be acquired by us, so that a

judgement of taste, with its demand for universal assent, is but a requirement of reason for generating such a

consensus, and does the "ought," i. e., the objective necessity of the coincidence of the feeling of all with the

particular feeling of each, only betoken the possibility of arriving at some sort of unanimity in these matters,

and the judgement of taste only adduce an example of the application of this principle? These are questions

which as yet we are neither willing nor in a position to investigate. For the present we have only to resolve

the faculty of taste into its elements, and to unite these ultimately in the idea of a common sense.

The beautiful is that which, apart from a concept, is cognized as object of a necessary delight.

The result to be extracted from the foregoing analysis is in effect this: That everything runs up into the

concept of taste as a critical faculty by which an object is estimated in reference to the free conformity to law

of the imagination. If, now, imagination must in the judgement of taste be regarded in its freedom, then, to

begin with, it is not taken as reproductive, as in its subjection to the laws of association, but as productive and

exerting an activity of its own (as originator of arbitrary forms of possible intuitions). And although in the

apprehension of a given object of sense it is tied down to a definite form of this object and, to that extent,

does not enjoy free play (as it does in poetry), still it is easy to conceive that the object may supply

readymade to the imagination just such a form of the arrangement of the manifold as the imagination, if it

were left to itself, would freely protect in harmony with the general conformity to law of the understanding.

But that the imagination should be both free and of itself conformable to law, i. e., carry autonomy with it, is

a contradiction. The understanding alone gives the law. Where, however, the imagination is compelled to

follow a course laid down by a definite law, then what the form of the product is to be is determined by

concepts; but, in that case, as already shown, the delight is not delight in the beautiful, but in the good (in

perfection, though it be no more than formal perfection), and the judgement is not one due to taste. Hence it is

only a conformity to law without a law, and a subjective harmonizing of the imagination and the

understanding without an objective onewhich latter would mean that the representation was referred to a

definite concept of the objectthat can consist with the free conformity to law of the understanding (which

has also been called finality apart from an end) and with the specific character of a judgement of taste.

Now geometrically regular figures, a circle, a square, a cube, and the like, are commonly brought forward by

critics of taste as the most simple and unquestionable examples of beauty. And yet the very reason why they

are called regular, is because the only way of representing them is by looking on them as mere presentations

of a determinate concept by which the figure has its rule (according to which alone it is possible) prescribed

for it. One or other of these two views must, therefore, be wrong: either the verdict of the critics that

SS 20. The condition of the necessity advanced by a judgement of taste is the idea of a common sense. 38

attributes beauty to such figures, or else our own, which makes finality apart from any concept necessary for

One would scarce think it necessary for a man to have taste to take more delight in a circle than in a scrawled

outline, in an equilateral and equiangular quadrilateral than in one that is all lopsided, and, as it were,

deformed. The requirements of common understanding ensure such a preference without the least demand

upon taste. Where some purpose is perceived, as, for instance, that of forming an estimate of the area of a plot

of land, or rendering intelligible the relation of divided parts to one another and to the whole, then regular

figures, and those of the simplest kind, are needed; and the delight does not rest immediately upon the way

the figure strikes the eye, but upon its serviceability for all manner of possible purposes. A room with the

walls making oblique angles, a plot laid out in a garden in a similar way, even any violation of symmetry, as

well in the figure of animals (e.g., being oneeyed) as in that of buildings, or of flowerbeds, is displeasing

because of its perversity of form, not alone in a practical way in respect of some definite use to which the

thing may be put, but for an estimate that looks to all manner of possible purposes. With the judgement of

taste the case is different. For, when it is pure, it combines delight or aversion immediately with the bare

The regularity that conduces to the concept of an object is, in fact, the indispensable condition (conditio sine

qua non) of grasping the object as a single representation and giving to the manifold its determinate form.

This determination is an end in respect of knowledge; and in this connection it is invariably coupled with

delight (such as attends the accomplishment of any, even problematical, purpose). Here, however, we have

merely the value set upon the solution that satisfies the problem, and not a free and indeterminately final

entertainment of the mental powers with what is called beautiful. In the latter case, understanding is at the

With a thing that owes its possibility to a purpose, a building, or even an animal, its regularity, which consists

in symmetry, must express the unity of the intuition accompanying the concept of its end, and belongs with it

to cognition. But where all that is intended is the maintenance of a free play of the powers of representation

(subject, however, to the condition that there is to be nothing for understanding to take exception to), in

ornamental gardens, in the decoration of rooms, in all kinds of furniture that shows good taste, etc., regularity

in the shape of constraint is to be avoided as far as possible. Thus English taste in gardens, and fantastic taste

in furniture, push the freedom of imagination to the verge of what is grotesque the idea being that in this

divorce from all constraint of rules the precise instance is being afforded where taste can exhibit its perfection

All stiff regularity (such as borders on mathematical regularity) is inherently repugnant to taste, in that the

contemplation of it affords us no lasting entertainment. Indeed, where it has neither cognition nor some

definite practical end expressly in view, we get heartily tired of it. On the other hand, anything that gives the

imagination scope for unstudied and final play is always fresh to us. We do not grow to hate the very sight of

it. Marsden, in his description of Sumatra, observes that the free beauties of nature so surround the beholder

on all sides that they cease to have much attraction for him. On the other band he found a pepper garden full

of charm, on coming across it in midforest with its rows of parallel stakes on which the plant twines itself.

From all this he infers that wild, and in its appearance quite irregular beauty, is only pleasing as a change to

one whose eyes have become surfeited with regular beauty. But he need only have made the experiment of

passing one day in his pepper garden to realize that once the regularity has enabled the understanding to put

itself in accord with the order that is the constant requirement, instead of the object diverting him any longer,

it imposes an irksome constraint upon the imagination: whereas nature subject to no constraint of artificial

rules, and lavish, as it there is, in its luxuriant variety can supply constant food for his taste. Even a bird's

song, which we can reduce to no musical rule, seems to have more freedom in it, and thus to be richer for

taste, than the human voice singing in accordance with all the rules that the art of music prescribes; for we

grow tired much sooner of frequent and lengthy repetitions of the latter. Yet here most likely our sympathy

SS 20. The condition of the necessity advanced by a judgement of taste is the idea of a common sense. 39

with the mirth of a dear little creature is confused with the beauty of its song, for if exactly imitated by man

(as has been sometimes done with the notes of the nightingale) it would strike our ear as wholly destitute of

Further, beautiful objects have to be distinguished from beautiful views of objects (where the distance often

prevents a clear perception). In the latter case, taste appears to fasten, not so much on what the imagination

grasps in this field, as on the incentive it receives to indulge in poetic fiction, i. e., in the peculiar fancies with

which the mind entertains itself as it is being continually stirred by the variety that strikes the eye. It is just as

when we watch the changing shapes of the fire or of a rippling brook: neither of which are things of beauty,

The beautiful and the sublime agree on the point of pleasing on their own account. Further they agree in not

presupposing either a judgement of sense or one logically determinant, but one of reflection. Hence it follows

that the delight does not depend upon a sensation, as with the agreeable, nor upon a definite concept, as does

the delight in the good, although it has, for all that, an indeterminate reference to concepts. Consequently the

delight is connected with the mere presentation or faculty of presentation, and is thus taken to express the

accord, in a given intuition, of the faculty of presentation, or the imagination, with the faculty of concepts that

belongs to understanding or reason, in the sense of the former assisting the latter. Hence both kinds of

judgements are singular, and yet such as profess to be universally valid in respect of every subject, despite the

fact that their claims are directed merely to the feeling of pleasure and not to any knowledge of the object.

There are, however, also important and striking differences between the two. The beautiful in nature is a

question of the form of object, and this consists in limitation, whereas the sublime is to be found in an object

even devoid of form, so far as it immediately involves, or else by its presence provokes a representation of

limitlessness, yet with a superadded thought of its totality. Accordingly, the beautiful seems to be regarded as

a presentation of an indeterminate concept of understanding, the sublime as a presentation of an

indeterminate concept of reason. Hence the delight is in the former case coupled with the representation of

quality, but in this case with that of quantity. Moreover, the former delight is very different from the latter in

kind. For the beautiful is directly attended with a feeling of the furtherance of life, and is thus compatible

with charms and a playful imagination. On the other hand, the feeling of the sublime is a pleasure that only

arises indirectly, being brought about by the feeling of a momentary check to the vital forces followed at once

by a discharge all the more powerful, and so it is an emotion that seems to be no sport, but dead earnest in the

affairs of the imagination. Hence charms are repugnant to it; and, since the mind is not simply attracted by the

object, but is also alternately repelled thereby, the delight in the sublime does not so much involve positive

pleasure as admiration or respect, i. e., merits the name of a negative pleasure.

But the most important and vital distinction between the sublime and the beautiful is certainly this: that if, as

is allowable, we here confine our attention in the first instance to the sublime in objects of nature (that of art

being always restricted by the conditions of an agreement with nature), we observe that whereas natural

beauty (such as is selfsubsisting) conveys a finality in its form making the object appear, as it were,

preadapted to our power of judgement, so that it thus forms of itself an object of our delight, that which,

without our indulging in any refinements of thought, but, simply in our apprehension of it, excites the feeling

of the sublime, may appear, indeed, in point of form to contravene the ends of our power of judgement, to be

illadapted to our faculty of presentation, and to be, as it were, an outrage on the imagination, and yet it is

From this it may be seen at once that we express ourselves on the whole inaccurately if we term any object of

nature sublime, although we may with perfect propriety call many such objects beautiful. For how can that

which is apprehended as inherently contrafinal be noted with an expression of approval? All that we can say

is that the object lends itself to the presentation of a sublimity discoverable in the mind.

For the sublime, in the strict sense of the word, cannot be contained in any sensuous form, but rather concerns

ideas of reason, which, although no adequate presentation of them is possible, may be excited and called into

the mind by that very inadequacy itself which does admit of sensuous presentation. Thus the broad ocean

agitated by storms cannot be called sublime. Its aspect is horrible, and one must have stored one's mind in

advance with a rich stock of ideas, if such an intuition is to raise it to the pitch of a feeling which is itself

sublimesublime because the mind has been incited to abandon sensibility and employ itself upon ideas

Selfsubsisting natural beauty reveals to us a technic of nature which shows it in the light of a system ordered

in accordance with laws the principle of which is not to be found within the range of our entire faculty of

understanding. This principle is that of a finality relative to the employment of judgement in respect of

phenomena which have thus to be assigned, not merely to nature regarded as aimless mechanism, but also to

nature regarded after the analogy of art. Hence it gives a veritable extension, not, of course, to our knowledge

of objects of nature, but to our conception of nature itselfnature as mere mechanism being enlarged to the

conception of nature as artan extension inviting profound inquiries as to the possibility of such a form. But

in what we are wont to call sublime in nature there is such an absence of anything leading to particular

objective principles and corresponding forms of nature that it is rather in its chaos, or in its wildest and most

irregular disorder and desolation, provided it gives signs of magnitude and power, that nature chiefly excites

the ideas of the sublime. Hence we see that the concept of the sublime in nature is far less important and rich

in consequences than that of its beauty. It gives on the whole no indication of anything final in nature itself,

but only in the possible employment of our intuitions of it in inducing a feeling in our own selves of a finality

quite independent of nature. For the beautiful in nature we must seek a ground external to ourselves, but for

the sublime one merely in ourselves and the attitude of mind that introduces sublimity into the representation

of nature. This is a very needful preliminary remark. It entirely separates the ideas of the sublime from that of

a finality of nature, and makes the theory of the sublime a mere appendage to the aesthetic estimate of the

finality of nature, because it does not give a representation of any particular form in nature, but involves no

more than the development of a final employment by the imagination of its own representation.

In the division of the moments of an aesthetic estimate of objects in respect of the feeling of the sublime, the

course of the Analytic will be able to follow the same principle as in the analysis of judgements of taste. For,

the judgement being one of the aesthetic reflective judgement, the delight in the sublime, just like that in the

beautiful, must in its quantity be shown to be universally valid, in its quality independent of interest, in its

relation subjective finality, and the latter, in its modality, necessary. Hence the method here will not depart

from the lines followed in the preceding section: unless something is made of the point that there, where the

aesthetic judgement bore on the form of the object, we began with the investigation of its quality, whereas

here, considering the formlessness that may belong to what we call sublime, we begin with that of its

quantity, as first moment of the aesthetic judgement on the sublimea divergence of method the reason for

But the analysis of the sublime obliges a division not required by that of the beautiful, namely one into the

For the feeling of sublime involves as its characteristic feature a mental movement combined with the

estimate of the object, whereas taste in respect of the beautiful presupposes that the mind is in restful

contemplation, and preserves it in this state. But this movement has to be estimated as subjectively final

(since the sublime pleases). Hence it is referred through the imagination either to the faculty of cognition or

to that of desire; but to whichever faculty the reference is made, the finality of the given representation is

estimated only in respect of these faculties (apart from end or interest). Accordingly the first is attributed to

the object as a mathematical, the second as a dynamical, affection of the imagination. Hence we get the above

Sublime is the name given to what is absolutely great. But to be great and to be a magnitude are entirely

different concepts (magnitudo and quantitas). In the same way, to assert without qualification (simpliciter)

that something is great is quite a different thing from saying that it is absolutely great (absolute, non

comparative magnum). The latter is what is beyond all comparison great. What, then, is the meaning of the

assertion that anything is great, or small, or of medium size? What is indicated is not a pure concept of

understanding, still less an intuition of sense; and just as little is it a concept of reason, for it does not import

any principle of cognition. It must, therefore, be a concept of judgement, or have its source in one, and must

introduce as basis of the judgement a subjective finality of the representation with reference to the power of

judgement. Given a multiplicity of the homogeneous together constituting one thing, and we may at once

cognize from the thing itself that it is a magnitude (quantum). No comparison with other things is required.

But to determine how great it is always requires something else, which itself has magnitude, for its measure.

Now, since in the estimate of magnitude we have to take into account not merely the multiplicity (number of

units) but also the magnitude of the unit (the measure), and since the magnitude of this unit in turn always

requires something else as its measure and as the standard of its comparison, and so on, we see that the

computation of the magnitude of phenomena is, in all cases, utterly incapable of affording us any absolute

concept of a magnitude, and can, instead, only afford one that is always based on comparison.

If, now, I assert without qualification that anything is great, it would seem that I have nothing in the way of a

comparison present to my mind, or at least nothing involving an objective measure, for no attempt is thus

made to determine how great the object is. But, despite the standard of comparison being merely subjective,

the claim of the judgement is none the less one to universal agreement; the judgements: "that man is

beautiful" and "He is tall", do not purport to speak only for the judging subject, but, like theoretical

Now in a judgement that without qualification describes anything as great, it is not merely meant that the

object has a magnitude, but greatness is ascribed to it preeminently among many other objects of a like kind,

yet without the extent of this preeminence being determined. Hence a standard is certainly laid at the basis

of the judgement, which standard is presupposed to be one that can be taken as the same for every one, but

which is available only for an aesthetic estimate of the greatness, and not for one that is logical

(mathematically determined), for the standard is a merely subjective one underlying the reflective judgement

upon the greatness. Furthermore, this standard may be empirical, as, let us say, the average size of the men

known to us, of animals of a certain kind, of trees, of houses, of mountains, and so forth. Or it may be a

standard given a priori, which by reason of the imperfections of the judging subject is restricted to subjective

conditions of presentation in concreto; as, in the practical sphere, the greatness of a particular virtue, or of

public liberty and justice in a country; or, in the theoretical sphere, the greatness of the accuracy or

Here, now, it is of note that, although we have no interest whatever in the object, i.e., its real existence may

be a matter of no concern to us, still its mere greatness, regarded even as devoid of form, is able to convey a

universally communicable delight and so involve the consciousness of a subjective finality in the

employment of our cognitive faculties, but not, be it remembered, a delight in the object, for the latter may be

formless, but, in contradistinction to what is the case with the beautiful, where the reflective judgement finds

itself set to a key that is final in respect of cognition generally, a delight in an extension affecting the

If (subject as above) we say of an object, without qualification, that it is great, this is not a mathematically

determinant, but a mere reflective judgement upon its representation, which is subjectively final for a

particular employment of our cognitive faculties in the estimation of magnitude, and we then always couple

with the representation a kind of respect, just as we do a kind of contempt with what we call absolutely small.

Moreover, the estimate of things as great or small extends to everything, even to all their qualities. Thus we

call even their beauty great or small. The reason of this is to be found in the fact that we have only got to

present a thing in intuition, as the precept of judgement directs (consequently to represent it aesthetically), for

If, however, we call anything not alone great, but, without qualification, absolutely, and in every respect

(beyond all comparison) great, that is to say, sublime, we soon perceive that for this it is not permissible to

seek an appropriate standard outside itself, but merely in itself. It is a greatness comparable to itself alone.

Hence it comes that the sublime is not to be looked for in the things of nature, but only in our own ideas. But

The above definition may also be expressed in this way: that is sublime in comparison with which all else is

small. Here we readily see that nothing can be given in nature, no matter how great we may judge it to be,

which, regarded in some other relation, may not be degraded to the level of the infinitely little, and nothing so

small which in comparison with some still smaller standard may not for our imagination be enlarged to the

greatness of a world. Telescopes have put within our reach an abundance of material to go upon in making

the first observation, and microscopes the same in making the second. Nothing, therefore, which can be an

object of the senses is to be termed sublime when treated on this footing. But precisely because there is a

striving in our imagination towards progress ad infinitum, while reason demands absolute totality, as a real

idea, that same inability on the part of our faculty for the estimation of the magnitude of things of the world

of sense to attain to this idea, is the awakening of a feeling of a supersensible faculty within us; and it is the

use to which judgement naturally puts particular objects on behalf of this latter feeling, and not the object of

sense, that is absolutely great, and every other contrasted employment small. Consequently it is the

disposition of soul evoked by a particular representation engaging the attention of the reflective judgement,

The foregoing formulae defining the sublime may, therefore, be supplemented by yet another: The sublime is

that, the mere capacity of thinking which evidences a faculty of mind transcending every standard of sense.

The estimation of magnitude by means of concepts of number (or their signs in algebra) is mathematical, but

that in mere intuition (by the eye) is aesthetic. Now we can only get definite concepts of how great anything

is by having recourse to numbers (or, at any rate, by getting approximate measurements by means of

numerical series progressing ad infinitum), the unit being the measure; and to this extent all logical

SS 26. The estimation of the magnitude of natural things requisite for the idea of the sublime. 43

estimation of magnitude is mathematical. But, as the magnitude of the measure has to be assumed as a known

quantity, if, to form an estimate of this, we must again have recourse to numbers involving another standard

for their unit, and consequently must again proceed mathematically, we can never arrive at a first or

fundamental measure, and so cannot get any definite concept of a given magnitude. The estimation of the

magnitude of the fundamental measure must, therefore, consist merely in the immediate grasp which we can

get of it in intuition, and the use to which our imagination can put this in presenting the numerical concepts:

i.e., all estimation of the magnitude of objects of nature is in the last resort aesthetic (i.e., subjectively and not

Now for the mathematical estimation of magnitude there is, of course, no greatest possible (for the power of

numbers extends to infinity), but for the aesthetic estimation there certainly is and of it I say that where it is

considered an absolute measure beyond which no greater is possible subjectively (i.e., for the judging

subject), it then conveys the idea of the sublime and calls forth that emotion which no mathematical

estimation of magnitudes by numbers can evoke (unless in so far as the fundamental aesthetic measure is kept

vividly present to the imagination): because the latter presents only the relative magnitude due to comparison

with others of a like kind, whereas the former presents magnitude absolutely, so far as the mind can grasp it

To take in a quantum intuitively in the imagination so as to be able to use it as a measure, or unit for

estimating magnitude by numbers, involves two operations of this faculty: apprehension (apprehensio) and

comprehension (comprehension aesthetica). Apprehension presents no difficulty: for this process can be

carried on ad infinitum; but with the advance of apprehension comprehension becomes more difficult at every

step and soon attains its maximum, and this is the aesthetically greatest fundamental measure for the

estimation of magnitude. For if the apprehension has reached a point beyond which the representations of

sensuous intuition in the case of the parts first apprehended begin to disappear from the imagination as this

advances to the apprehension of yet others, as much, then, is lost at one end as is gained at the other, and for

This explains Savary's observations in his account of Egypt, that in order to get the full emotional effect of

the size of the Pyramids we must avoid coming too near just as much as remaining too far away. For in the

latter case the representation of the apprehended parts (the tiers of stones) is but obscure, and produces no

effect upon the aesthetic judgement of the Subject. In the former, however, it takes the eye some time to

complete the apprehension from the base to the summit; but in this interval the first tiers always in part

disappear before the imagination has taken in the last, and so the comprehension is never complete. The same

explanation may also sufficiently account for the bewilderment, or sort of perplexity, which, as is said, seizes

the visitor on first entering St. Peter's in Rome. For here a feeling comes home to him of the inadequacy of

his imagination for presenting the idea of a whole within which that imagination attains its maximum, and, in

its fruitless efforts to extend this limit, recoils upon itself, but in so doing succumbs to an emotional delight.

At present I am not disposed to deal with the ground of this delight, connected, as it is, with a representation

in which we would least of all look for ita representation, namely, that lets us see its own inadequacy, and

consequently its subjective want of finality for our judgement in the estimation of magnitudebut confine

myself to the remark that if the aesthetic judgement is to be pure (unmixed with any teleological judgement

which, as such, belongs to reason), and if we are to give a suitable example of it for the Critique of aesthetic

judgement, we must not point to the sublime in works of art, e.g., buildings, statues and the like, where a

human end determines the form as well as the magnitude, nor yet in things of nature, that in their very

concept import a definite end, e.g., animals of a recognized natural order, but in rude nature merely as

involving magnitude (and only in this so far as it does not convey any charm or any emotion arising from

actual danger). For, in a representation of this kind, nature contains nothing monstrous (nor what is either

magnificent or horrible)the magnitude apprehended may be increased to any extent provided imagination is

able to grasp it all in one whole. An object is monstrous where by its size it defeats the end that forms its

SS 26. The estimation of the magnitude of natural things requisite for the idea of the sublime. 44

concept. The colossal is the mere presentation of a concept which is almost too great for presentation, i.e.,

borders on the relatively monstrous; for the end to be attained by the presentation of a concept is made harder

to realize by the intuition of the object being almost too great for our faculty of apprehension. A pure

judgement upon the sublime must, however, have no end belonging to the object as its determining ground, if

it is to be aesthetic and not to be tainted with any judgement of understanding or reason.

Since whatever is to be a source of pleasure, apart from interest, to the merely reflective judgement must

involve in its representation subjective, and, as such, universally valid finalitythough here, however, no

finality of the form of the object underlies our estimate of it (as it does in the case of the beautiful)the

question arises: What is the subjective finality, and what enables it to be prescribed as a norm so as to yield a

ground for universally valid delight in the mere estimation of magnitude, and that, too, in a case where it is

pushed to the point at which faculty of imagination breaks down in presenting the concept of a magnitude,

In the successive aggregation of units requisite for the representation of magnitudes, the imagination of itself

advances ad infinitum without let or hindranceunderstanding, however, conducting it by means of concepts

of number for which the former must supply the schema. This procedure belongs to the logical estimation of

magnitude, and, as such, is doubtless something objectively final according to the concept of an end (as all

measurement is), but it is hot anything which for the aesthetic judgement is final or pleasing. Further, in this

intentional finality there is nothing compelling us to tax the utmost powers of the imagination, and drive it as

far as ever it can reach in its presentations, so as to enlarge the size of the measure, and thus make the single

intuition holding the many in one (the comprehension) as great as possible. For, in the estimation of

magnitude by the understanding (arithmetic), we get just as far, whether the comprehension of the units is

pushed to the number 10 (as in the decimal scale) or only to 4 (as in the quaternary); the further production of

magnitude being carried out by the successive aggregation of units, or, if the quantum is given in intuition, by

apprehension, merely progressively (not comprehensively), according to an adopted principle of progression.

In this mathematical estimation of magnitude, understanding is as well served and as satisfied whether

imagination selects for the unit a magnitude which one can take in at a glance, e.g., a foot, or a perch, or else

a German mile, or even the earth's diameter, the apprehension of which is indeed possible, but not its

comprehension in, sit intuition of the imagination (i.e., it is not possible by means of a comprehension

aesthetica, thought quite so by means of a comprehension logica in a numerical concept). In each case the

The mind, however, hearkens now to the voice of reason, which for all given magnitudeseven for those

which can never be completely apprehended, though (in sensuous representation) estimated as completely

givenrequires totality, and consequently comprehension in one intuition, and which calls for a presentation

answering to all the above members of a progressively increasing numerical series, and does not exempt even

the infinite (space and time past) from this requirement, but rather renders it inevitable for us to regard this

infinite (in the judgement of common reason) as completely given (i.e., given in its totality).

But the infinite is absolutely (not merely comparatively) great. In comparison with this all else (in the way of

magnitudes of the same order) is small. But the point of capital importance is that the mere ability even to

think it as a whole indicates a faculty of mind transcending every standard of sense. For the latter would

entail a comprehension yielding as unit a standard bearing to the infinite ratio expressible in numbers, which

is impossible. Still the mere ability even to think the given infinite without contradiction, is something that

requires the presence in the human mind of a faculty that is itself supersensible. For it is only through this

faculty and its idea of a noumenon, which latter, while not itself admitting of any intuition, is yet introduced

as substrate underlying the intuition of the world as mere phenomenon, that the infinite of the world of sense,

in the pure intellectual estimation of magnitude, is completely comprehended under a concept, although in the

mathematical estimation by means of numerical concepts it can never be completely thought. Even a faculty

enabling the infinite of supersensible intuition to be regarded as given (in its intelligible substrate), transcends

SS 26. The estimation of the magnitude of natural things requisite for the idea of the sublime. 45

every standard of sensibility and is great beyond all comparison even with the faculty of mathematical

estimation: not, of course, from a theoretical point of view that looks to the interests of our faculty of

knowledge, but as a broadening of the mind that from another (the practical) point of view feels itself

Nature, therefore, is sublime in such of its phenomena as in their intuition convey the idea of their infinity.

But this can only occur through the inadequacy of even the greatest effort of our imagination in the

estimation of the magnitude of an object. But, now, in the case of the mathematical estimation of magnitude,

imagination is quite competent to supply a measure equal to the requirements of any object. For the

numerical concepts of the understanding can by progressive synthesis make any measure adequate to any

given magnitude. Hence it must be the aesthetic estimation of magnitude in which we get at once a feeling of

the effort towards a comprehension that exceeds the faculty of imagination for mentally grasping the

progressive apprehension in a whole of intuition, and, with it, a perception of the inadequacy of this faculty,

which has no bounds to its progress, for taking in and using for the estimation of magnitude a fundamental

measure that understanding could turn to account without the least trouble. Now the proper unchangeable

fundamental measure of nature is its absolute whole, which, with it, regarded as a phenomenon, means

infinity comprehended. But, since this fundamental measure is a selfcontradictory concept (owing to the

impossibility of the absolute totality of an endless progression), it follows that where the size of a natural

object is such that the imagination spends its whole faculty of comprehension upon it in vain, it must carry

our concept of nature, to a supersensible substrate (underlying both nature and our faculty of thought). which

is, great beyond every standard of sense. Thus, instead of the object, it is rather the cast of the mind in

Therefore, just as the aesthetic judgement in its estimate of the beautiful refers the imagination in its free play

to the understanding, to bring out its agreement with the concepts of the latter in general (apart from their

determination): so in its estimate of a thing as sublime it refers that faculty to reason to bring out its

subjective accord with ideas of reason (indeterminately indicated), i.e., to induce a temper of mind

conformableto that which the influence of definite (practical) ideas would produce upon feeling, and in

This makes it evident that true sublimity must be sought only in the mind of the judging subject, and not in

the object of nature that occasions this attitude by the estimate formed of it. Who would apply the term

"sublime" even to shapeless mountain masses towering one above the other in wild disorder, with their

pyramids of ice, or to the dark tempestuous ocean, or such like things? But in the contemplation of them,

without any regard to their form, the mind abandons itself to the imagination and to a reason placed, though

quite apart from any definite end, in conjunction therewith, and merely broadening its view, and it feels itself

elevated in its own estimate of itself on finding all the might of imagination still unequal to its ideas.

We get examples of the mathematically sublime of nature in mere intuition in all those instances where our

imagination is afforded, not so much a greater numerical concept as a large unit as measure (for shortening

the numerical series). A tree judged by the height of man gives, at all events, a standard for a mountain; and,

supposing this is, say, a mile high, it can serve as unit for the number expressing the earth's diameter, so as to

make it intuitable; similarly the earth's diameter for the known planetary system; this again for the system of

the Milky Way; and the immeasurable host of such systems, which go by the name of nebulae, and most

likely in turn themselves form such a system, holds out no prospect of a limit. Now in the aesthetic estimate

of such an immeasurable whole, the sublime does not lie so much in the greatness of the number, as in the

fact that in our onward advance we always arrive at proportionately greater units. The systematic division of

the cosmos conduces to this result. For it represents all that is great in nature as in turn becoming little; or, to

be more exact, it represents our imagination in all its boundlessness, and with it nature, as sinking into

insignificance before the ideas of reason, once their adequate presentation is attempted.

SS 26. The estimation of the magnitude of natural things requisite for the idea of the sublime. 46

The feeling of our incapacity to attain to an idea that is a law for us, is respect. Now the idea of the

comprehension of any phenomenon whatever, that may be given us, in a whole of intuition, is an idea

imposed upon us by a law of reason, which recognizes no definite, universally valid and unchangeable

measure except the absolute whole. But our imagination, even when taxing itself to the uttermost on the score

of this required comprehension of a given object in a whole of intuition (and so with a view to the

presentation of the idea of reason), betrays its limits and its inadequacy, but still, at the same time, its proper

vocation of making itself adequate to the same as law. Therefore the feeling of the sublime in nature is

respect for our own vocation, which we attribute to an object of nature by a certain subreption (substitution of

a respect for the object in place of one for the idea of humanity in our own selfthe subject); and this feeling

renders, as it were, intuitable the supremacy of our cognitive faculties on the rational side over the greatest

The feeling of the sublime is, therefore, at once a feeling of displeasure, arising from the inadequacy of

imagination in the aesthetic estimation of magnitude to attain to its estimation by reason, and a

simultaneously awakened pleasure, arising from this very judgement of the inadequacy of the greatest faculty

of sense being in accord with ideas of reason, so far as the effort to attain to these is for us a law. It is, in other

words, for us a law (of reason), which goes to make us what we are, that we should esteem as small in

comparison with ideas of reason everything which for us is great in nature as an object of sense; and that

which makes us alive to the feeling of this supersensible side of our being harmonizes with that law. Now the

greatest effort of the imagination in the presentation of the unit for the estimation of magnitude involves in

itself a reference to something absolutely great, consequently a reference also to the law of reason that this

alone is to be adopted as the supreme measure of what is great. Therefore the inner perception of the

inadequacy of every standard of sense to serve for the rational estimation of magnitude is a coming into

accord with reason's laws, and a displeasure that makes us alive to the feeling of the supersensible side of our

being, according to which it is final, and consequently a pleasure, to find every standard of sensibility falling

The mind feels itself set in motion in the representation of the sublime in nature; whereas in the aesthetic

judgement upon what is beautiful therein it is in restful contemplation. This movement, especially in its

inception, may be compared with vibration, i.e., with a rapidly alternating repulsion and attraction produced

by one and the same object. The point of excess for the imagination (towards which it is driven in the

apprehension of the intuition) is like an abyss in which it fears to lose itself, yet again for the rational idea of

the supersensible it is not excessive, but conformable to law, and directed to drawing out such an effort on the

part of the imagination: and so in turn as much a source of attraction as it was repellent to mere sensibility.

But the judgement itself all the while steadfastly preserves its aesthetic character, because it represents,

without being grounded on any definite concept of the object, merely the subjective play of the mental

powers (imagination and reason) as harmonious by virtue of their very contrast. For just as in the estimate of

the beautiful imagination and understanding by their concert generate subjective finality of the mental

faculties, so imagination and reason do so here by their conflictthat is to say they induce a feeling of our

possessing a pure and selfsufficient reason, or a faculty for the estimation of magnitude, whose preeminence

can only be made intuitively evident by the inadequacy of that faculty which in the presentation of

Measurement of a space (as apprehension) is at the same time a description of it, and so an objective

movement in the imagination and a progression. On the other hand, the comprehension of the manifold in the

unity, not of thought, but of intuition, and consequently the comprehension of the successively apprehended

parts at one glance, is a retrogression that removes the timecondition in the progression of the imagination,

and renders coexistence intuitable. Therefore, since the timeseries is a condition of the internal sense and of

an intuition, it is a subjective movement of the imagination by which it does violence to the internal sensea

violence which must be proportionately more striking the greater the quantum which the imagination

comprehends in one intuition. The effort, therefore, to receive in a single intuition a measure for magnitudes

which it takes an appreciable time to apprehend, is a mode of representation which, subjectively considered,

is contrafinal, but objectively, is requisite for the estimation of magnitude, and is consequently final. Here

the very same violence that is wrought on the subject through the imagination is estimated as final for the

The quality of the feeling of the sublime consists in being, in respect of the faculty of forming aesthetic

estimates, a feeling of displeasure at an object, which yet, at the same time, is represented as being finala

representation which derives its possibility from the fact that the subject's very incapacity betrays the

consciousness of an unlimited faculty of the same subject, and that the mind can only form an aesthetic

In the case of the logical estimation of magnitude, the impossibility of ever arriving at absolute totality by the

progressive measurement of things of the sensible world in time and space was cognized as an objective

impossibility, i.e., one of thinking the infinite as given, and not as simply subjective, i.e., an incapacity for

grasping it; for nothing turns there on the amount of the comprehension in one intuition, as measure, but

everything depends on a numerical concept. But in an aesthetic estimation of magnitude the numerical

concept must drop out of count or undergo a change. The only thing that is final for such estimation is the

comprehension on the part of imagination in respect of the unit of measure (the concept of a law of the

successive production of the concept of magnitude being consequently avoided). If, now, a magnitude begins

to tax the utmost stretch of our faculty of comprehension in an intuition, and still numerical magnitudesin

respect of which we are conscious of the boundlessness of our facultycall upon the imagination for aesthetic

comprehension in a greater unit, the mind then gets a feeling of being aesthetically confined within bounds.

Nevertheless, with a view to the extension of imagination necessary for adequacy with what is unbounded in

our faculty of reason, namely the idea of the absolute whole, the attendant displeasure, and, consequently, the

want of finality in our faculty of imagination, is still represented as final for ideas of reason and their

animation. But in this very way the aesthetic judgement itself is subjectively final for reason as source of

ideas, i.e., of such an intellectual comprehension as makes all aesthetic comprehension small, and the object

is received as sublime with a pleasure that is only possible through the mediation of a displeasure.

Might is a power which is superior to great hindrances. It is termed dominion if it is also superior to the

resistance of that which itself possesses might. Nature, considered in an aesthetic judgement as might that has

If we are to estimate nature as dynamically sublime, it must be represented as a source of fear (though the

converse, that every object that is a source of fear, in our aesthetic judgement, sublime, does not hold). For in

forming an aesthetic estimate (no concept being present) the superiority to hindrances can only be estimated

according to the greatness of the resistance. Now that which we strive to resist is an evil, and, if we do not

find our powers commensurate to the task, an object of fear. Hence the aesthetic judgement can only deem

nature a might, and so dynamically sublime, in so far as it is looked upon as an object of fear.

But we may look upon an object as fearful, and yet not be afraid of it, if, that is, our estimate takes the form

of our simply picturing to ourselves the case of our wishing to offer some resistance to it and recognizing that

all such resistance would be quite futile. So the righteous man fears God without being afraid of Him,

because he regards the case of his wishing to resist God and His commandments as one which need cause

him no anxiety. But in every such case, regarded by him as not intrinsically impossible, he cognizes Him as

One who is in a state of fear can no more play the part of a judge of the sublime of nature than one captivated

by inclination and appetite can of the beautiful. He flees from the sight of an object filling him with dread;

and it is impossible to take delight in terror that is seriously entertained. Hence the agreeableness arising from

the cessation of an uneasiness is a state of joy. But this, depending upon deliverance from a danger, is a

rejoicing accompanied with a resolve never again to put oneself in the way of the danger: in fact we do not

like bringing back to mind how we felt on that occasion not to speak of going in search of an opportunity for

Bold, overhanging, and, as it were, threatening rocks, thunderclouds piled up the vault of heaven, borne along

with flashes and peals, volcanos in all their violence of destruction, hurricanes leaving desolation in their

track, the boundless ocean rising with rebellious force, the high waterfall of some mighty river, and the like,

make our power of resistance of trifling moment in comparison with their might. But, provided our own

position is secure, their aspect is all the more attractive for its fearfulness; and we readily call these objects

sublime, because they raise the forces of the soul above the height of vulgar commonplace, and discover

within us a power of resistance of quite another kind, which gives us courage to be able to measure ourselves

In the immeasurableness of nature and the incompetence of our faculty for adopting a standard proportionate

to the aesthetic estimation of the magnitude of its realm, we found our own limitation. But with this we also

found in our rational faculty another nonsensuous standard, one which has that infinity itself under it as a

unit, and in comparison with which everything in nature is small, and so found in our minds a preeminence

over nature even in it immeasurability. Now in just the same way the irresistibility of the might of nature

forces upon us the recognition of our physical helplessness as beings of nature, but at the same time reveals a

faculty of estimating ourselves as independent of nature, and discovers a preeminence above nature that is

the foundation of a selfpreservation of quite another kind from that which may be assailed and brought into

danger by external nature. This saves humanity in our own person from humiliation, even though as mortal

men we have to submit to external violence. In this way, external nature is not estimated in our aesthetic

judgement as sublime so far as exciting fear, but rather because it challenges our power (one not of nature) to

regard as small those things of which we are wont to be solicitous (worldly goods, health, and life), and hence

to regard its might (to which in these matters we are no doubt subject) as exercising over us and our

personality no such rude dominion that we should bow down before it, once the question becomes one of our

highest principles and of our asserting or forsaking them. Therefore nature is here called sublime merely

because it raises the imagination to a presentation of those cases in which the mind can make itself sensible of

This estimation of ourselves loses nothing by the fact that we must see ourselves safe in order to feel this

soulstirring delighta fact from which it might be plausibly argued that, as there is no seriousness in the

danger, so there is just as little seriousness in the sublimity of our faculty of soul. For here the delight only

concerns the province of our faculty disclosed in such a case, so far as this faculty has its root in our nature;

notwithstanding that its development and exercise is left to ourselves and remains an obligation. Here indeed

there is truthno matter how conscious a man, when he stretches his reflection so far abroad, may be of his

This principle has, doubtless, the appearance of being too farfetched and subtle, and so of lying beyond the

reach of an aesthetic judgement. But observation of men proves the reverse, and that it may be the foundation

of the commonest judgements, although one is not always conscious of its presence. For what is it that, even

to the savage, is the object of the greatest admiration? It is a man who is undaunted, who knows no fear, and

who, therefore, does not give way to danger, but sets manfully to work with full deliberation. Even where

civilization has reached a high pitch, there remains this special reverence for the soldier; only that there is

then further required of him that he should also exhibit all the virtues of peacegentleness, sympathy, and

even becoming thought for his own person; and for the reason that in this we recognize that his mind is above

the threats of danger. And so, comparing the statesman and the general, men may argue as they please as to

the preeminent respect which is due to either above the other; but the verdict of the aesthetic judgement is

for the latter. War itself, provided it is conducted with order and a sacred respect for the rights of civilians,

has something sublime about it, and gives nations that carry it on in such a manner a stamp of mind only the

more sublime the more numerous the dangers to which they are exposed, and which they are able to meet

with fortitude. On the other hand, a prolonged peace favours the predominance of a mere commercial spirit,

and with it a debasing selfinterest, cowardice, and effeminacy, and tends to degrade the character of the

So far as sublimity is predicated of might, this solution of the concept of it appears at variance with the fact

that we are wont to represent God in the tempest, the storm, the earthquake, and the like, as presenting

Himself in His wrath, but at the same time also in His sublimity, and yet here it would be alike folly and

presumption to imagine a preeminence of our minds over the operations and, as it appears, even over the

direction of such might. Here, instead of a feeling of the sublimity of our own nature, submission, prostration,

Aristotle's remarks on Courage, in the utter helplessness seem more to constitute the attitude of mind befitting

the manifestation of such an object, and to be that also more customarily associated with the idea of it on the

occasion of a natural phenomenon of this kind. In religion, as a rule, prostration, adoration with bowed head,

coupled with contrite, timorous posture and voice, seems to be the only becoming demeanour in presence of

the Godhead, and accordingly most nations have assumed and still observe it. Yet this cast of mind is far

from being intrinsically and necessarily involved in the idea of the sublimily of a religion and of its object.

The man that is actually in a state of fear, finding in himself good reason to be so, because he is conscious of

offending with his evil disposition against a might directed by a will at once irresistible and just, is far from

being in the frame of mind for admiring divine greatness, for which a temper of calm reflection and a quite

free judgement are required. Only when he becomes conscious of having a disposition that is upright and

acceptable to God, do those operations of might serve, to stir within him the idea of the sublimity of this

Being, so far as he recognizes the existence in himself of a sublimity of disposition consonant with His will,

and is thus raised above the dread of such operations of nature, in which he no longer sees God pouring forth

the vials of the wrath. Even humility, taking the form of an uncompromising judgement upon his

shortcomings, which, with consciousness of good intentions, might readily be glossed over on the ground of

the frailty of human nature, is a sublime temper of the mind voluntarily to undergo the pain of remorse as a

means of more and more effectually eradicating its cause. In this way religion is intrinsically distinguished

from superstition, which latter rears in the mind, not reverence for the sublime, but dread and apprehension of

the allpowerful Being to whose will terrorstricken man sees himself subjected, yet without according Him

due honour. From this nothing can arise but gracebegging and vain adulation, instead of a religion

Sublimity, therefore, does not reside in any of the things of nature, but only in our own mind, in so far as we

may become conscious of our superiority over nature within, and thus also over nature without us (as exerting

influence upon us). Everything that provokes this feeling in us, including the might of nature which

challenges our strength, is then, though improperly, called sublime, and it is only under presupposition of this

idea within us, and in relation to it, that we are capable of attaining to the idea of the sublimity of that Being

Which inspires deep respect in us, not by the mere display of its might in nature, but more by the faculty

which is planted in us of estimating that might without fear, and of regarding our estate as exalted above it.

Beautiful nature contains countless things as to which we at once take every one as in their judgement

concurring with our own, and as to which we may further expect this concurrence without facts finding us far

astray. But in respect of our judgement upon the sublime in nature, we cannot so easily vouch for ready

acceptance by others. For a far higher degree of culture, not merely of the aesthetic judgement, but also of the

faculties of cognition which lie at its basis, seems to be requisite to enable us to lay down a judgement upon

The proper mental mood for a feeling of the sublime postulates the mind's susceptibility for ideas, since it is

precisely in the failure of nature to attain to these and consequently only under presupposition of this

susceptibility and of the straining of the imagination to use nature as a schema for ideas that there is

something forbidding to sensibility, but which, for all that, has an attraction for us, arising from the fact of its

being a dominion which reason exercises over sensibility with a view to extending it to the requirements of

its own realm (the practical) and letting it look out beyond itself into the infinite, which for it is an abyss. In

fact, without the development of moral ideas, that which, thanks to preparatory culture, we call sublime,

merely strikes the untutored man as terrifying. He will see in the evidences which the ravages of nature give

of her dominion, and in the vast scale of her might, compared with which his own is diminished to

insignificance, only the misery, peril, and distress that would compass the man who was thrown to its mercy.

So the simpleminded, and, for the most part, intelligent, Savoyard peasant, (as Herr von Sassure relates),

unhesitatingly called all lovers of snow mountains fools. And who can tell whether he would have been so

wide of the mark, if that student of nature had taken the risk of the dangers to which he exposed himself

merely, as most travellers do, for a fad, or so as some day to be able to give a thrilling account of his

adventures? But the mind of Sassure was bent on the instruction of mankind, and soulstirring sensations that

excellent man indeed had, and the reader of his travels got them thrown into the bargain.

But the fact that culture is requisite for the judgement upon the sublime in nature (more than for that upon the

beautiful) does not involve its being an original product of culture and something introduced in a more or less

conventional way into society. Rather is it in human nature that its foundations are laid, and, in fact, in that

which, at once with common understanding, we may expect every one to possess and may require of him,

namely, a native capacity for the feeling for (practical) ideas, i.e., for moral feeling.

This, now, is the foundation of the necessity of that agreement between other men's judgements upon the

sublime and our own, which we make our own imply. For just as we taunt a man who is quite inappreciative

when forming an estimate of an object of nature in which we see beauty, with want of taste, so we say of a

man who remains unaffected in the presence of what we consider sublime, that he has no feeling. But we

demand both taste and feeling of every man, and, granted some degree of culture, we give him credit for both.

Still, we do so with this difference: that, in the, case of the former, since judgement there refers the

imagination merely to the understanding, as a the faculty of concepts, we make the requirement as a matter of

course, whereas in the case of the latter, since here the judgement refers the imagination to reason, as a

faculty of ideas, we do so only under a subjective presupposition (which, however, we believe we are

warranted in making), namely, that of the moral feeling in man. And, on this assumption, we attribute

In this modality of aesthetic judgements, namely, their assumed necessity, lies what is for the Critique of

judgement a moment of capital importance. For this is exactly what makes an a priori principle apparent in

their case, and lifts them out of the sphere of empirical psychology, in which otherwise they would remain

buried amid the feelings of gratification and pain (only with the senseless epithet of finer feeling), so as to

place them, and, thanks to them, to place the faculty of judgement itself, in the class of judgements of which

the basis of an a priori principle is the distinguishing feature, and, thus distinguished, to introduce them into

In relation to the feeling of pleasure an object is to be counted either as agreeable, or beautiful, or sublime, or

As the motive of desires the agreeable is invariably of one and the same kind, no matter what its source or

how specifically different the representation (of sense and sensation objectively considered). Hence in

estimating its influence upon the mind, the multitude of its charms (simultaneous or successive) is alone

revelant, and so only, as it were, the mass of the agreeable sensation, and it is only by the quantity, therefore,

that this can be made intelligible. Further it in no way conduces to our culture, but belongs only to mere

enjoyment. The beautiful, on the other hand, requires the representation of a certain quality of the object, that

pernfits also of being understood and reduced to concepts (although in the aesthetic judgement it is not

reduced), and it cultivates, as it instructs us to attend to, finality in the feeling of pleasure. The sublime

consists merely in the relation exhibited by the estimate of the serviceability of the sensible in the

representation of nature for a possible supersensible employment. The absolutely good, estimated

subjectively according to the feeling it inspires (the object of the moral feeling), as the determinability of the

powers of the subject by means of the representation of an absolutely necessitating law, is principally

distinguished, by the modality of a necessity resting upon concepts a priori, and involving not a mere claim,

but a command upon every one to assent, and belongs intrinsically not to the aesthetic, but to the pure

intellectual judgement. Further, it is not ascribed to nature but to freedom, and that in a determinant and not a

merely reflective judgement. But the determinability of the subject by means of this idea, and, what is more,

that of a subject which can be sensible, in the way of a modification of its state, to hindrances on the part of

sensibility, while, at the same time, it can by surmounting them feel superiority over thema determinability,

in other words, as moral feelingis still so allied to aesthetic judgement and its formal conditions as to be

capable of being pressed into the service of the aesthetic representation of the conformity to law of action

from duty, i.e., of the representation of this as sublime, or even as beautiful, without forfeiting its purityan

impossible result were one to make it naturally bound up with the feeling of the agreeable.

The net result to be extracted from the exposition so far given of both kinds of aesthetic judgements may be

The beautiful is what pleases in the mere estimate formed of it (consequently not by intervention of any

feeling of sense in accordance with a concept of the understanding). From this it follows at once that it must

The sublime is what pleases immediately by reason of its opposition to the interest of sense.

Both, as definitions of aesthetic universally valid estimates, have reference to subjective grounds. In the one

case the reference is to grounds of sensibility, in so far as these are final on behalf of the contemplative

understanding, in the other case in so far as, in their opposition to sensibility, they are, on the contrary, final

in reference to the ends of practical reason. Both, however, as united in the same subject, are final in

reference to the moral feeling. The beautiful prepares us to love something, even nature, apart from any

interest: the sublime to esteem something highly even in opposition to our (sensible) interest object,

The sublime may be described in this way: It is an object (of nature) the representation of which determines

the mind to regard the elevation of nature beyond our reach as equivalent to a presentation of ideas.

In a literal sense and according to their logical import, ideas cannot be presented. But if we enlarge our

empirical faculty of representation (mathematical or dynamical) with a view to the intuition of nature, reason

inevitably steps forward, as the faculty concerned with the independence of the absolute totality, and calls

forth the effort of the mind, unavailing though it be, to make representation of sense adequate to this totality.

This effort, and the feeling of the unattainability of the idea by means of imagination, is itself a presentation

of the subjective finality of our mind in the employment of the imagination in the interests of the mind's

supersensible province, and compels us subjectively to think nature itself in its totality as a presentation of

something supersensible, without our being able to effectuate this presentation objectively.

For we readily see that nature in space and time falls entirely short of the unconditioned, consequently also of

the absolutely great, which still the commonest reason demands. And by this we are also reminded that we

have only to do with nature as phenomenon, and that this itself must be regarded as the mere presentation of a

natureinitself (which exists in the idea of reason). But this idea of the supersensible, which no doubt we

cannot further determine so that we cannot cognize nature as its presentation, but only think it as suchis

awakened in us by an object the aesthetic estimating of which strains the imagination to its utmost, whether

in respect of its extension (mathematical), or of its might over the mind (dynamical). For it is founded upon

the feeling of a sphere of the mind which altogether exceeds the realm of nature (i.e., upon the moral feeling),

with regard to which the representation of the object is estimated as subjectively final.

As a matter of fact, a feeling for the sublime in nature is hardly thinkable unless in association with an

attitude of mind resembling the moral. And though, like that feeling, the immediate pleasure in the beautiful

in nature presupposes and cultivates a certain liberality of thought, i.e., makes our delight independent of any

mere enjoyment of sense, still it represents freedom rather as in play than as exercising a lawordained

function, which is the genuine characteristic of human morality, where reason has to impose its dominion

upon sensibility. There is, however, this qualification, that in the aesthetic judgement upon the sublime this

dominion is represented as exercised through the imagination itself as an instrument of reason.

Thus, too, delight in the sublime in nature is only negative (whereas that in the beautiful is positive): that is to

say, it is a feeling of imagination by its own act depriving itself of its freedom by receiving a final

determination in accordance with a law other than that of its empirical employment. In this way it gains an

extension and a might greater than that which it sacrifices. But the ground of this is concealed from it, and in

its place it feels the sacrifice or deprivation, as well as its cause, to which it is subjected. The astonishment

amounting almost to terror, the awe and thrill of devout feeling, that takes hold of one when gazing upon the

prospect of mountains ascending to heaven, deep ravines and torrents raging there, deep shadowed solitudes

that invite to brooding melancholy, and the likeall this, when we are assured of our own safety, is not actual

fear. Rather is it an attempt to gain access to it through imagination, for the purpose of feeling the might of

this faculty in combining the movement of the mind thereby aroused with its serenity, and of thus being

superior to internal and, therefore, to external, nature, so far as the latter can have any bearing upon our

feeling of wellbeing. For the imagination, in accordance with laws of association, makes our state of

contentment dependent upon physical conditions. But acting in accordance with principles of the schematism

of judgement (consequently so far as it is subordinated to freedom), it is at the same time an instrument of

reason and its ideas. But in this capacity it is a might enabling us to assert our independence as against the

influences of nature, to degrade what is great in respect of the latter to the level of what is little, and thus to

locate the absolutely great only in the proper estate of the subject. This reflection of aesthetic judgement by

which it raises itself to the point of adequacy with reason, though without any determinate concept of reason,

is still a representation of the object as subjectively final, by virtue even of the objective inadequacy of the

imagination in its greatest extension for meeting the demands of reason (as the faculty of ideas).

Here we have to attend generally to what has been already adverted to, that in the transcendental aesthetic of

judgement there must be no question of anything but pure aesthetic judgements. Consequently examples are

not to be selected from such beautiful, or sublime objects as presuppose the concept of an end. For then the

finality would be either teleological, or based upon mere sensations of an object: (gratification or pain) and

so, in the first case, not aesthetic, and, in the second, not merely formal. So, if we call the sight of the starry

heaven sublime, we must not found our estimate of it upon any concepts of worlds inhabited by rational

beings, with the bright spots, which we see filling the space above us, as their suns moving in orbits

prescribed for them with the wisest regard to ends. But we must take it, just as it strikes the eye, as a broad

and allembracing canopy: and it is merely under such a representation that we may posit the sublimity

which the pure aesthetic judgement attributes to this object. Similarly, as to the prospect of the ocean, we are

not to regard it as we, with our minds stored with knowledge on a variety of matters (which, however, is not

contained in the immediate intuition), are wont to represent it in thought, as, let us say, a spacious realm of

aquatic creatures, or as the mighty reservoirs from which are drawn the vapours that fill the air with clouds of

moisture for the good of the land, or yet as an element which no doubt divides continent from continent, but

at the same time affords the means of the greatest commercial intercourse between themfor in this way we

get nothing beyond teleological judgements. Instead of this we must be able to see sublimity in the ocean,

regarding it, as the poets do, according to what the impression upon the eye reveals, as, let us say, in its calm

a clear mirror of water bounded only by the heavens, or, be it disturbed, as threatening to overwhelm and

engulf everything. The same is to be said of the sublime and beautiful in the human form. Here, for

determining grounds of the judgement, we must not have recourse to concepts of ends subserved by all: all its

and members, or allow their accordance with these ends to influence our aesthetic judgement (in such case no

longer pure), although it is certainly also a also a necessary condition of aesthetic delight that they should not

conflict. With these ends. Aesthetic finality is the conformity to law of judgement in its freedom. The delight

in the object depends on the reference which we seek to give to the imagination, subject to the proviso that it

is to entertain the mind in a free activity. If, on the other hand, something elsebe it sensation or concept of

the understandingdetermines the judgement, it is then conformable to law, no doubt, but not an act of free

Hence to speak of intellectual beauty or sublimity is to use expressions which, in the first place, are not quite

correct. For these are aesthetic modes of representation which would be entirely foreign to us were we merely

pure intelligences (or if we even put ourselves in thought in the position of such). Secondly, although both, as

objects of an intellectual (moral) delight, are compatible with aesthetic delight to the extent of not resting

upon any interest, still, on the: Other hand, there is a difficulty in the way of their alliance with such delight,

since their function is to produce an interest, and, on the assumption that the presentation has to accord with

delight in the aesthetic estimate, this interest could only be effected by means of an interest of sense

combined with it in the presentation. But in this way the intellectual finality would be violated and rendered

The object of a pure and unconditioned intellectual delight is the moral law in the might which it exerts in us

over all antecedent motives of the mind. Now, since it is only through sacrifices that this might makes itself

known to us aesthetically (and this involves a deprivation of something though in the interest of inner

freedomwhilst in turn it reveals in us an unfathomable depth of this supersensible faculty, the consequences

of which extend beyond reach of the eye of sense), it follows that the delight, looked at from the aesthetic

side (in reference to sensibility) is negative, i.e., opposed to this interest, but from the intellectual side,

positive and bound up with an interest. Hence it follows that the intellectual and intrinsically final (moral)

good, estimated aesthetically, instead of being represented as beautiful, must rather be represented as

sublime, with the result that it arouses more a feeling of respect (which disdains charm) than of love or of the

heart being drawn towards itfor human nature does not of its own proper motion accord with the good, but

only by virtue of the dominion which reason exercises over sensibility. Conversely, that, too, which we call

sublime in external nature, or even internal nature (e.g., certain affections) is only represented as a might of

the mind enabling it to overcome this or that hindrance of sensibility by means of moral principles, and it is

I must dwell while on the latter point. The idea of the good to which affection is superadded is enthusiasm.

This state of mind appears to be sublime: so much so that there is a common saying that nothing great can be

achieved without it. But now every affection* is blind either as to the choice of its end, or, supposing this has

been furnished by reason, in the way it is effected for it is that mental movement whereby the exercise of free

deliberation upon fundamental principles, with a view to determining oneself accordingly, is rendered

impossible. On this account it cannot merit any delight on the part of reason. Yet, from an aesthetic point of

view, enthusiasm is sublime, because it is an effort of one's powers called forth by ideas which give to the

mind an impetus of far stronger and more enduring efficacy than the stimulus afforded by sensible

representations. But (as seems strange) even freedom from affection (apatheia, phlegma in significatu bono)

in a mind that strenuously follows its unswerving principles is sublime, and that, too, in a manner vastly

superior, because it has at the same time the delight of pure reason on its side. Such a stamp of mind is alone

called noble. This expression, however, comes in time to be applied to thingssuch as buildings, a garment,

literary style, the carriage of one's person, and the likeprovided they do not so much excite astonishment

(the affection attending the representation of novelty exceeding expectation) as admiration (an astonishment

which does not cease when the novelty wears off)and this obtains where ideas undesignedly and artlessly

*There is a specific distinction between affections and Passions. Affections are related merely to feeling;

passions belong to the faculty of desire, and are inclinations that hinder or render impossible all

determinability of the elective will by principles. Affections are impetuous and irresponsible; passions are

abiding and deliberate. Thus resentment, in the form of anger, is an affection: but in the form of hatred

(vindictiveness) it is a passion. Under no circumstances can the latter be called sublime; for, while the

freedom of the mind is, no doubt, impeded in the case of affection, in passion it is abrogated.

Every affection of the STRENUOUS TYPE (such, that is, as excites the consciousness of our power of

overcoming every resistance [animus strenuus]) is aesthetically sublime, e.g., anger, even desperation (the

rage of forlorn hope but not fainthearted despair). On the other hand, affection of the LANGUID TYPE

(which converts the very effort of resistance into an object of displeasure [animus languidus] has nothing

noble about it, though it may take its rank as possessing beauty of the sensuous order. Hence the emotions

capable of attaining the strength of an affection are very diverse. We have spirited, and we have tender

emotions. When the strength of the latter reaches that of an affection they can be turned to no account. The

propensity to indulge in them is sentimentality. A sympathetic grief that refuses to be consoled, or one that

has to do with imaginary misfortune to which we deliberately give way so far as to allow our fancy to delude

us into thinking it actual fact, indicates and goes to make a tender, but at the same time weak, soul, which

shows a beautiful side, and may no doubt be called fanciful, but never enthusiastic. Romances, maudlin

dramas, shallow homilies, which trifle with socalled (though falsely so) noble sentiments, but in fact make

the heart enervated, insensitive to the stem precepts of duty, and incapable of respect for the worth of

humanity in our own person and the rights of men (which is something quite other than their happiness), and

in general incapable of all firm principles; even a religious discourse which recommends a cringing and

abject gracebegging and favourseeking, abandoning all reliance on our own ability to resist the evil within

us, in place of the vigorous resolution to try to get the better of our inclinations by means of those powers

which, miserable sinners though we be, are still left to us; that false humility by which selfabasement,

whining hypocritical repentance and a merely passive frame of mind are set down as the method by which

alone we can become acceptable to the Supreme Beingthese have neither lot nor fellowship with what may

be reckoned to belong to beauty, not to speak of sublimity, of mental temperament.

But even impetuous movements of the mind be they allied under the name of edification with ideas of

religion, or, as pertaining merely to culture, with ideas involving a social interest no matter what tension of

the imagination they may produce, can in no way lay claim to the honour of a sublime presentation, if they do

not leave behind them a temper of mind which, though it be only indirectly, has an influence upon the

consciousness of the mind's strength and resoluteness in respect of that which carries with it pure intellectual

finality (the supersensible). For, in the absence of this, all these emotions belong only to motion, which we

welcome in the interests of good health. The agreeable lassitude that follows upon being stirred up in that

way by the play of the affections, is a fruition of the state of wellbeing arising from the restoration of the

equilibrium of the various vital forces within us. This, in the last resort, comes to no more than what the

Eastern voluptuaries find so soothing when they get their bodies massaged, and all their muscles and joints

softly pressed and bent; only that in the first case the principle that occasions the movement is chiefly

internal, whereas here it is entirely external. Thus, many a man believes himself edified by a sermon in which

there is no establishment of anything (no system of good maxims); or thinks himself improved by a tragedy,

when he is merely glad at having got well rid of the feeling of being bored. Thus the sublime must in every

case have reference to our way of thinking, i.e., to maxims directed to giving the intellectual side of our

We have no reason to fear that the feeling of the sublime will suffer from an abstract mode of presentation

like this, which is altogether negative as to what is sensuous. For though the imagination, no doubt, finds

nothing beyond the sensible world to which it can lay hold, still this thrusting aside of the sensible barriers

gives it a feeling of being unbounded; and that removal is thus a presentation of the infinite. As such it can

never be anything more than a negative presentationbut still it expands the soul. Perhaps there is no more

sublime passage in the Jewish Law than the commandment: "Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven

image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven or on earth, or under the earth, etc." This commandment

can alone explain the enthusiasm which the Jewish people, in their moral period, felt for their religion when

comparing themselves with others, or the pride inspired by Mohammedanism. The very same holds good of

our representation of the moral law and of our native capacity for morality. The fear that, if we divest this

representation of everything that can commend it to the senses, it will thereupon be attended only with a cold

and lifeless approbation and not with any moving force or emotion, is wholly unwarranted. The very reverse

is the truth. For when nothing any longer meets the eye of sense, and the unmistakable and ineffaceable idea

of morality is left in possession of the field, there would be need rather of tempering the ardour of an

unbounded imagination to prevent it rising to enthusiasm, than of seeking to lend these ideas the aid of

images and childish devices for fear of their being wanting in potency. For this reason, governments have

gladly let religion be fully equipped with these accessories, seeking in this way to relieve their subjects of the

exertion, but to deprive them, at the same time, of the ability, required for expanding their spiritual powers

beyond the limits arbitrarily laid down for them, and which facilitate their being treated as though they were

This pure, elevating, merely negative presentation of morality involves, on the other hand, no fear of

fanaticism, which is a delusion that would will some VISION beyond all the bounds of sensibility; i.e., would

dream according to principles (rational raving). The safeguard is the purely negative character of the

presentation. For the inscrutability of the idea of freedom precludes all positive presentation. The moral law,

however, is a sufficient and original source of determination within us: so it does not for a moment permit us

to cast about for a ground of determination external to itself. If enthusiasm is comparable to delirium,

fanaticism may be compared to mania. Of these, the latter is least of all compatible with the sublime, for it is

profoundly ridiculous. In enthusiasm, as an affection, the imagination is unbridled; in fanaticism, as a

deepseated, brooding passion, it is anomalous. The first is a transitory accident to which the healthiest

understanding is liable to become at times the victim; the second is an undermining disease.

Simplicity (artless finality) is, as it were, the style adopted by nature in the sublime. It is also that of morality.

The latter is a second (supersensible) nature, whose laws alone we know, without being able to attain to an

intuition of the supersensible faculty within usthat which contains the ground of this legislation.

One further remark. The delight in the sublime, no less than in the beautiful, by reason of its universal

communicability not alone is plainly distinguished from other aesthetic judgements, but also from this same

property acquires an interest in society (in which it admits of such communication). Yet, despite this, we have

to note the fact that isolation from all society is looked upon as something sublime, provided it rests upon

ideas which disregard all sensible interest. To be selfsufficing, and so not to stand in need of society, yet

without being unsociable, i.e., without shunning it, is something approaching the sublimea remark

applicable to all superiority to wants. On the other hand, to shun our fellow men from misanthropy, because

of enmity towards them, or from anthropophobia, because we imagine the hand of every man is against us, is

partly odious, partly contemptible. There is, however, a misanthropy (most improperly so called), the

tendency towards which is to be found with advancing years in many right minded men, that, as far as good

will goes, is no doubt, philanthropic enough, but as the result of long and sad experience, is widely removed

from delight in mankind. We see evidences of this in the propensity to recluseness, in the fanciful desire for a

retired country seat, or else (with the young) in the dream of the happiness of being able to spend one's life

with a little family on an island unknown to the rest of the worldmaterial of which novelists or writers of

Robinsonades know how to make such good use. Falsehood, ingratitude, injustice, the puerility of the ends

which we ourselves look upon as great and momentous, and to compass which man inflicts upon his brother

man all imaginable evilsthese all so contradict the idea of what men might be if they only would, and are so

at variance with our active wish to see them better, that, to avoid hating where we cannot love, it seems but a

slight sacrifice to forego all the joys of fellowship with our kind. This sadness, which is not directed to the

evils which fate brings down upon others (a sadness which springs from sympathy), but to those which they

inflict upon themselves (one which is based on antipathy in questions of principle), is sublime because it is

founded on ideas, whereas that springing from sympathy can only be accounted beautiful. Sassure, who was

no less ingenious than profound, in the description of his Alpine travels remarks of Bonhomme, one of the

Savoy mountains: "There reigns there a certain insipid sadness." He recognized, therefore, that, besides this,

there is an interesting sadness, such as is inspired by the sight of some desolate place into which men might

fain withdraw themselves so as to hear no more of the world without, and be no longer versed in its affairs, a

place, however, which must yet not be so altogether inhospitable as only to afford a most miserable retreat for

a human being. I only make this observation as a reminder that even melancholy, (but not dispirited sadness),

may take its place among the vigorous affections, provided it has its root in moral ideas. If, however, it is

grounded upon sympathy, and, as such, is lovable, it belongs only to the languid affections. And this serves to

call attention to the mental temperament which in the first case alone is sublime are

The transcendental exposition of aesthetic judgements now brought to a close may be compared with the

physiological, as worked out by Burke and many acute men among us, so that we may see where a merely

empirical exposition of the sublime and beautiful would bring us. Burke, who deserves to be called the

foremost author in this method of treatment, deduces, on these lines, "that the feeling of the sublime is

grounded on the impulse towards selfpreservation and on fear, i.e., on a pain, which, since it does not go the

length of disordering the bodily parts, calls forth movements which, as they clear the vessels, whether fine or

gross, of a dangerous and troublesome encumbrance, are capable of producing delight; not pleasure but a sort

of delightful horror, a sort of tranquility tinged With terror." The beautiful, which he grounds on love (from

which, still, he would have desire kept separate), he reduces to "the relaxing, slackening, and enervating of

the fibres of the body, and consequently a softening, a dissolving, a languor, and a fainting, dying, and

melting away for pleasure." And this explanation he supports, not alone by instances in which the feeling of

the beautiful as well as of the sublime is capable of being excited in us by the imagination in conjunction with

the understanding, but even by instances when it is in conjunction with sensations. As psychological

observations, these analyses of our mental phenomena are extremely fine, and supply a wealth of material for

the favourite investigations of empirical anthropology. But, besides that, there is no denying the fact that all

representations within us, no matter whether they are objectively merely sensible or wholly intellectual, are

still subjectively associable with gratification or pain, however imperceptible either of these may be. (For

these representations one and all have an influence on the feeling of life, and none of them, so far as it is a

modification of the subject, can be indifferent.) We must even admit that, as Epicurus maintained,

gratification and pain though proceeding from the imagination or even from representations of the

understanding, are always in the last resort corporeal, since apart from any feeling of the bodily organ life

would be merely a consciousness of one's existence, and could not include any feeling of wellbeing or the

reverse, i.e., of the furtherance or hindrance of the vital forces. For, of itself alone, the mind is all life (the

lifeprinciple itself), and hindrance or furtherance has to be sought outside it, and yet in the man himself

But if we attribute the delight in the object wholly and entirely to the gratification which it affords through

charm or emotion, then we must not exact from any one else agreement with the aesthetic judgement passed

by us. For, in such matters each person rightly consults his own personal feeling alone. But in that case there

is an end of all censorship of tasteunless the afforded by others as the result of a contingent coincidence of

their judgements is to be held over us as commanding our assent. But this principle we would presumably

resent, and appeal to our natural right of submitting a judgement to our own sense, where it rests upon the

immediate feeling of personal wellbeing, instead of submitting it to that of others.

Hence if the import of the judgement of taste, where we appraise it as a judgement entitled to require the

concurrence of every one, cannot be egoistic, but must necessarily, from its inner nature, be allowed a

pluralistic validity, i.e., on account of what taste itself is, and not on account of the examples which others

give of their taste, then it must found upon some a priori principle (be it subjective or objective), and no

amount of prying into the empirical laws of the changes that go on within the mind can succeed in

establishing such a principle. For these laws only yield a knowledge of how we do judge, but they do not give

us a command as to how we ought to judge, and, what is more, such a command as is unconditionedand

commands of this kind are presupposed by judgements of taste, inasmuch as they require delight to be taken

as immediately connected with a representation. Accordingly, though the empirical exposition of aesthetic

judgements may be a first step towards accumulating the material for a higher investigation, yet a

transcendental examination of this faculty is possible, and forms an essential part of the Critique of Taste.

For, were not taste in possession of a priori principles, it could not possibly sit in judgement upon the

judgements of others and pass sentence of commendation or condemnation upon them, with even the least

The remaining part of the Analytic of the aesthetic judgement contains first of all the:

The claim of an aesthetic judgement to universal validity for every subject, being a judgement which must

rely on some a priori principle, stands in need of a deduction (i.e., a derivation of its title). Further, where the

delight or aversion turns on the form of the object this has to be something over and above the exposition of

the judgement. Such is the case with judgements of taste upon the beautiful in nature. For there the finality

has its foundation in the object and its outward formalthough it does not signify the reference of this to other

objects according to concepts (for the purpose of cognitive judgements), but is merely concerned in general

with the apprehension of this form so far as it proves accordant in the mind with the faculty of concepts as

well as with that of their presentation (which is identical with that of apprehension). With regard to the

beautiful in nature, therefore, we may start a number of questions touching the cause of this finality of their

forms e.g., how we are to explain why nature has scattered beauty abroad with so lavish a hand even in the

depth of the ocean where it can but seldom be reached by the eye of manfor which alone it is. final?

But the sublime in natureif we pass upon it a pure aesthetic judgement unmixed with concepts of perfection,

as objective finality, which would make the judgement teleologicalmay be regarded as completely wanting

in form or figure, and none the less be looked upon as an object of pure delight, and indicate a subjective

finality of the given representation. So, now, the question suggests itself, whether in addition to the

exposition of what is thought in an aesthetic judgement of this kind, we may be called upon to give a

This we may meet with the reply that the sublime in nature is improperly so called, and that sublimity should,

in strictness, be attributed merely to the attitude of thought, or, rather, to that which serves as basis for this in

human nature. The apprehension of an object otherwise formless and in conflict with ends supplies the mere

SS 30. The deduction of aesthetic judgements upon objects of nature must not be directed to what we call sublime in nature, but only to the beautiful. 58

occasion for our coming to a consciousness of this basis; and the object is in this way put to a

subjectivelyfinal use, but it is not estimated as subjectivelyfinal on its own account and because of its

form. (It is, as it were, a species finalis accepta, non data.) Consequently the exposition we gave of

judgements upon the sublime in nature was at the same time their deduction. For, in our analysis of the

reflection on the part of judgement in this case, we found that in such judgements there is a final relation of

the cognitive faculties, which has to be laid a priori at the basis of the faculty of ends (the will), and which is

therefore itself a priori final. This, then, at once involves the deduction, i.e., the justification of the claim of

Hence we may confine our search to one for the deduction of judgements of taste, i.e., of judgements upon

the beauty of things of nature, and this will satisfactorily dispose of the problem for the entire aesthetic

The obligation to furnish a deduction, i.e., a guarantee of the legitimacy of judgements of a particular kind,

only arises where the judgement lays claim to necessity. This is the case even where it requires subjective

universality, i.e., the concurrence of every one, albeit the judgement is not a cognitive judgement, but only

one of pleasure or displeasure in a given object, i.e., an assumption of a subjective finality that has a

thoroughgoing validity for every one, and which, since the judgement is one of taste, is not to be grounded

Now, in the latter case, we are not dealing with a judgement of cognitionneither with a theoretical one based

on the concept of a nature in general, supplied by understanding, nor with a (pure) practical one based on the

idea of freedom, as given a priori by reasonand so we are not called upon to justify a priori the validity of a

judgement which represents either what a thing is, or that there is something which I ought to do in order to

produce it. Consequently, if for judgement generally we demonstrate the universal validity of a singular

judgement expressing the subjective finality of an empirical representation of the form of an object, we shall

do all that is needed to explain how it is possible that something can please in the mere formation of an

estimate of it (without sensation or concept), and how, just as the estimate of an object for the sake of a

cognition generally has universal rules, the delight of any one person may be pronounced as a rule for every

Now if this universal validity is not to be based on a collection of votes and interrogation of others as to what

sort of sensations they experience, but is to rest, as it were, upon an, autonomy of the subject passing

judgement on the feeling of pleasure (in the given representation), i.e., upon his own taste, and yet is also not

to be derived from concepts; then it follows that such a judgementand such the judgement of taste in fact

ishas a double and also logical peculiarity. For, first, it has universal validity a priori, yet without having a

logical universality according to concepts, but only the universality of a singular judgement. Secondly, it has

a necessity (which must invariably rest upon a priori grounds), but one which depends upon no a priori proofs

by the representation of which it would be competent to enforce the assent which the judgement of taste

The solution of these logical peculiarities, which distinguish a judgement of taste from all cognitive

judgements, will of itself suffice for a deduction of this strange faculty, provided we abstract at the outset

from all content of the judgement, viz., from the feeling of pleasure, and merely compare the aesthetic form

with the form of objective judgements as prescribed by logic. We shall first try, with the help of examples, to

The judgement of taste determines its object in respect of delight (as a thing of beauty) with a claim to the

To say: "this flower is beautiful is tantamount to repeating its own proper claim to the delight of everyone.

The agreeableness of its smell gives it no claim at all. One man revels in it, but it gives another a headache.

Now what else are we to suppose from this than that its beauty is to be taken for a property of the flower itself

which does not adapt itself to the diversity of heads and the individual senses of the multitude, but to which

they must adapt themselves, if they are going to pass judgement upon it. And yet this is not the way the

matter stands. For the judgement of taste consists precisely in a thing being called beautiful solely in respect

Besides, every judgement which is to show the taste of the individual, is required to be an independent

judgement of the individual himself. There must be no need of groping about among other people's

judgements and getting previous instruction from their delight in or aversion to the same object.

Consequently his judgement should be given out a priori, and not as an imitation relying on the general

pleasure a thing gives as a matter of fact. One would think, however, that a judgement a priori must involve a

concept of the object for the cognition of which it contains the principle. But the judgement of taste is not

founded on concepts, and is in no way a cognition, but only an aesthetic judgement.

Hence it is that a youthful poet refuses to allow himself to be dissuaded from the conviction that his poem is

beautiful, either by the judgement of the public or of his friends. And even if he lends them an ear, he does

so,not because he has now come to a different judgement, but because, though the whole public, at least so

far as his work is concerned, should have false taste, he still, in his desire for recognition, finds good reason

to accommodate himself to the popular error (even against his own judgement). It is only in aftertime, when

his judgement has been sharpened by exercise, that of his own free will and accord he deserts his former

judgements behaving in just the same way as with those of his judgements which depend wholly upon reason.

Taste lays claim simply to autonomy. To make the judgements of others the determining ground of one's own

The fact that we recommend the works of the ancients as models, and rightly too, and call their authors

classical, as constituting sort of nobility among writers that leads the way and thereby gives laws to the

people, seems to indicate a posteriori sources of taste and to contradict the autonomy of taste in each

individual. But we might just as well say that the ancient mathematicians, who, to this day, are looked upon

as the almost indispensable models of perfect thoroughness and elegance in synthetic methods, prove that

reason also is on our part only imitative, and that it is incompetent with the deepest intuition to produce of

itself rigorous proofs by means of the construction of concepts. There is no employment of our powers, no

matter how free, not even of reason itself (which must create all its judgements from the common a priori

source), which, if each individual had always to start afresh with the crude equipment of his natural state,

would not get itself involved in blundering attempts, did not those of others tie before it as a warning. Not

that predecessors make those who follow in their steps mere imitators, but by their methods they set others

upon the track of seeking in themselves for the principles, and so of adopting their own, often better, course.

Even in religionwhere undoubtedly every one bas to derive his rule of conduct from himself, seeing that he

himself remains responsible for it and, when he goes wrong, cannot shift the blame upon others as teachers or

leadersgeneral precepts learned at the feet either of priests or philosophers, or even drawn from ones' own

resources, are never so efficacious as an example of virtue or holiness, which, historically portrayed, does not

dispense with the autonomy of virtue drawn from the spontaneous and original idea of morality (a priori), or

convert this into a mechanical process of imitation. Following which has reference to a precedent, and not

imitation, is the proper expression for all influence which the products of an exemplary author may exert

upon others and this means no more than going to the same sources for a creative work as those to which he

went for his creations, and learning from one's predecessor no more than the mode of availing oneself of such

sources. Taste, just because its judgement cannot be determined by concepts or precepts, is among all

faculties and talents the very one that stands most in need of examples of what has in the course of culture

maintained itself longest in esteem. Thus it avoids an early lapse into crudity and a return to the rudeness of

Proofs are of no avail whatever for determining the judgement of taste, and in this connection matters stand

If any one does not think a building, view, or poem beautiful, then, in the first place, he refuses, so far as his

inmost conviction goes, to allow approval to be wrung from him by a hundred voices all lauding it to the

skies. Of course he may affect to be pleased with it, so as not to be considered as wanting in taste. He may

even begin to harbour doubts as to whether he has formed his taste upon an acquaintance with a sufficient

number of objects of a particular kind (just as one who in the distance recognizes, as he believes, something

as a wood which every one else regards as a town, becomes doubtful of the judgement of his own eyesight).

But, for all that, he clearly perceives that the approval of others affords no valid proof, available for the

estimate of beauty. He recognizes that others, perchance, may see and observe for him, and that what many

have seen in one and the same way may, for the purpose of a theoretical, and therefore logical, judgement,

serve as an adequate ground of proof for or albeit he believes he saw otherwise, but that what has pleased

others can never serve him as the ground of an aesthetic judgement. The judgement of others, where

unfavourable to ours, may, no doubt, rightly make us suspicious in respect of our own, but convince us that it

is wrong it never can. Hence there is no empirical ground of proof that can coerce any one's judgement of

In the second place, a proof a priori according to definite rules is still less capable of determining the

judgement as to beauty. If any one reads me his poem, or brings me to a play, which, all said and done, fails

to commend itself to my taste, then let him adduce Batteux or Lessing, or still older and more famous critics

of taste, with all the host of rules laid down by them, as a proof of the beauty of his poem; let certain passages

particularly displeasing to me accord completely with the rules of beauty (as set out by these critics and

universally recognized): I stop my ears: I do not want to hear any reasons or any arguing about the matter. I

would prefer to suppose that those rules of the critics were at fault, or at least have no application, than to

allow my judgement to be determined by a priori proofs. I take my stand on the ground that my judgement is

This would appear to be one of the chief reasons why this faculty of aesthetic judgement has been given the

name of taste. For a man may recount to me all the ingredients of a dish, and observe of each and every one

of them that it is just what I like, and, in addition, rightly commend the wholesomeness of the food; yet I am

deaf to all these arguments. I try the dish with my own tongue and palate, and I pass judgement according to

As a matter of fact, the judgement of taste is invariably laid down as a singular judgement upon the object.

The understanding can, from the comparison of the object, in point of delight, with the judgements of others,

form a universal judgement, e.g.: "All tulips are beautiful." But that judgement is then not one of taste, but is

a logical judgement which converts the reference of an object to our taste into a predicate belonging to things

of a certain kind. But it is only the judgement whereby I regard an individual given tulip as beautiful, i.e.,

regard my delight in it as of universal validity, that is a judgement of taste. Its peculiarity, however, consists

in the fact, that, although it has merely subjective validity, still it extends its claims to all subjects, as

unreservedly as it would if it were an objective judgement, resting on grounds of cognition and capable of

A principle of taste would mean a fundamental premiss under the condition of which one might subsume the

concept of an object, and then, by a syllogism, draw the inference that it is beautiful. That, however, is

absolutely impossible. For I must feel the pleasure immediately in the representation of the object, and I

cannot be talked into it by any grounds of proof. Thus although critics, as Hume says, are able to reason more

plausibly than cooks, they must still share the same fate. For the determining ground of their judgement they

are not able to look to the force of demonstrations, but only to the reflection of the subject upon his own state

There is, however, a matter upon which it is competent for critics to exercise their subtlety, and upon which

they ought to do so, so long as it tends to the rectification and extension of our judgements of taste. But that

matter is not one of exhibiting the determining ground of aesthetic judgements of this kind in a universally

applicable formulawhich is impossible. Rather is it the investigation of the faculties of cognition and their

function in these judgements, and the illustration, by the analysis of examples, of their mutual subjective

finality, the form of which in a given representation has been shown above to constitute the beauty of their

object. Hence with regard to the representation whereby an object is given, the critique of taste itself is only

subjective; viz., it is the art or science of reducing the mutual relation of the understanding and the

imagination in the given representation (without reference to antecedent sensation or concept), consequently

their accordance or discordance, to rules, and of determining them with regard to their conditions. It is art if it

only illustrates this by examples; it is science if it deduces the possibility of such an estimate from the nature

of these faculties as faculties of knowledgein general. It is only with the latter, as transcendental critique,

that we have here any concern. Its proper scope is the development and justification of the subjective

principle of taste, as an a priori principle of judgement. As an art, critique merely looks to the physiological

(here psychological) and, consequently, empirical rules, according to which in actual fact taste proceeds

(passing by the question of their possibility) and seeks to apply them in estimating its objects. The latter

critique criticizes the products of fine art, just as the former does the faculty of estimating them.

The judgement of taste is differentiated from logical judgement by the fact that, whereas the latter subsumes a

representation under a concept of the object, the judgement of taste does not subsume under a concept at

allfor, if it did, necessary and universal approval would be capable of being enforced by proofs. And yet it

does bear this resemblance to the logical judgement, that it asserts a universality and necessity, not, however,

according to concepts of the object, but a universality and necessity that are, consequently, merely subjective.

Now the concepts in a judgement constitute its content (what belongs to the cognition of the object). But the

judgement of taste is not determinable by means of concepts. Hence it can only have its ground in the

subjective formal condition of a judgement in general. The subjective condition of all judgements is the

judging faculty itself, or judgement. Employed in respect of a representation whereby an object is given, this

requires the harmonious accordance of two powers of representation. These are: the imagination (for the

intuition and the arrangement of the manifold of intuition), and the understanding (for the concept as a

representation of the unity of this arrangement). Now, since no concept of the object underlies the judgement

here, it can consist only in the subsumption of the imagination itself (in the case of a representation whereby

an object is given) under the conditions enabling the understanding in general to advance from the intuition to

concepts. That is to say, since the freedom of the imagination consists precisely in the fact that it schematizes

without a concept, the judgement of taste must found upon a mere sensation of the mutually quickening

activity of the imagination in its freedom, and of the understanding with its conformity to law. It must

therefore rest upon a feeling that allows the object to be estimated by the finality of the representation (by

which an object is given) for the furtherance of the cognitive faculties in their free play. Taste, then, as a

subjective power of judgement, contains a principle of subsumption, not of intuitions under concepts, but of

the faculty of intuitions or presentations, i.e., of the imagination, under the faculty of concepts, i.e., the

understanding, so far as the former in its freedom accords with the latter in its conformity to law.

For the discovery of this title by means of a deduction of judgements of taste, we can only avail ourselves of

the guidance of the formal peculiarities of judgements of this kind, and consequently the mere consideration

To form a cognitive judgement we may immediately connect with the perception of an object the concept of

an object in general, the empirical predicates of which are contained in that perception. In this way, a

judgement of experience is produced. Now this judgement rests on the foundation of a priori concepts of the

synthetical unity of the manifold of intuition, enabling it to be thought as the determination of an object.

These concepts (the categories) call for a deduction, and such was supplied in the Critique of Pure Reason.

That deduction enabled us to solve the problem: How are synthetical a priori cognitive judgements possible?

This problem had, accordingly, to do with the a priori principles of pure understanding and its theoretical

But we may also immediately connect with a perception a feeling of pleasure (or displeasure) and a delight,

attending the representation of the object and serving it instead of a predicate. In this way there arises a

judgement which is aesthetic and not cognitive. Now, if such a judgement is not merely one of sensation, but

a formal judgement of reflection that exacts this delight from everyone as necessary, something must lie at its

basis as its a priori principle. This principle may, indeed, be a mere subjective one (supposing an objective

one should be impossible for judgements of this kind), but, even as such, it requires a deduction to make it

intelligible how an aesthetic judgement can lay claim to necessity. That, now, is what lies at the bottom of the

problem upon which we are at present engaged, i.e.: How are judgements of taste possible? This problem,

therefore, is concerned with the a priori principles of pure judgement in aesthetic judgements, i.e., not those

in which (as in theoretical judgements) it has merely to subsume under objective concepts of understanding,

and in which it comes under a law, but rather those in which it is itself, subjectively, object as well as law.

We may also put the problem in this way: How a judgement possible which, going merely upon the

individual's own feeling of pleasure in an object independent of the concept of it, estimates this as a pleasure

attached to the representation of the same object in every other individual, and does so a priori, i.e., without

It is easy to see that judgements of taste are synthetic, for they go beyond the concept and even the intuition

of the object, and join as predicate to that intuition something which is not even a cognition at all, namely, the

feeling of pleasure (or displeasure). But, although the predicate (the personal pleasure that is connected with

the representation) is empirical, still we need not go further than what is involved in the expressions of their

claim to see that, so far as concerns the agreement required of everyone, they are a priori judgements, or

mean to pass for such. This problem of the Critique of judgement, therefore, is part of the general problem of

The immediate synthesis of the representation of an object with pleasure can only be a matter of internal

perception, and, were nothing more than this sought to be indicated, would only yield a mere empirical

judgement. For with no representation can I a priori connect a determinate feeling (of pleasure or displeasure)

except where I rely upon the basis of an a priori principle in reason determining the will. The truth is that the

pleasure (in the moral feeling) is the consequence of the determination of the will by the principle. It cannot,

therefore, be compared with the pleasure in taste. For it requires a determinate concept of a law: whereas the

pleasure in taste has to be connected immediately with the sample estimate prior to any concept. For the same

reason, also, all judgements of taste are singular judgements, for they unite their predicate of delight, not to a

Hence, in a judgement of taste, what is represented a priori as a universal rule for the judgement and as valid

for everyone, is not the pleasure but the universal validity of this pleasure perceived, as it is, to be combined

in the mind with the mere estimate of an object. A judgement to the effect that it is with pleasure that I

perceive and estimate some object is an empirical judgement. But if it asserts that I think the object beautiful,

i.e., that I may attribute that delight to everyone as necessary, it is then an a priori judgement.

Admitting that in a pure judgement of taste the delight in the object is connected with the mere estimate of its

form, then what we feel to be associated in the mind with the representation of the object is nothing else than

its subjective finality for judgement. Since, now, in respect of the formal rules of estimating, apart from all

matter (whether sensation or concept), judgement can only be directed to the subjective conditions of its

employment in general (which is not restricted to the particular mode of sense nor to a particular concept of

the understanding), and so can only be directed to that subjective factor which we may presuppose in all men

(as requisite for a possible experience generally), it follows that the accordance of a representation with these

conditions of the judgement must admit of being assumed valid a priori for every one. In other words, we are

warranted in exacting from every one the pleasure or subjective finality of the representation in respect of the

relation of the cognitive faculties engaged in the estimate of a sensible object in general*.

*In order to be justified in claiming universal agreement an aesthetic judgement merely resting on subjective

grounds, it is sufficient to assume: (1) that the subjective conditions of this faculty of aesthetic judgement are

identical with all men in what concerns the relation of the cognitive faculties, there brought into action, with a

view to a cognition in general. This must be true, as otherwise men would be incapable of communicating

their representations or even their knowledge; (2) that the judgement has paid regard merely to this relation

(consequently merely to the formal condition of the faculty of judgement), and is pure, i.e., is free from

confusion either with concepts of the object or sensations as determining grounds. If any mistake is made in

this latter point, this only touches the incorrect application to a particular case of the right which a law gives

What makes this deduction so easy is that it is spared the necessity of having to justify the objective reality of

a concept. For beauty is not a concept of the object, and the judgement of taste is not a cognitive judgement.

All that it holds out for is that we are justified in presupposing that the same subjective conditions of

judgement which we find in ourselves are universally present in every man, and further that we have rightly

subsumed the given object under these conditions. The latter, no doubt, has to face unavoidable difficulties

which do not affect the logical judgement. (For there the subsumption is under concepts; whereas in the

aesthetic judgement it is under a mere sensible relation of the imagination and understanding mutually

harmonizing with one another in the represented form of the object, in which case the subsumption may

easily prove fallacious.) But this in no way detracts from the legitimacy of the claim of the judgement to

count upon universal agreementa claim which amounts to no more than this: the correctness of the principle

of judging validly for every one upon subjective grounds. For as to the difficulty and uncertainty concerning

the correctness of the subsumption under that principle, it no more casts a doubt upon the legitimacy of the

claim to this validity on the part of an aesthetic judgement generally, or, therefore, upon the principle itself,

than the mistakes (though. not so often or easily incurred), to which the subsumption of the logical judgement

under its principle is similarly liable, can render the latter principle, which is objective, open to doubt. But if

the question were: How is it possible to assume a priori that nature is a complex of objects of taste? the

problem would then have reference to teleology, because it would have to be regarded as an end of nature

belonging essentially to its concept that it should exhibit forms that are final for our judgement. But the

correctness of this assumption may still be seriously questioned, while the actual existence of beauties of

Sensation, as the real in perception, where referred to knowledge, is called organic sensation and its specific

quality may be represented as completely communicable to others in a like mode, provided we assume that

every one has a like sense to our own. This, however, is an absolutely inadmissible presupposition in the case

of an organic sensation. Thus a person who is without a sense of smell cannot have a sensation of this kind

communicated to him, and, even if be does not suffer from this deficiency, we still cannot be certain that he

gets precisely the same sensation from a flower that we get from it. But still more divergent must we consider

men to be in respect of the agreeableness or disagreeableness derived from the sensation of one and the same

object of sense, and it is absolutely out of the question to require that pleasure in such objects should be

acknowledged by every one. Pleasure of this kind, since it enters into the mind through senseour role,

On the other hand, delight in an action on the score of its moral character is not a pleasure of enjoyment, but

one of selfasserting activity and in this coming up to the idea of what it is meant to be. But this feeling,

which is called the moral feeling, requires concepts and is the presentation of a finality, not free, but

according to law. It, therefore, admits of communication only through the instrumentality of reason and, if the

pleasure is to be of the same kind for everyone, by means of very determinate practical concepts of reason.

The pleasure in the sublime in nature, as one of rationalizing contemplation, lays claim also to universal

participation, but still it presupposes another feeling, that, namely, of our supersensible sphere, which feeling,

however obscure it may be, has a moral foundation. But there is absolutely no authority for my presupposing

that others will pay attention to this and take a delight in beholding the uncouth dimensions of nature (one

that in truth cannot be ascribed to its aspect, which is terrifying rather than otherwise). Nevertheless, having

regard to the fact that attention ought to be paid upon every appropriate occasion to this moral birthright, we

may still demand that delight from everyone; but we can do so only through the moral law, which, in its turn,

The pleasure in the beautiful is, on the other hand, neither a pleasure of enjoyment nor of an activity

according to law, nor yet one of a rationalizing contemplation according to ideas, but rather of mere

reflection. Without any guidingline of end or principle, this pleasure attends the ordinary apprehension of an

object by means of the imagination, as the faculty of intuition, but with a reference to the understanding as

faculty of concepts, and through the operation of a process of judgement which bas also to be invoked in

order to obtain the commonest experience. In the latter case, however, its functions are directed to perceiving

an empirical objective concept, whereas in the former (in the aesthetic mode of estimating) merely to

perceiving the adequacy of the representation for engaging both faculties of knowledge in their freedom in an

harmonious (subjectively final) employment, i.e., to feeling with pleasure the subjective bearings of the

representation. This pleasure must of necessity depend for every one upon the same conditions, seeing that

they are the subjective conditions of the possibility of a cognition in general, and the proportion of these

cognitive faculties which is requisite for taste is requisite also for ordinary sound understanding, the presence

of which we are entitled to presuppose in every one. And, for this reason also, one who judges with taste

(provided he does not make a mistake as to this consciousness, and does not take the matter for the form, or

charm for beauty) can impute the subjective finality, i.e., his delight in the object, to everyone else and

suppose his feeling universally communicable, and that, too, without the mediation of concepts.

The name of sense is often given to judgement where what attracts attention is not so much its reflective act

as merely its result. So we speak of a sense of truth, of a sense of propriety, or of justice, etc. And yet, of

course, we know, or at least ought well enough to know, that a sense cannot be the true abode of these

concepts, not to speak of its being competent, even in the slightest degree, to pronounce universal rules. On

the contrary, we recognize that a representation of this kind, be it of truth, propriety, beauty, or justice, could

never enter our thoughts were we not able to raise ourselves above the level of the senses to that of higher

faculties of cognition. Common human understanding which as mere sound (not yet cultivated)

understanding, is looked upon as the least we can expect from any one claiming the name of man, has

therefore the doubtful honour of having the name of common sense (sensus communis) bestowed upon it; and

bestowed, too, in an acceptation of the word common (not merely in our own language, where it actually has

a double meaning, but also in many others) which makes it amount to what is vulgarwhat is everywhere to

be met witha quality which by no means confers credit or distinction upon its possessor.

However, by the name sensus communis is to be understood the idea of a public sense, i.e., a critical faculty

which in its reflective act takes account (a priori) of the mode of representation of everyone else, in order, as

it were, to weigh its judgement with the collective reason of mankind, and thereby avoid the illusion arising

from subjective and personal conditions which could readily be taken for objective, an illusion that would

exert a prejudicial influence upon its judgement. This is accomplished by weighing the judgement, not so

much with actual, as rather with the merely possible, judgements of others, and by putting ourselves in the

position of everyone else, as the result of a mere abstraction from the limitations which contingently affect

our own estimate. This, in turn, is effected by so far as possible letting go the element of matter, i.e.,

sensation, in our general state of representative activity, and confining attention to the formal peculiarities of

our representation or general state of representative activity. Now it may seem that this operation of reflection

is too artificial to be attributed to the faculty which we call common sense. But this is an appearance due only

to its expression in abstract formulae. In itself nothing is more natural than to abstract from charm and

emotion where one is looking for a judgement intended to serve as a universal rule.

While the following maxims of common human understanding do not properly come in here as constituent

parts of the critique of taste, they may still serve to elucidate its fundamental propositions. They are these: (I)

to think for oneself; (2) to think from the standpoint of everyone else; (3) always to think consistently. The

first is the maxim of unprejudiced thought, the second that of enlarged thought, the third that of consistent

thought. The first is the maxim of a neverpassive reason. To be given to such passivity, consequently to

heteronomy of reason, is called prejudice; and the greatest of all prejudices is that of fancying nature not to be

subject to rules which the understanding by virtue of its own essential laws lays at its basis, i.e., superstition.

Emancipation from superstition is called enlightenment*; for although this term applies also to emancipation

from prejudices generally, still superstition deserves preeminently (in sensu eminenti) to be called a

prejudice. For the condition of blindness into which superstition puts one, which is as much as demands from

one as an obligation, makes the need of being led by others, and consequently the passive state of the reason,

preeminently conspicuous. As to the second maxim belonging to our habits of thought, we have quite got

into the way of calling a man narrow (narrow, as opposed to being of enlarged mind) whose talents fall short

of what is required for employment upon work of any magnitude (especially that involving intensity). But the

question here is not one of the faculty of cognition, but of the mental habit of making a final use of it. This,

however small the range and degree to which man's natural endowments extend, still indicates a man of

enlarged mind: if he detaches himself from the subjective personal conditions of his judgement, which cramp

the minds of so many others, and reflects upon his own judgement from a universal standpoint (which he can

only determine by shifting his ground to the standpoint of others). The third maximthat, namely, of

consistent thoughtis the hardest of attainment, and is only attainable by the union of both the former, and

after constant attention to them has made one at home in their observance. We may say: The first of these is

the maxim of understanding, the second that of judgement, the third of that reason.

*We readily see that enlightenment, while easy, no doubt, in thesi, in hypothesis is difficult and slow of

realization. For not to be passive with one's reason, but always to be selflegislative, is doubtless quite an

easy matter for a man who only desires to be adapted to his essential end, and does not seek to know what is

beyond his understanding. But as the tendency in the latter direction is hardly avoidable, and others are

always coming and promising with full assurance that they are able to satisfy one's curiosity, it must be very

difficult to preserve or restore in the mind (and particularly in the public mind) that merely negative attitude

I resume the thread of the discussion interrupted by the above digression, and I say that taste can with more

justice be called a sensus communis than can sound understanding; and that the aesthetic, rather than the

intellectual, judgement can bear the name of a public sense,* i.e., taking it that we are prepared to use the

word sense of an effect that mere reflection has upon the mind; for then by sense we mean the feeling of

pleasure. We might even define taste as the faculty of estimating what makes our feeling in a given

*Taste may be designated a sensus communis aestheticus, common human understanding a sensus communis

The aptitude of men for communicating their thoughts requires, also, a relation between the imagination and

the understanding, in order to connect intuitions with concepts, and concepts, in turn, with intuitions, which

both unite in cognition. But there the agreement of both mental powers is according to law, and under the

constraint of definite concepts. Only when the imagination in its freedom stirs the understanding, and the

understanding apart from concepts puts the imagination into regular play, does the representation

communicate itself not as thought, but as an internal feeling of a final state of the mind.

Taste is, therefore, the faculty of forming an a priori estimate of the communicability of the feeling that,

Supposing, now, that we could assume that the mere universal communicability of our feeling must of itself

carry with it an interest for us (an assumption, however, which we are not entitled to draw as a conclusion

from the character of a merely reflective judgement), we should then be in a position to explain how the

feeling in the judgement of taste comes to be exacted from everyone as a sort of duty.

Abundant proof bas been given above to show that the judgement of taste by which something is declared

beautiful must have no interest as its determining ground. But it does not follow from this that, after it has

once been posited as a pure aesthetic judgement, an interest cannot then enter into combination with it. This

combination, however, can never be anything but indirect. Taste must, that is to say, first of all be represented

in conjunction with something else, if the delight attending the mere reflection upon an object is to admit of

having further conjoined with it a pleasure in the real existence of the object (as that wherein all interest

consists). For the saying, a posse ad esse non valet consequentia,* which is applied to cognitive judgements,

holds good here in the case of aesthetic judgements. Now this "something else" may be something empirical,

such as an inclination proper to the nature of human beings, or it may be something intellectual, as a property

of the will whereby it admits of rational determination a priori. Both of these involve a delight in the

existence of the object, and so can lay the foundation for an interest in what has already pleased of itself and

The empirical interest in the beautiful exists only in society. And if we admit that the impulse to society is

natural to mankind, and that the suitability for and the propensity towards it, i.e., sociability, is a property

essential to the requirements of man as a creature intended for society, and one, therefore, that belongs to

humanity, it is inevitable that we should also look upon taste in the light of a faculty for estimating whatever

enables us to communicate even our feeling to every one else, and hence as a means of promoting that upon

With no one to take into account but himself, a man abandoned on a desert island would not adorn either

himself or his hut, nor would he look for flowers, and still less plant them, with the object of providing

himself with personal adornments. Only in society does it occur to him to be not merely a man, but a man

refined after the manner of his kind (the beginning of civilization)for that is the estimate formed of one who

has the bent and turn for communicating his pleasure to others, and who is not quite satisfied with an object

unless his feeling of delight in it can be shared in communion with others. Further, a regard to universal

communicability is a thing which every one expects and requires from every one else, just as if it were part of

an original compact dictated by humanity itself. And thus, no doubt, at first only charms, e.g., colours for

painting oneself (roucou among the Caribs and cinnabar among the Iroquois), or flowers, seashells,

beautifully coloured feathers, then, in the course of time, also beautiful forms (as in canoes, wearingapparel,

etc.) which convey no gratification, i.e., delight of enjoyment, become of moment in society and attract a

considerable interest. Eventually, when civilization has reached its height it makes this work of

communication almost the main business of refined inclination, and the entire value of sensations is placed in

the degree to which they permit of universal communication. At this stage, then, even where the pleasure

which each one has in an object is but insignificant and possesses of itself no conspicuous interest, still the

This interest, indirectly attached to the beautiful by the inclination towards society, and, consequently,

empirical, is, however, of no importance for us here. For that to which we have alone to look is what can have

a bearing a priori, even though indirect, upon the judgement of taste. For, if even in this form an associated

interest should betray itself, taste would then reveal a transition on the part of our critical faculty. from the

enjoyment of sense to the moral feeling. This would not merely mean that we should be supplied with a more

effectual guide for the final employment of taste, but taste would further be presented as a link in the chain' of

the human faculties a priori upon which all legislation, depend. This much may certainly be said of the

empirical interest in objects of taste, and in taste itself, that as taste thus pays homage to inclination, however

refined, such interest will nevertheless readily fuse also with all inclinations and passions, which in society

attain to their greatest variety and highest degree, and the interest in the beautiful, if this is made its ground,

can but afford a very ambiguous transition from the agreeable to the good. We have reason, however, to

inquire whether this transition may not still in some way be furthered by means of taste when taken in its

It has been with the best intentions that those who love to see in the ultimate end of humanity, namely the

morally good, the goal of all activities to which men are impelled by the inner bent of their nature, have

regarded it as a mark of a good moral character to take an interest in the beautiful generally. But they have,

not without reason, been contradicted, by others, who appeal to the fact of experience, that virtuosi in matters

of taste being not alone often, but one might say as a general rule, vain, capricious, and addicted to injurious

passions, could perhaps more rarely than others lay claim to any preeminent attachment to moral principles.

And so it would seem, not only that the feeling for the beautiful is specifically different from the moral

feeling (which as a matter of fact is the case), but also that the interest which we may combine with it will

Now I willingly admit that the interest in the beautiful of art (including under this heading the artificial use of

natural beauties for personal adornment, and so from vanity) gives no evidence at all of a habit of mind

attached to the morally good, or even inclined that way. But, on the other hand, I do maintain that to take an

immediate interest in the beauty of nature (not merely to have taste in estimating it) is always a mark of a

good soul; and that, where this interest is habitual, it is at least indicative of a temper of mind favourable to

the moral feeling that it should readily associate itself with the contemplation of nature. It must, however, be

borne in mind that I mean to refer strictly to the beautiful forms of nature, and to put to one side the charms

which she is wont so lavishly to combine with them; because, though the interest in these is no doubt

One who alone (and without any intention of communicating his observations to others) regards the beautiful

form of a wild flower, a bird, an insect, or the like, out of admiration and love of them, and being loath to let

them escape him in nature, even at the risk of some misadventure to himselfso far from there being any

prospect of advantage to himsuch a one takes an immediate, and in fact intellectual, interest in the beauty of

nature. This means that he is not alone pleased with nature's product in respect of its form, but is also pleased

at its existence, and is so without any charm of sense having a share in the matter, or without his associating

In this connection, however, it is of note that were we to play a trick on our lover of the beautiful, and plant in

the ground artificial flowers (which can be made so as to look just like natural ones), and perch artfully

carved birds on the branches of trees, and he were to find out how he had been taken in, the immediate

interest which these things previously had for him would at once vanishthough, perhaps, a different interest

might intervene in its stead, that, namely, of vanity in decorating his room with them for the eyes of others.

The fact is that our intuition and reflection must have as their concomitant the thought that the beauty in

question is nature's handiwork; and this is the sole basis of the immediate interest that is taken in it. Failing

this, we are either left with a bare judgement of taste void of all interest whatever, or else only with one that

is combined with an interest that is mediate, involving, namely, a reference to society; which latter affords no

The superiority which natural beauty has over that of art, even where it is excelled by the latter in point of

form, in yet being alone able to awaken an immediate interest, accords with the refined and wellgrounded

habits of thought of all men who have cultivated their moral feeling. If a man with taste enough to judge of

works of fine art with the greatest correctness and refinement readily quits the room in which he meets with

those beauties that minister to vanity or, at least, social joys, and betakes himself to the beautiful in nature, so

that he may there find as it were a feast for his soul in a train of thought which he can never completely

evolve, we will then regard this his choice even with veneration, and give him credit for a beautiful soul, to

which no connoisseur or art collector can lay claim on the score of the interest which his objects have for

him. Here, now, are two kinds of objects which in the judgement of mere taste could scarcely contend with

one another for a superiority. What then, is the distinction that makes us hold them in such different esteem?

We have a faculty of judgement which is merely aesthetica faculty of judging of forms without the aid of

concepts, and of finding, in the mere estimate of them, a delight that we at the same time make into a rule for

every one, without this judgement being founded on an interest, or yet producing one. On the other hand, we

have also a faculty of intellectual judgement for the mere forms of practical maxims (so far as they are of

themselves qualified for universal legislation)a faculty of determining an a priori delight, which we make

into a law for everyone, without our judgement being founded on any interest, though here it produces one.

The pleasure or displeasure in the former judgement is called that of taste; the latter is called that of the moral

But, now, reason is further interested in ideas (for which in our moral feeling it brings about an immediate

interest), having also objective reality. That is to say, it is of interest to reason that nature should at least show

a trace or give a hint that it contains in itself some ground or other for assuming a uniform accordance of its

products with our wholly disinterested delight (a delight which we cognizea priori as a law for every one

without being able to ground it upon proofs). That being so, reason must take an interest in every

manifestation on the part of nature of some such accordance. Hence the mind cannot reflect on the beauty of

nature without at the same time finding its interest engaged. But this interest is akin to the moral. One, then,

who takes such an interest in the beautiful in nature can only do so in so far as he has previously set his

interest deep in the foundations of the morally good. On these grounds we have reason for presuming the

presence of at least the germ of a good moral disposition in the case of a man to whom the beauty of nature is

It will be said that this interpretation of aesthetic judgements on the basis of kinship with our moral feeling

has far too studied an appearance to be accepted as the true construction of the cypher in which nature speaks

to us figuratively in its beautiful forms. But, first of all, this immediate interest in the beauty of nature is not

in fact common. It is peculiar to those whose habits of thought are already trained to the good or else are

eminently susceptible of such training; and under the circumstances the analogy in which the pure judgement

of taste that, without relying upon any interest, gives us a feeling of delight, and at the same time represents it

a priori as proper to mankind in general, stands to the moral judgement that does just the same from concepts,

is one which, without any clear, subtle, and deliberate reflection, conduces to a like immediate interest being

taken in the objects of the former judgement as in those of the latterwith this one difference, that the interest

in the first case is free, while in the latter it is one founded on objective laws. In addition to this, there is our

admiration of Nature, which in her beautiful products displays herself as art, not as mere matter of chance,

but, as it were, designedly, according to a lawdirected arrangement, and as finality apart from any end. As

we never meet with such an end outside ourselves, we naturally look for it in ourselves, and, in fact, in that

which constitutes the ultimate end of our existencethe moral side of our being. (The inquiry into the ground

of the possibility of such a natural finality will, however, first come under discussion in the Teleology.)

The fact that the delight in beautiful art does not, in the pure judgement of taste, involve an immediate

interest, as does that in beautiful nature, may be readily explained. For the former is either such an imitation

of the latter as goes the length of deceiving us, in which case it acts upon us in the character of a natural

beauty, which we take it to be; or else it is an intentional art obviously directed to our delight. In the latter

case, however, the delight in the product would, it is true, be brought about immediately by taste, but there

would be nothing but a mediate interest in the cause that lay beneathan interest, namely, in an art only

capable of interesting by its end, and never in itself. It will, perhaps, be said that this is also the case where an

object of nature only interests by its beauty so far as a moral idea is brought into partnership therewith. But it

is not the object that is of immediate interest, but rather the inherent character of the beauty qualifying it for

such a partnershipa character, therefore, that belongs to the very essence of beauty.

The charms in natural beauty, which are to be found blended, as it were, so frequently with beauty of form,

belong either to the modifications of light (in colouring) or of sound (in tones). For these are the only

sensations which permit not merely of a feeling of the senses, but also of reflection upon the form of these

modifications of sense, and so embody as it were a language in which nature speaks to us and which has the

semblance of a higher meaning. Thus the white colour of the lily seems to dispose the mind to ideas of

innocence, and the other seven colours, following the series from the red to the violet, similarly to ideas of (1)

sublimity, (2) courage, (3) candour, (4) amiability, (5) modesty, (6) constancy, (7) tenderness. The bird's song

tells of joyousness and contentment with its existence. At least so we interpret naturewhether such be its

purpose or not. But it is the indispensable requisite of the interest which we here take in beauty, that the

beauty should be that of nature, and it vanishes completely as soon as we are conscious of having been

deceived, and that it is only the work of artso completely that even taste can then no longer find in it

anything beautiful nor sight anything attractive. What do poets set more store on than the nightingale's

bewitching and beautiful note, in a lonely thicket on a still summer evening by the soft light of the moon?

And yet we have instances of how, where no such songster was to be found, a jovial host has played a trick

on the guests with him on a visit to enjoy the country air, and has done so to their huge satisfaction, by biding

in a thicket a rogue of a youth who (with a reed or rush in his mouth) knew how to reproduce this note so as

to hit off nature to perfection. But the instant one realizes that it is all a fraud no one will long endure

listening to this song that before was regarded as so attractive. And it is just the same with the song of any

other bird. It must be nature, or be mistaken by us for nature, to enable us to take an immediate interest in the

beautiful as such; and this is all the more so if we can even call upon others to take a similar interest. And

such a demand we do in fact make, since we regard as coarse and low the habits of thought of those who have

no feeling for beautiful nature (for this is the word we use for susceptibility to an interest in the contemplation

of beautiful nature), and who devote themselves to the mere enjoyments of sense found in eating and

(1.) Art is distinguished from nature as making (facere) is from acting or operating in general (agere), and the

product or the result of the former is distinguished from that of the latter as work (opus) from operation

By right it is only production through freedom, i.e., through an act of will that places reason at the basis of its

action, that should be termed art. For, although we are pleased to call what bees produce (their regularly

constituted cells) a work of art, we only do so on the strength of an analogy with art; that is to say, as soon as

we call to mind that no rational deliberation forms the basis of their labour, we say at once that it is a product

of their nature (of instinct), and it is only to their Creator that we ascribe it as art.

If, as sometimes happens, in a search through a bog, we light on a piece of hewn wood, we do not say it is a

product of nature but of art. Its producing cause had an end in view to which the object owes its form. Apart

from such cases, we recognize an art in everything formed in such a way that its actuality must have been

preceded by a representation of the thing in its cause (as even in the case of the bees), although the effect

could not have been thought by the cause. But where anything is called absolutely a work of art, to

distinguish it from a natural product, then some work of man is always understood.

(2.) Art, as human skill, is distinguished also from science (as ability from knowledge), as a practical from a

theoretical faculty, as technic from theory (as the art of surveying from geometry). For this reason, also, what

one can do the' moment one only knows what is to be done, hence withoutanything more than sufficient

knowledge of the desired result, is not called art. To art that alone belongs which the possession of the most

complete knowledge does not involve one's having then and there the skill to do it. Camper, describes very

exactly how the best shoe must be made, but he, doubtless, was not able to turn one out himself.*

*In my part of the country, if you set a common man a problem like that of Columbus and his egg, he says,

"There is no art in that, it is only science": i.e., you can do it if you know how; and he says just the same of

all the wouldbe arts of jugglers. To that of the tightrope dancer, on the other hand, he has not the least

(3.) Art is further distinguished from handicraft. The first is called free, the other may be called industrial art.

We look on the former as something which could only prove final (be a success) as play, i.e., an occupation

which is agreeable on its own account; but on the second as labour, i.e., a business, which on its own account

is disagreeable (drudgery), and is only attractive by means of what it results in (e.g., the pay), and which is

consequently capable of being a compulsory imposition. Whether in the list of arts and crafts we are to rank

watchmakers as artists, and smiths on the contrary as craftsmen, requires a standpoint different from that here

adoptedone, that is to say, taking account of the proposition of the talents which the business undertaken in

either case must necessarily involve. Whether, also, among the socalled seven free arts some may not have

been included which should be reckoned as sciences, and many, too, that resemble handicraft, is a matter I

will not discuss here. It is not amiss, however, to remind the reader of this: that in all free arts something of a

compulsory character is still required, or, as it is called, a mechanism, without which the soul, which in art

must be free, and which alone gives life to the work, would be bodyless and evanescent (e.g., in the poetic art

there must be correctness and wealth of language, likewise prosody and metre). For not a few leaders of a

newer school believe that the best way to promote a free art is to sweep away all restraint and convert it from

There is no science of the beautiful, but only a critique. Nor, again, is there an elegant (schone) science, but

only a fine (schone) art. For a science of the beautiful would have to determine scientifically, i.e., by means

of proofs, whether a thing was to be considered beautiful or not; and the judgement upon beauty,

consequently, would, if belonging to science, fail to be a judgement of taste. As for a beautiful sciencea

science which, as such, is to be beautiful, is a nonentity. For if, treating it as a science, we were to ask for

reasons and proofs, we would be put off with elegant phrases (bons mots). What has given rise to the current

expression elegant sciences is, doubtless, no more than this, that common observation has, quite accurately,

noted the fact that for fine art, in the fulness of its perfection, a large store of science is required, as, for

example, knowledge of ancient languages, acquaintance with classical authors, history, antiquarian learning,

etc. Hence these historical sciences, owing to the fact that they form the necessary preparation and

groundwork for fine art, and partly also owing to the fact that they are taken to comprise even the knowledge

of the products of fine art (rhetoric and poetry), have by aconfusion of words, actually got the name of

Where art, merely seeking to actualize a possible object to the cognition of which it is adequate, does

whatever acts are required for that purpose. then it is mechanical. But should the feeling of pleasure be what

it has immediately in view, it is then termed aesthetic art. As such it may be either agreeable or fine art. The

description "agreeable art" applies where the end of the art is that the pleasure should accompany the

representations considered as mere sensations, the description "fine art" where it is to accompany them

Agreeable arts are those which have mere enjoyment for their object. Such are all the charms that can gratify

a dinner party: entertaining narrative, the art of starting the whole table in unrestrained and sprightly

conversation, or with jest and laughter inducing a certain air of gaiety. Here, as the saying goes, there may be

much loose talk over the glasses, without a person wishing to be brought to book for all he utters, because it

is only given out for the entertainment of the moment, and not as a lasting matter to be made the subject of

reflection or repetition. (Of the same sort is also the art of arranging the table for enjoyment, or, at large

banquets, the music of the orchestraa quaint idea intended to act on the mind merely as an agreeable noise

fostering a genial spirit, which, without any one paying the smallest attention to the composition, promotes

the free flow of conversation between guest and guest.) In addition must be included play of every kind

which is attended with no further interest than that of making the time pass by unheeded.

Fine art, on the other hand, is a mode of representation which is intrinsically final, and which, although

devoid of an end, has the effect of advancing the culture of the mental powers in the interests of social

The universal communicability of a pleasure involves in its very concept that the pleasure is not one of

enjoyment arising out of mere sensation, but must be one of reflection. Hence aesthetic art, as art which is

beautiful, is one having for its standard the reflective judgement and not organic sensation.

A product of fine art must be recognized to be art and not nature. Nevertheless the finality in its form must

appear just as free from the constraint of arbitrary rules as if it were a product of mere nature. Upon this

feeling of freedom in the play of our cognitive facultieswhich play has at the same time to be final rests that

pleasure which alone is universally communicable without being based on concepts. Nature proved beautiful

when it wore the appearance of art; and art can only be termed beautiful, where we are conscious of its being

For, whether we are dealing with beauty of nature or beauty of art, we may make the universal statement:

That is beautiful which pleases in the mere estimate of it (not in sensation or by means of a concept). Now art

has always got a definite intention of producing something. Were this "something," however, to be mere

sensation (something merely subjective), intended to be accompanied with pleasure, then such product

would, in our estimation of it, only please through the agency of the feeling of the senses. On the other hand,

were the intention one directed to the production of a definite object, then, supposing this were attained by

art, the object would only please by means of a concept. But in both cases the art would please, not in the

Hence the finality in the product of fine art, intentional though it be, must not have the appearance of being

intentional; i.e., fine art must be clothed with the aspect of nature, although we recognize it to be art. But the

way in which a product of art seems like nature is by the presence of perfect exactness in the agreement with

rules prescribing how alone the product can be what it is intended to be, but with an absence of laboured

effect (without academic form betraying itself), i.e., without a trace appearing of the artist having always had

Genius is the talent (natural endowment) which gives the rule to art. Since talent, as an innate productive

faculty of the artist, belongs itself to nature, we may put it this way: Genius is the innate mental aptitude

Whatever may be the merits of this definition, and whether it is merely arbitrary, or whether it is adequate or

not to the concept usually associated with the word genius (a point which the following sections have to clear

up), it may still be shown at the outset that, according to this acceptation of the word, fine arts must

For every art presupposes rules which are laid down as the foundation which first enables a product, if it is to

be called one of art, to be represented as possible. The concept of fine art, however, does not permit of the

judgement upon the beauty of its product being derived from any rule that has a concept for its determining

ground, and that depends, consequently, on a concept of the way in which the product is possible.

Consequently fine art cannot of its own self excogitate the rule according to which it is to effectuate its

product. But since, for all that, a product can never be called art unless there is a preceding rule, it follows

that nature in the individual (and by virtue of the harmony of his faculties) must give the rule to art, i.e., fine

From this it may be seen that genius (1) is a talent for producing that for which no definite rule can be given,

and not an aptitude in the way of cleverness for what can be learned according to some rule; and that

consequently originality must be its primary property. (2) Since there may also be original nonsense, its

products must at the same time be models, i.e., be exemplary; and, consequently, though not themselves

SS 45. Fine art is an art, so far as it has at the same time the appearance of being nature. 73

derived from imitation, they must serve that purpose for others, i.e., as a standard or rule of estimating. (3) It

cannot indicate scientifically how it brings about its product, but rather gives the rule as nature. Hence, where

an author owes a product to his genius, he does not himself know how the ideas for it have entered into his

head, nor has he it in his power to invent the like at pleasure, or methodically, and communicate the same to

others in such precepts as would put them in a position to produce similar products. (Hence, presumably, our

word Genie is derived from genius, as the peculiar guardian and guiding spirit given to a man at his birth, by

the inspiration of which those original ideas were obtained.) (4) Nature prescribes the rule through genius not

Every one is agreed on the point of the complete opposition between genius and the spirit of imitation. Now

since learning is nothing but imitation, the greatest ability, or aptness as a pupil (capacity), is still, as such,

not equivalent to genius. Even though a man weaves his own thoughts or fancies, instead of merely taking in

what others have thought, and even though he go so far as to bring fresh gains to art and science, this does not

afford a valid reason for calling such a man of brains, and often great brains, a genius, in contradistinction to

one who goes by the name of shallowpate, because he can never do more than merely learn and follow a

lead. For what is accomplished in this way is something that could have been learned. Hence it all lies in the

natural path of investigation and reflection according to rules, and so is not specifically distinguishable from

what may be acquired as the result of industry backed up by imitation. So all that Newton bas set forth in his

immortal work on the Principles of Natural Philosophy may well be learned, however great a mind it took to

find it all out, but we cannot learn to write in a true poetic vein, no matter how complete all the precepts of

the poetic art may be, or however excellent its models. The reason is that all the steps that Newton had to take

from the first elements of geometry to his greatest and most profound discoveries were such as he could make

intuitively evident and plain to follow, not only for himself but for every one else. On the other hand, no

Homer or Wieland can show how his ideas, so rich at once in fancy and in thought, enter and assemble

themselves in his brain, for the good reason that he does not himself know, and so cannot teach others. In

matters of science, therefore, the greatest inventor differs only in degree from the most laborious imitator and

apprentice, whereas he differs specifically from one endowed by nature for fine art. No disparagement,

however, of those great men, to whom the human race is so deeply indebted, is involved in this comparison

of them with those who on the score of their talent for fine art are the elect of nature. The talent for science is

formed for the continued advances of greater perfection in knowledge, with all its dependent practical

advantages, as also for imparting the same to others. Hence scientists can boast a ground of considerable

superiority over those who merit the honour of being called geniuses, since genius reaches a point at which

art must make a halt, as there is a limit imposed upon it which it cannot transcend. This limit has in all

probability been long since attained. In addition, such skill cannot be communicated, but requires to be

bestowed directly from the hand of nature upon each individual, and so with him it dies, awaiting the day

when nature once again endows another in the same wayone who needs no more than an example to set the

Seeing, then, that the natural endowment of art (as fine art) must furnish the rule, what kind of rule must this

be? It cannot be one set down in a formula and serving as a preceptfor then the judgement upon the

beautiful would be determinable according to concepts. Rather must the rule be gathered from the

performance, i.e., from the product, which others may use to put their own talent to the test, so as to let it

serve as a model, not for imitation, but for following. The possibility of this is difficult to explain. The artist's

ideas arouse like ideas on the part of his pupil, presuming nature to have visited him with a like proportion of

the mental Powers. For this reason, the models of fine art are the only means of handing down this art to

posterity. This is something which cannot be done by mere descriptions (especially not in the line of the arts

of speech), and in these arts, furthermore, only those models can become classical of which the ancient, dead

Despite the marked difference that distinguishes mechanical art, as an art merely depending upon industry

and learning, from fine art, as that of genius, there is still no fine art in which something mechanical, capable

of being at once comprehended and followed in obedience to rules, and consequently something academic,

does not constitute the essential condition of the art. For the thought of something as end must be present, or

else its product would not be ascribed to an art at all, but would be a mere product of chance. But the

effectuation of an end necessitates determinate rules which we cannot venture to dispense with. Now, seeing

that originality of talent is one (though not the sole) essential factor that goes to make up the character of

genius, shallow minds fancy that the best evidence they can give of their being fullblown geniuses is by

emancipating themselves from all academic constraint of rules, in the belief that one cuts a finer figure on the

back of an illtempered than of a trained horse. Genius can do no more than furnish rich material for products

of fine art; its elaboration and its form require a talent academically trained, so that it may be employed in

such a way as to stand the test of judgement. But, for a person to hold forth and pass sentence like a genius in

matters that fall to the province of the most patient rational investigation, is ridiculous in the extreme.1 One is

at a loss to know whether to laugh more at the impostor who envelops himself in such a cloudin which we

are given fuller scope to our imagination at the expense of all use of our critical facultyor at the

simpleminded public which imagines that its inability clearly to cognize and comprehend this masterpiece

of penetration is due to its being invaded by new truths en masse, in comparison with which, detail, due to

carefully weighed exposition and an academic examination of root principles, seems to it only the work of a

For estimating beautiful objects, as such, what is required is taste; but for fine art, i.e., the production of such

If we consider genius as the talent for fine art (which the proper signification of the word imports), and if we

would analyse it from this point of view into the faculties which must concur to constitute such a talent, it is

imperative at the outset accurately to determine the difference between beauty of nature, which it only

requires taste to estimate, and beauty of art, which requires genius for its possibility (a possibility to which

A beauty of nature is a beautiful thing; beauty of art is a beautiful representation of a thing.

To enable me to estimate a beauty of nature, as such, I do not need to be previously possessed of a concept of

what sort of a thing the object is intended to be, i.e., I am not obliged to know its material finality (the end),

but, rather, in forming an estimate of it apart from any knowledge of the end, the mere form pleases on its

own account. If, however, the object is presented as a product of art, and is as such to be declared beautiful,

then, seeing that art always presupposes an end in the cause (and its causality), a concept of what the thing is

intended to be must first of all be laid at its basis. And, since the agreement of the manifold in a thing with an

inner character belonging to it as its end constitutes the perfection of the thing, it follows that in estimating

beauty of art the perfection of the thing must be also taken into accounta matter which in estimating a

beauty of nature, as beautiful, is quite irrevelant. It is true that in forming an estimate, especially of animate

objects of nature, e.g., of a man or a horse, objective finality is also commonly taken into account with a view

to judgement upon their beauty; but then the judgement also ceases to be purely aesthetic, i.e., a mere

judgement of taste. Nature is no longer estimated as it appears like art, but rather in so far as it actually is art,

though superhuman art; and the teleological judgement serves as a basis and condition of the aesthetic, and

one which the latter must regard. In such a case, where one says, for example, "That is a beautiful woman,"

what one in fact thinks is only this, that in her form nature excellently portrays the ends present in the female

figure. For one has to extend one's view beyond the mere form to a concept, to enable the object to be thought

Where fine art evidences its superiority is in the beautiful descriptions it gives of things that in nature would

be ugly or displeasing. The Furies, diseases, devastations of war, and the like, can (as evils) be very

beautifully described, nay even represented in pictures. One kind of ugliness alone is incapable of being

represented conformably to nature without destroying all aesthetic delight, and consequently artistic beauty,

namely, that which excites disgust. For, as in this strange sensation, which depends purely on the

imagination, the object is represented as insisting, as it were, upon our enjoying it, while we still set our face

against it, the artificial representation of the object is no longer distinguishable from the nature of the object

itself in our sensation, and so it cannot possibly be regarded as beautiful. The art of sculpture, again, since in

its products art is almost confused with nature, has excluded from its creations the direct representation of

ugly objects, and, instead, only sanctions, for example, the representation of death (in a beautiful genius), or

of the warlike spirit (in Mars), by means of an allegory, or attributes which wear a pleasant guise, and so only

indirectly, through an interpretation on the part of reason, and not for the pure aesthetic judgement.

So much for the beautiful representation of an object, which is properly only the form of the presentation of a

concept and the means by which the latter is universally communicated. To give this form, however, to the

product of fine art, taste merely is required. By this the artist, having practised and corrected his taste by a

variety of examples from nature or art, controls his work and, after many, and often laborious, attempts to

satisfy taste, finds the form which commends itself to him. Hence this form is not, as it were, a matter of

inspiration, or of a free swing of the mental powers, but rather of a slow and even painful process of

improvement, directed to making the form adequate to his thought without prejudice to the freedom in the

Taste is, however, merely a critical, not a productive faculty; and what conforms to it is not, merely on that

account, a work of fine art. It may belong to useful and mechanical art, or even to science, as a product

following definite rules which are capable of being learned and which must be closely followed. But the

pleasing form imparted to the work is only the vehicle of communication and a mode, as it were, of

execution, in respect of which one remains to a certain extent free, notwithstanding being otherwise tied

down to a definite end. So we demand that table appointments, or even a moral dissertation, and, indeed, a

sermon, must bear this form of fine art, yet without its appearing studied. But one would not call them on this

account works of fine art. A poem, a musical composition, a picturegallery, and so forth, would, however,

be placed under this head; and so in a wouldbe work of fine art we may frequently recognize genius without

Of certain products which are expected, partly at least, to stand on the footing of fine art, we say they are

soulless; and this, although we find nothing to censure in them as far as taste goes. A poem may be very

pretty and elegant, but is soulless. A narrative has precision and method, but is soulless. A speech on some

festive occasion may be good in substance and ornate withal, but may be soulless. Conversation frequently is

not devoid of entertainment, but yet soulless. Even of a woman we may well say, she is pretty, affable, and

Soul (Geist) in an aesthetical sense, signifies the animating principle in the mind. But that whereby this

principle animates the psychic substance (Seele)the material which it employs for that purposeis that

which sets the mental powers into a swing that is final, i.e., into a play which is selfmaintaining and which

Now my proposition is that this principle is nothing else than the faculty of presenting aesthetic ideas. But, by

an aesthetic idea I mean that representation of the imagination which induces much thought, yet without the

possibility of any definite thought whatever, i.e., concept, being adequate to it, and which language,

consequently, can never get quite on level terms with or render completely intelligible. It is easily seen, that

an aesthetic idea is the counterpart (pendant) of a rational idea, which, conversely, is a concept, to which no

The imagination (as a productive faculty of cognition) is a powerful agent for creating, as it were, a second

nature out of the material supplied to it by actual nature. It affords us entertainment where experience proves

too commonplace; and we even use it to remodel experience, always following, no doubt, laws that are based

on analogy, but still also following principles which have a higher seat in reason (and which are every whit as

natural to us as those followed by the understanding in laying hold of empirical nature). By this means we get

a sense of our freedom from the law of association' (which attaches to the empirical employment of the

imagination), with the result that the material can be borrowed by us from nature in accordance with that law,

Such representations of the imagination may be termed ideas. This is partly because they at least strain after

something lying out beyond the confines of experience, and so seek to approximate to a presentation of

rational concepts (i.e., intellectual ideas), thus giving to these concepts the semblance of an objective reality.

But, on the other hand, there is this most important reason, that no concept can be wholly adequate to them as

internal intuitions. The poet essays the task of interpreting to sense the rational ideas of invisible beings, the

kingdom of the blessed, hell, eternity, creation, etc. Or, again, as to things of which examples occur in

experience, e.g., death, envy, and all vices, as also love, fame, and the like, transgressing the limits of

experience he attempts with the aid of an imagination which emulates the display of reason in its attainment

of a maximum, to body them forth to sense with a completeness. of which: nature affords no parallel; and it is

in' fact precisely in the poetic art that the faculty of aesthetic ideas can show itself to full advantage. This

faculty, however, regarded solely on its own account, is properly no more than a talent' (of the imagination).

If, now, we attach to a concept a representation of the imagination belonging to its presentation, but inducing

solely on its own account such a wealth of thought as would never admit of comprehension in a definite

concept, and, as a consequence, giving aesthetically an unbounded expansion to the concept itself, then the

imagination here displays a creative activity, and it puts the faculty of intellectual ideas (reason) into

motiona motion, at the instance of a representation, towards an extension of thought, that, while germane,

no doubt, to the concept of the object, exceeds what can be laid hold of in that representation or clearly

Those forms which do not constitute the presentation of a given concept itself, but which,. as secondary

representations of the imagination, express the derivatives connected with it, and its kinship with other

concepts, are called (aesthetic) attributes of an object, the concept of Which, as an idea of reason, cannot be

adequately presented. In this way Jupiter's eagle, with the lightning in its claws, is an attribute of the mighty

king of heaven, and the peacock of its stately queen. They do not, like logical (aesthetic) attributes of an

object, the concept of the sublimity and majesty of creation, but rather something elsesomething that gives

the imagination an incentive to spread its flight over a whole host of kindred representations that provoke

more thought than admits of expression in a concept determined by words. They furnish an aesthetic idea,

which serves the above rational idea as a substitute for logical presentation, but with the proper function,

however, of animating the mind by opening out for it a prospect into a field of kindred representations

stretching beyond its ken. But it is not alone in the arts of painting or sculpture, where the name of attribute is

customarily employed, that fine art acts in this way; poetry and rhetoric also drive the soul that animates their

work wholly from the aesthetic attributes of the objectsattributes which go hand in hand with the logical,

and give the imagination an impetus to bring more thought into: play in the matter, though in an undeveloped

manner, than allows of being brought within the embrace of a concept, or, therefore, of being definitely

formulated in language. For the sake of brevity I must confine myself to a few examples only. When the great

Sont les derniers soupirs qu'il donne a l'Univers; he kindles in this way his rational idea of a cosmopolitan

sentiment even at the close of life, with help of an attribute which the imagination (in remembering all the

pleasures of a fair summer's day that is over and gonea memory of which pleasures is suggested by a serene

evening) annexes to that representation, and which stirs up a crowd of sensations and secondary

representations for which no expression can be found. On the other hand, even an intellectual concept may

serve, conversely, as attribute for a representation of sense, and so animate the latter with the idea of the

supersensible; but only by the aesthetic factor subjectively attaching to the consciousness of the supersensible

being employed for the purpose. So, for example, a certain poet says in his description of a beautiful

morning: "The sun arose, as out of virtue rises peace." The consciousness of virtue, even where we put

ourselves only in thought in the position of a virtuous man, diffuses in the mind a multitude of sublime and

tranquillizing feelings, and gives a boundless outlook into a happy future, such as no expression within the

*Perhaps there has never been a more sublime utterance, or a thought more sublimely expressed, than the

wellknown inscription upon the Temple of Isis (Mother Nature): "I am all that is, and that was, and that

shall be, and no mortal hath raised the veil from before my face." Segner made use of this idea in a suggestive

vignette on the frontispiece of his Natural Philosophy, in order to inspire his pupil at the threshold of that

temple into which he was about to lead him, with such a holy awe as would dispose his mind to serious

In a word, the aesthetic idea is a representation of the imagination, annexed to a given concept, with which, in

the free employment of imagination, such a multiplicity of partial representations are bound up, that no

expression indicating a definite concept can be found for it one which on that account allows a concept to be

supplemented in thought by much that is indefinable in words, and the feeling of which quickens the

cognitive faculties, and with language, as a mere thing of the letter, binds up the spirit (soul) also.

The mental powers whose union in a certain relation constitutes genius are imagination and understanding.

Now, since the imagination, in its employment on behalf of cognition, is subjected to the constraint of the

understanding and the restriction of having to be conformable to the concept belonging' thereto, whereas

aesthetically it is free to furnish of its own accord, over and above that agreement with the concept, a wealth

of undeveloped material for the understanding, to which the latter paid no regard in its concept, but which it

can make use of, not so much objectively for cognition, as subjectively for quickening the cognitive faculties,

and hence also indirectly for cognitions, it may be seen that genius properly consists in the happy relation,

which science cannot teach nor industry learn, enabling one to find out ideas for a given concept, and,

besides, to hit upon the expression for themthe expression by means of which the subjective mental

condition induced by the ideas as the concomitant of a concept may be communicated to others. This latter

talent is properly that which is termed soul. For to get an expression for what is indefinable in the mental

state accompanying a particular representation and to make it universally communicablebe the expression in

language or painting or statuaryis a "thing requiring a faculty for laying hold of the rapid and transient play

of the imagination, and for unifying it in a concept (which for that very reason is original, and reveals a new

rule which could not have been inferred from any preceding principles or examples) that admits of

If, after this analysis, we cast a glance back upon the above definition of what is called genius, we find: First,

that it is a talent for artnot one for science, in which clearly known rules must take the lead and determine

the procedure. Secondly, being a talent in the line of art, it presupposes a definite concept of the productas

its end. Hence it presupposes understanding, but, in addition, a representation, indefinite though it be, of the

material, i.e., of the intuition, required for the presentation of that concept, and so a relation of the

imagination to the understanding. Thirdly, it displays itself, not so much in the working out of the projected

end in the presentation of a definite concept, as rather in the portrayal, or expression of aesthetic ideas

containing a wealth of material for effecting that intention. Consequently the imagination is represented by it

in its freedom from all guidance of rules, but still as final for the presentation of the given concept. Fourthly,

and lastly, the unsought and undesigned subjective finality in the free harmonizing of the imagination with

the understanding's conformity to law presupposes a proportion and accord between these faculties such as

cannot be brought about by any observance of rules, whether of science or mechanical imitation, but can only

Genius, according to these presuppositions, is the exemplary originality of the natural endowments of an

individual in the free employment of his cognitive faculties. On this showing, the product of a genius (in

respect of so much in this product as is attributable to genius, and not to possible learning or academic

instruction) is an example, not for imitation (for that would mean the loss of the element of genius, and just

the very soul of the work), but to be followed by another geniusone whom it arouses to a sense of his own

originality in putting freedom from the constraint of rules so into force in his art that for art itself a new rule

is wonwhich is what shows a talent to be exemplary. Yet, since the genius is one of nature's electa type

that must be regarded as but a rare phenomenonfor other clever minds his example gives rise to a school,

that is to say a methodical instruction according to rules, collected, so far as the circumstances admit, from

such products of genius and their peculiarities. And, to that extent, fine art is for such persons a matter of

But this imitation becomes aping when the pupil copies everything down to the deformities which the genius

only of necessity suffered to remain, because they could hardly be removed without loss of force to the idea.

This courage has merit only in the case of a genius. A certain boldness of expression and, in general, many a

deviation from the common rule becomes him well, but in no sense is it a thing worthy of imitation. On the

contrary it remains all through intrinsically a blemish, which one is bound to try to remove, but for which the

genius is, as it were, allowed to plead a privilege, on the ground that a scrupulous carefulness would spoil

what is inimitable in the impetuous ardour of his soul. Mannerism is another kind of apingan aping of

peculiarity (originality) in general, for the sake of removing oneself as far as possible from imitators, while

the talent requisite to enable one to be at the same time exemplary is absent. There are, in fact, two modes

(modi) in general of arranging one's thoughts for utterance. The one is called a manner (modus aestheticus),

the other a method (modus logicus). The distinction between them is this: the former possesses no standard

other than the feeling of unity in the presentation, whereas the latter here follows definite principles. As a

consequence, the former is alone admissible for fine art. It is only, however, where the manner of carrying the

idea into execution in a product of art is aimed at singularity, instead of being made appropriate to the idea,

that mannerism is properly ascribed to such a product. The ostentatious (precieux), forced, and affected

styles, intended to mark one out from the common herd (though soul is wanting), resemble the behaviour of a

man who, as we say, hears himself talk, or who stands and moves about as if he were on a stage to be gaped

To ask whether more stress should be laid in matters of fine art upon the presence of genius or upon that of

taste, is equivalent to asking whether more turns upon imagination or upon judgement. Now, imagination

rather entitles an art to be called an inspired (geistreiche) than a fine art. It is only in respect of judgement that

the name of fine art is deserved. Hence it follows that judgement, being the indispensable condition (conditio

sine qua non), is at least what one must look to as of capital importance in forming an estimate of art as fine

art. So far as beauty is concerned, to be fertile and original in ideas is not such an imperative requirement as it

is that the imagination in its freedom should be in accordance with the understanding's conformity to law.

For, in lawless freedom, imagination, with all its wealth, produces nothing but nonsense; the power of

judgement, on the other hand, is the faculty that makes it consonant with understanding.

Taste, like judgement in general, is the discipline (or corrective) of genius. It severely clips its wings, and

makes it orderly or polished; but at the same time it gives it guidance directing and controlling its flight, so

that it may preserve its character of finality. It introduces a clearness and order into the plenitude of thought,

and in so doing gives stability to the ideas, and qualifies them at once for permanent and universal approval,

for being followed by others, and for a continually progressive culture. And so, where the interests of both

these qualities clash in a product, and there has to be a sacrifice of something, then it should rather be on the

side of genius; and judgement, which in matters of fine art bases its decision on its own proper principles,

will more readily endure an abatement of the freedom and wealth of the imagination than that the

The requisites for fine art are, therefore, imagination, understanding, soul, and taste.*

*The first three faculties are first brought into union by means of the fourth. Hume, in his history, informs the

English that although they are second in their works to no other people in the world in respect the evidences

they afford of the three first qualities separately considered, still in what unites them they must yield to their

Beauty (whether it be of nature or of art) may in general be termed the expression of aesthetic ideas. But the

provision must be added that with beauty of art this idea must be excited through the medium of a concept of

the object, whereas with beauty of nature the bare reflection upon a given intuition, apart from any concept of

what the object is intended to be, is sufficient for awakening and communicating the idea of which that object

Accordingly, if we wish to make a division of the fine arts, we can choose for that purpose, tentatively at

least, no more convenient principle than the analogy which art bears to the mode of expression of which men

avail themselves in speech with a view to communicating themselves to one another as completely as

possible, i.e., not merely in respect of their concepts but in respect of their sensations also.* Such expression

consists in word, gesture, and tone (articulation, gesticulation, and modulation). It is the combination of these

three modes of expression which alone constitutes a complete communication of the speaker. For thought,

intuition, and sensation are in this way conveyed to others simultaneously and in conjunction.

*The reader is not to consider this scheme for a possible division of the fine arts as a deliberate theory. It is

Hence there are only three kinds of fine art: the art of speech, formative art, and the art of the play of

sensations (as external sense impressions). This division might also be arranged as a dichotomy, so that fine

art would be divided into that of the expression of thoughts or intuitions, the latter being subdivided

according to the distinction between the form and the matter (sensation). It would, however, in that case

(1) The arts of speech are rhetoric and poetry. Rhetoric is the art of transacting a serious business of the

understanding as if it were a free play of the imagination; poetry that of conducting a free play of the

Thus the orator announces a serious business, and for the purpose of entertaining his audience conducts it as

if it were a mere play with ideas. The poet promises merely an entertaining play with ideas, and yet for the

understanding there enures as much as if the promotion of its business had been his one intention. The

combination and harmony of the two faculties of cognition, sensibility and understanding, which, though

doubtless indispensable to one another, do not readily permit of being united without compulsion and

reciprocal abatement, must have the appearance of being undesigned and a spontaneous

occurrenceotherwise it is not fine art. For this reason what is studied and laboured must be here avoided. For

fine art must be free art in a double sense: i.e., not alone in a sense opposed to contract work, as not being a

work the magnitude of which may be estimated, exacted, or paid for, according to a definite standard, but free

also in the sense that, while the mind, no doubt, occupies itself, still it does so without ulterior regard to any

other end, and yet with a feeling of satisfaction and stimulation (independent of reward).

The orator, therefore, gives something which he does not promise, viz., an entertaining play of the

imagination. On the other hand, there is something in which he fails to come up to his promise, and a thing,

too, which is his avowed business, namely, the engagement of the understanding to some end. The poet's

promise, on the contrary, is a modest one, and a mere play with ideas is all he holds out to us, but he

accomplishes something worthy of being made a serious business, namely, the using of play to provide food

for the understanding, and the giving of life to its concepts by means of the imagination. Hence the orator in

(2) The formative arts, or those for the expression of ideas in sensuous intuition (not by means of

representations of mere imagination that are excited by words) are arts either of sensuous truth or of sensuous

semblance. The first is called plastic art, the second painting. Both use figures in space for the expression of

ideas: the former makes figures discernible to two senses, sight and touch (though, so far as the latter sense is

concerned, without regard to beauty), the latter makes them so to the former sense alone. The aesthetic idea

(archetype, original) is the fundamental basis of both in the imagination; but the figure which constitutes its

expression (the ectype, the copy) is given either in its bodily extension (the way the object itself exists) or

else in accordance with the picture which it forms of itself in the eye (according to its appearance when

projected on a flat surface). Or, whatever the archetype is, either the reference to an actual end or only the

To plastic art, as the first kind of formative fine art, belong sculpture and architecture. The first is that which

presents concepts of things corporeally, as they might exist in nature (though as fine art it directs its attention

to aesthetic finality). The second is the art of presenting concepts of things which are possible only through

art, and the determining ground of whose form is not nature but an arbitrary endand of presenting them both

with a view to this purpose and yet, at the same time, with aesthetic finality. In architecture the chief point is

a certain use of the artistic object to which, as the condition, the aesthetic ideas are limited. In sculpture the

mere expression of aesthetic ideas is the main intention. Thus statues of men, gods, animals, etc., belong to

sculpture; but temples, splendid buildings for public concourse, or even dwellinghouses, triumphal arches,

columns, mausoleums, etc., erected as monuments, belong to architecture, and in fact all household furniture

(the work of cabinetmakers, and so forththings meant to be used) may be added to the list, on the ground

that adaptation of the product to a particular use is the essential element in a work of architecture. On the

other hand, a mere piece of sculpture, made simply to be looked at and intended to please on its own account,

is, as a corporeal presentation, a mere imitation of nature, though one in which regard is paid to aesthetic

ideas, and in which, therefore, sensuous truth should not go the length of losing the appearance of being an

Painting, as the second kind of formative art, which presents the sensuous semblance in artful combination

with ideas, I would divide into that of the beautiful Portrayal of nature, and that of the beautiful arrangement

of its products. The first is painting proper, the second landscape gardening. For the first gives only the

semblance of bodily extension; whereas the second, giving this, no doubt, according to its truth, gives only

the semblance of utility and employment for ends other than the play of the imagination in the contemplation

of its forms.* The latter consists in no more than decking out the ground with the same manifold variety

(grasses, flowers, shrubs, and trees, and even water, hills, and dales) as that with which nature presents it to

our view, only arranged differently and in obedience to certain ideas. The beautiful arrangement of corporeal

things, however, is also a thing for the eye only, just like paintingthe sense of touch can form no intuitable

representation of such a form, In addition I would place under the head of painting, in the wide sense, the

decoration of rooms by means of hangings, ornamental accessories, and all beautiful furniture the sole

function of which is to be looked at; and in the same way the art of tasteful dressing (with rings, snuffboxes,

etc.). For a parterre of various flowers, a room with a variety of ornaments (including even the ladies' attire),

go to make at a festal gathering a sort of picture which, like pictures in the true sense of the word (those

which are not intended to teach history or natural science), has no business beyond appealing to the eye, in

order to entertain the imagination in free play with ideas, and to engage actively the aesthetic judgement

independently of any definite end. No matter how heterogeneous, on the mechanical side, may be the craft

involved in all this decoration, and no matter what a variety of artists may be required, still the judgement of

taste, so far as it is one upon what is beautiful in this art, is determined in one and the same way: namely, as a

judgement only upon the forms (without regard to any end) as they present themselves to the eye, singly or in

combination, according to their effect upon the imagination. The justification, however, of bringing formative

art (by analogy) under a common head with gesture in a speech, lies in the fact that through these figures the

soul of the artists furnishes a bodily expression for the substance and character of his thought, and makes the

thing itself speak, as it were, in mimic languagea very common play of our fancy, that attributes to lifeless

*It seems strange that landscape gardening may be regarded as a kind of painting, notwithstanding that it

presents its forms corporeally. But, as it takes its forms bodily from nature (the trees, shrubs, grasses, and

flowers taken, originally at least, from wood and field) it is to that extent not an art such as, let us say, plastic

art. Further, the arrangement which it makes is not conditioned by any concept of the object or of its end (as

is the case in sculpture), but by the mere free play of the imagination in the act of contemplation. Hence it

bears a degree of resemblance to simple aesthetic painting that has no definite theme (but by means of light

(3) The art of the beautiful play of sensations (sensations that arise from external stimulation), which is a play

of sensations that has nevertheless to permit of universal communication, can only be concerned with the

proportion of the different degrees of tension in the sense to which the sensation belongs, i.e., with its tone. In

this comprehensive sense of the word, it may be divided into the artificial play of sensations of hearing and of

sight, consequently into music and the art of colour. It is of note that these two senses, over and above such

susceptibility for impressions as is required to obtain concepts of external objects by means of these

impressions, also admit of a peculiar associated sensation of which we cannot well determine whether it is

based on sense or reflection; and that this sensibility may at times be wanting, although the sense, in other

respects, and in what concerns its employment for the cognition of objects, is by no means deficient but

particularly keen. In other words, we cannot confidently assert whether a colour or a tone (sound) is merely

an agreeable sensation, or whether they are in themselves a beautiful play of sensations, and in being

estimated aesthetically, convey, as such, a delight in their form. If we consider the velocity of the vibrations

of light, or, in the second case, of the air, which in all probability far outstrips any capacity on our part for

forming an immediate estimate in perception of the time interval between them, we should be led to believe

that it is only the effect of those vibrating movements upon the elastic parts of our body, that can be evident

to sense, but that the timeinterval between them is not noticed nor involved in our estimate, and that,

consequently, all that enters into combination with colours and tones is agreeableness, and not beauty, of their

composition. But, let us consider, on the other hand, first, the mathematical character both of the proportion

of those vibrations in music, and of our judgement upon it, and, as is reasonable, form an estimate of colour

contrasts on the analogy of the latter. Secondly, let us consult the instances, albeit rare, of men who, with the

best of sight, have failed to distinguish colours, and, with the sharpest hearing, to distinguish tones, while for

men who have this ability the perception of an altered quality (not merely of the degree of the sensation) in

the case of the different intensities in the scale of colours or tones is definite, as is also the number of those

which may be intelligibly distinguished. Bearing all this in mind, we may feel compelled to look upon the

sensations afforded by both, not as mere senseimpressions, but as the effect of an estimate of form in the

play of a number of sensations. The difference which the one opinion or the other occasions in the estimate of

the basis of music would, however, only give rise to this much change in its definition, that either it is to be

interpreted, as we have done, as the beautiful play of sensations (through bearing), or else as one of agreeable

sensations. According to the former interpretation, alone, would music be represented out and out as a fine

art, whereas according to the latter it would be represented as (in part at least) an agreeable art.

Rhetoric may in a drama be combined with a pictorial presentation as well of its subjects as of objects; as

may poetry with music in a song; and this again with a pictorial (theatrical) presentation in an opera; and so

may the play of sensations in a piece of music with the play of figures in a dance, and so on. Even the

presentation of the sublime, so far as it belongs to fine art, may be brought into union with beauty in a

tragedy in verse, a didactic poem or an oratorio, and in this combination fine art is even more artistic.

Whether it is also more beautiful (having regard to the multiplicity of different kinds of delight which cross

one another) may in some of these instances be doubted. Still in all fine art the essential element consists in

the form which is final for observation and for estimating. Here the pleasure is at the same time culture, and

disposes the soul to ideas, making it thus susceptible of such pleasure and entertainment in greater

abundance. The matter of sensation (charm or emotion) is not essential. Here the aim is merely enjoyment,

which leaves nothing behind it in the idea, and renders the soul dull, the object in the course of time

distasteful, and the mind dissatisfied with itself and illhumoured, owing to a consciousness that in the

Where fine arts are not, either proximately or remotely, brought into combination with moral ideas, which

alone are attended with a selfsufficing delight, the above is the fate that ultimately awaits them. They then

only serve for a diversion, of which one continually feels an increasing need in proportion as one has availed

oneself of it as a means of dispelling the discontent of one's mind, with the result that one makes oneself ever

moreand more unprofitable and dissatisfied with oneself. With a view to the purpose first named, the

beauties of nature are in general the most beneficial, if one is early habituated to observe, estimate, and

Poetry (which owes its origin almost entirely to genius and is least willing to be led by precepts or example)

holds the first rank among all the arts. It expands the mind by giving freedom to the imagination and by

offering, from among the boundless multiplicity of possible forms accordant with a given concept, to whose

bounds it is restricted, that one which couples with the presentation of the concept a wealth of thought to

which no verbal expression is completely adequate, and by thus rising aesthetically to ideas. It invigorates the

mind by letting it feel its facultyfree, spontaneous, and independent of determination by nature of regarding

and estimating nature as phenomenon in the light of aspects which nature of itself does not afford us in

experience, either for sense or understanding, and of employing it accordingly in behalf of, and as a sort of

schema for, the supersensible. It plays with semblance, which it produces at will, but not as an instrument of

deception; for its avowed pursuit is merely one of play, which, however, understanding may turn to good

account and employ for its own purpose. Rhetoric, so far as this is taken to mean the art of persuasion, i.e.,

the art of deluding by means of a fair semblance (as ars oratoria), and not merely excellence of speech

(eloquence and style), is a dialectic, which borrows from poetry only so much as is necessary to win over

men's minds to the side of the speaker before they have weighed the matter, and to rob their verdict of its

freedom. Hence it can be recommended neither for the bar nor the pulpit. For where civil laws, the right of

individual persons, or the permanent instruction and determination of men's minds to a correct knowledge

and a conscientious observance of their duty is at stake, then it is below the dignity of an undertaking of such

moment to exhibit even a trace of the exuberance of wit and imagination, and, still more, of the art of talking

men round and prejudicing them in favour of any one. For although such art is capable of being at times

directed to ends intrinsically legitimate and praiseworthy, still it becomes reprehensible on account of the

subjective injury done in this way to maxims and sentiments, even where objectively the action may be

lawful. For it is not enough to do what is right, but we should practise it solely on the ground of its being

right. Further, the simple lucid concept of human concerns of this kind, backed up with lively illustrations of

it, exerts of itself, in the absence of any offence against the rules of euphony of speech or of propriety in the

expression of ideas of reason (all which together make up excellence of speech), a sufficient influence upon

human minds to obviate the necessity of having recourse here to the machinery of persuasion, which, being

equally available for the purpose of putting a fine gloss or a cloak upon viceand error, fails to rid one

completely of the lurking suspicion that one is being artfully hoodwinked. In poetry everything is straight and

above board. It shows its hand: it desires to carry on a mere entertaining play with the imagination, and one

consonant, in respect of form, with the laws of understanding, and it does not seek to steal upon and ensnare

*I confess to the pure delight which I have ever been afforded by a beautiful poem; whereas the reading of

the best speech of a Roman forensic orator, a modern parliamentary debater, or a preacher, has invariably

been mingled with an unpleasant sense of disapproval of an insidious art that knows how, in matters of

moment, to move men like machines to a judgement that must lose all its weight with them upon calm

reflection. Force and elegance of speech (which together constitute rhetoric) belong to fine art; but oratory

(ars oratoria), being the art of playing for one's own purpose upthe weaknesses of men (let this purpose be

ever so good in intention or even in fact) merits no respect whatever. Besides, both at Athens and at Rome, it

only attained its greatest height at a time when the state was hastening to its decay, and genuine patriotic

sentiment was a thing of the past. One who sees the issue clearly, and who has a command of language in its

wealth and its purity, and who is possessed of an imagination that is fertile and effective in presenting his

ideas, and whose heart, withal, turns with lively sympathy to what is truly goodhe is the vir bonus dicendi

peritus, the orator without art, but of great impressiveness, Cicero would have him, though he may not

After poetry, if we take charm and mental stimulation into account, I would give the next place to that art

which comes nearer to it than to any other art of speech, and admits of very natural union with it, namely the

art of tone. For though it speaks by means of mere sensations without concepts, and so does not, like poetry,

leave behind it any food for reflection, still it moves the mind more diversely, and, although with transient,

still with intenser effect. It is certainly, however, more a matter of enjoyment than of culturethe play of

thought incidentally excited by it being merely the effect of a more or less mechanical associationand it

possesses less worth in the eyes of reason than any other of the fine arts. Hence, like all enjoyment, it calls for

constant change, and does not stand frequent repetition without inducing weariness. Its charm, which admits

of such universal communication, appears to rest on the following facts. Every expression in language has an

associated tone suited to its sense. This tone indicates, more or less, a mode in which the speaker is affected,

and in turn evokes it in the hearer also, in whom conversely it then also excites the idea which in language is

expressed with such a tone. Further, just as modulation is, as it were, a universal language of sensations

intelligible to every man, so the art of tone wields the full force of this language wholly on its own account,

namely, as a language of the affections, and in this way, according to the law of association, universally

communicates the aesthetic ideas that are naturally combined therewith. But, further, inasmuch as those

aesthetic ideas are not concepts or determinate thoughts, the form of the arrangement of these sensations

(harmony and melody), taking the place of the place of the form of a language, only serves the purpose of

giving an expression to the aesthetic idea of an integral whole of an unutterable wealth of thought that fills

the measure of a certain theme forming the dominant affection in the piece. This purpose is effectuated by

means of a proposition in the accord of the sensations (an accord which may be brought mathematically

under certain rules, since it rests, in the case of tones, upon the numerical relation of the vibrations of the air

in the same time, so far as there is a combination of the tones simultaneously or in succession). Although this

mathematical form is not represented by means of determinate concepts, to it alone belongs the delight which

the mere reflection upon such a number of concomitant or consecutive sensations couples with this their play,

as the universally valid condition of its beauty, and it is with reference to it alone that taste can lay claim to a

But mathematics, certainly, does not play the smallest part in the charm and movement of the mind produced

by music. Rather is it only the indispensable condition (conditio sine qua non) of that proportion of the

combining as well as changing impressions which makes it possible to grasp them all in one and prevent

them from destroying one another, and to let them, rather, conspire towards the production of a continuous

movement and quickening of the mind by affections that are in unison with it, and thus towards a serene

If, on the other hand, we estimate the worth of the fine arts by the culture they supply to the mind, and adopt

for our standard the expansion of the faculties whose confluence, in judgement, is necessary for cognition,

music, then, since it plays merely with sensations, 'has the lowest place among the fine artsjust as it has

perhaps the highest among those valued at the same time for their agreeableness. Looked at in this light, it is

far excelled by the formative arts. For, in putting the imagination into a play which is at once free and

adapted to the understanding, they all the while carry on a serious business, since they execute a product

which serves the Concepts of understanding as a vehicle, permanent and appealing to us on its own account,

for effectuating their union with sensibility, and thus for promoting, as it were, the urbanity of the higher

powers of cognition. The two kinds of art pursue completely different courses. Music advances from

sensations to indefinite ideas: formative art from definite ideas to sensations. The latter gives a lasting

impression, the former one that is only fleeting. The former sensations imagination can recall and agreeably

entertain itself with, while the latter either vanish entirely, or else, if involuntarily repeated by the

imagination, are more annoying to us than agreeable. Over and above all this, music has a certain lack of

urbanity about it. For owing chiefly to the character of its instruments, it scatters its influence abroad to an

uncalledfor extent (through the neighbourhood), and thus, as it were, becomes obtrusive and deprives

others, outside the musical circle, of their freedom. This is a thing that the arts that address themselves to the

eye do not do, for if one is not disposed to give admittance to their impressions, one has only to look the other

way. The case is almost on a par with the practice of regaling oneself with a perfume that exhales its odours

far and wide. The man who pulls his perfumed handkerchief from his pocket gives a treat to all around

whether they like it or not, and compels them, if they want to breathe at all, to be parties to the enjoyment,

*Those who have recommended the singing of hymns at family prayers have forgotten the amount of

annoyance which they give to the general public by such noisy (and, as a rule, for that very reason,

pharisaical) worship, for they compel their neighbours either to join in the singing or else abandon their

Among the formative arts I would give the palm to painting: partly because it is the art of design and, as such,

the groundwork of all the other formative arts; partly because it can penetrate much further into the region of

ideas, and in conformity with them give a greater extension to the field of intuition than it is open to the

As we have often shown, an essential distinction lies between what pleases simply in the estimate formed of

it and what gratifies (pleases in sensation). The latter is something which, unlike the former, we cannot

demand from every one. Gratification (no matter whether its cause has its seat even in ideas) appears always

to consist in a feeling of the furtherance of the entire life of the man, and hence, also of his bodily

wellbeing, i.e., his health. And so, perhaps, Epicurus was not wide of the mark when he said that at bottom

all gratification is bodily sensation, and only misunderstood himself in ranking intellectual and even practical

delight under the head of gratification. Bearing in mind the latter distinction, it is readily explicable how even

the gratification a person feels is capable of displeasing him (as the joy of a necessitous but goodnatured

individual on being made the heir of an affectionate but penurious father), or how deep pain may still give

pleasure to the sufferer (as the sorrow of a widow over the death of her deserving husband), or how there may

be pleasure over and above gratification (as in scientific pursuits), or how a pain (as, for example, hatred,

envy, and desire for revenge) may in addition be a source of displeasure. Here the delight or aversion depends

upon reason, and is one with approbation or disapprobation. Gratification and pain, on the other hand, can

only depend upon feeling, or upon the prospect of a possible wellbeing or the reverse (irrespective of

The changing free play of sensations (which do not follow any preconceived plan) is always a source of

gratification, because it promotes the feeling of health; and it is immaterial whether or not we experience

delight in the object of this play or even in the gratification itself when estimated in the light of reason. Also

this gratification may amount to an affection, although we take no interest in the object itself, or none, at

least, proportionate to the degree of the affection. We may divide the above play into that of games of chance

(Gluckspiel), harmony (Tonspiel), and wit (Gedankenspiel). The first stands in need of an interest, be it of

vanity or selfseeking, but one which falls far short of that centered in the adopted mode of procurement. All

that the second requires is the change of sensations, each of which has its bearing on affection, though

without attaining to the degree of an affection, and excites aesthetic ideas. The third springs merely from the

change of the representations in the judgement, which, while unproductive of any thought conveying an

What a fund of gratification must be afforded by play, without our having to fall back upon any consideration

of interest, is a matter to which all our evening parties bear witness for without play they hardly ever escape

falling flat. But the affections of hope, fear, joy, anger, and derision here engage in play, as every moment

they change their parts and are so lively that, as by an internal motion, the whole vital function of the body

seems to be furthered by the processas is proved by a vivacity of the mind producedalthough no one comes

by anything in the way of profit or instruction. But as the play of chance is not one that is beautiful, we will

here lay it aside. Music, on the contrary, and what provokes laughter are two kinds of play with aesthetic

ideas, or even with representations of the understanding, by which, all said and done, nothing is thought. By

mere force of change they yet are able to afford lively gratification. This furnishes pretty clear evidence that

the quickening effect of both is physical, despite its being excited by ideas of the mind, and that the feeling of

health, arising from a movement of the intestines answering to that play, makes up that entire gratification of

an animated gathering upon the spirit and refinement of which we set such store. Not any estimate of

harmony in tones or flashes of wit, which, with its beauty, serves only as a necessary vehicle, but rather the

stimulated vital functions of the body, the affection stirring the intestines and the diaphragm, and, in a word,

the feeling of health (of which we are only sensible upon some such provocation) are what constitute the

gratification we experience at being able to reach the body through the soul and use the latter as the physician

In music, the course of this play is from bodily sensation to aesthetic ideas (which are the objects for the

affections), and then from these back again, but with gathered strength, to the body. In jest (which just as

much as the former deserves to be ranked rather as an agreeable than a fine art) the play sets out from

thoughts which collectively, so far as seeking sensuous expression, engage the activity of the body. In this

presentation the understanding, missing what it expected, suddenly lets go its hold, with the result that the

effect of this slackening is felt in the body by the oscillation of the organs. This favours the restoration of the

Something absurd (something in which, therefore, the understanding can of itself find no delight) must be

present in whatever is to raise a hearty convulsive laugh. Laughter is an all action arising from a strained

expectation being suddenly reduced to nothing. This very reduction, at which certainly understanding cannot

rejoice, is still indirectly a source of very lively enjoyment for a moment. Its cause must consequently lie in

the influence of the representation upon the body and the reciprocal effect of this upon the mind. This,

moreover, cannot depend upon the representation being objectively an object of gratification (for how can we

derive gratification from a disappointment?) but must rest solely upon the fact that the reduction is a mere

play of representations, and, as such, produces an equilibrium of the vital forces of the body.

Suppose that some one tells the following story: An Indian at an Englishman's table in Surat saw a bottle of

ale opened, and all the beer turned into froth and flowing out. The repeated exclamations of the Indian

showed his great astonishment. "Well, what is so wonderful in that?" asked the Englishman. "Oh, I'm not

surprised myself," said the Indian, "at its getting out, but at how you ever managed to get it all in." At this we

laugh, and it gives us hearty pleasure. This is not because we think ourselves, maybe, more quickwitted than

this ignorant Indian, or because our understanding here brings to our notice any other ground of delight. It is

rather that the bubble of our expectation was extended to the full and suddenly went off into nothing. Or,

again, take the case of the heir of a wealthy relative being minded to make preparations for having the funeral

obsequies on a most imposing scale, but complaining that things would not go right for him, because (as he

said) "the more money I give my mourners to look sad, the more pleased they look." At this we laugh

outright, and the reason lies in the fact that we had an expectation which is suddenly reduced to nothing. We

must be careful to observe that the reduction is not one into the positive contrary of an expected objectfor

that is always something, and may frequently pain usbut must be a reduction to nothing. For where a person

arouses great expectation by recounting some tale, and at the close its untruth becomes at once apparent to us,

we are displeased at it. So it is, for instance, with the tale of people whose hair from excess of grief is said to

have turned white in a single night. On the other hand, if a wag, wishing to cap the story, tells with the utmost

circumstantiality of a merchant's grief, who, on his return journey from India to Europe with all his wealth in

merchandise, was obliged by stress of storm to throw everything overboard, and grieved to such an extent

that in the selfsame night his wig turned grey, we laugh and enjoy the tale. This is because we keep for a time

playing on our own mistake about an object otherwise indifferent to us, or rather on the idea we ourselves

were following out, and, beating it to and fro, just as if it were a ball eluding our grasp, when all we intend to

do is just to get it into our hands and hold it tight. Here our. gratification is. not excited by a knave or a fool

getting a rebuff: for, even on its own account, the latter tale told with an air of seriousness would of itself be

enough to set a whole table into roars of laughter; and the other matter would ordinarily not be worth a

It is observable that in all such cases the joke must have something in it capable of momentarily deceiving us.

Hence, when the semblance vanishes into nothing, the mind looks back in order to try it over again, and thus

by a rapidly succeeding tension and relaxation it is jerked to and fro and put in oscillation. As the snapping of

what was, as it were, tightening up the string takes place suddenly (not by a gradual loosening), the

oscillation must bring about a mental movement and a sympathetic internal movement of the body. This

continues involuntarily and produces fatigue, but in so doing it also affords recreation (the effects of a motion

For supposing we assume that some movement in the bodily organs is associated sympathetically with all our

thoughts, it is readily intelligible how the sudden act above referred to, of shifting the mind now to one

standpoint and now to the other, to enable it to contemplate its object, may involve a corresponding and

reciprocal straining and slackening of the elastic parts of our intestines, which communicates itself to the

diaphragm (and resembles that felt by ticklish people), in the course of which the lungs expel the air with

rapidly succeeding interruptions, resulting in a movement conducive to health. This alone, and not what goes

on in the mind, is the proper cause of the gratification in a thought that at bottom represents nothing. Voltaire

said that heaven has given us two things to compensate us for the many miseries of life, hope and sleep. He

might have added laughter to the listif only the means of exciting it in men of intelligence were as ready to

hand, and the wit or originality of humour which it requires were not just as rare as the talent is common for

inventing stuff that splits the head, as mystic speculators do, or that breaks your neck, as the genius does, or

that harrows the heart as sentimental novelists do (aye, and moralists of the same type).

We may, therefore as I conceive, make Epicurus a present of the point that all gratification, even when

occasioned by concepts that evoke aesthetic ideas, is animal, i.e., bodily sensation. For from this admission

the spiritual feeling of respect for moral ideas, which is not one of gratification, but a selfesteem (an esteem

for humanity within us) that raises us above the need of gratification, suffers not a whitno nor even the less

In naivete we meet with a joint product of both the above. Naivete is the breaking forth of the ingenuousness

originally natural to humanity, in opposition to the art of disguising oneself that has become a second nature.

We laugh at the simplicity that is as yet a stranger to dissimulation, but we rejoice the while over the

simplicity of nature that thwarts that art. We await the commonplace manner of artificial utterance,

thoughtfully addressed to a fair show, and lo! nature stands before us in unsullied innocencenature that we

were quite unprepared to meet, and that he who laid it bare had also no intention of revealing. That the

outward appearance, fair but false, that usually assumes such importance in our judgement, is here, at a

stroke, turned to a nullity, that, as it were, the rogue in us is nakedly exposed, calls forth the movement of the

mind, in two successive and opposite directions, agitating the body at the same time with wholesome motion.

But that something infinitely better than any accepted code of manners, namely purity of mind (or at least a

vestige of such purity), has not become wholly extinct in human nature, infuses seriousness and reverence

into this play of judgement. But since it is only a manifestation that obtrudes itself for a moment, and the veil

of a dissembling art is soon drawn over it again, there enters into the above feelings a touch of pity. This is an

emotion of tenderness, playful in its way, that thus readily admits of combination with this sort of genial

laughter. And, in fact, this emotion is as a rule associated with it, and, at the same time, is wont to make

amends to the person who provides such food for our merriment for his embarrassment at not being wise after

the manner of men. For thatreason art of being naif is a contradiction. But it is quite possible to give a

representation of naivete in a fictitious personage, and, rare as the art is, it is a fine art. With this naivete we

must not confuse homely simplicity, which only avoids spoiling nature by artificiality, because it has no

The humorous manner may also be ranked as a thing which in its enlivening influence is clearly allied to the

gratification provoked by laughter. It belongs to originality of mind (des Geistes), though not to the talent for

fine art. Humour, in a good sense, means the talent for being able to put oneself at will into a certain frame of

mind in which everything is estimated on lines that go quite off the beaten track (a topsyturvy view of

things), and yet on lines that follow certain principles, rational in the case of such a mental temperament. A

person with whom such variations are not a matter of choice is said to have humours; but if a person can

assume them voluntarily and of set purpose (on behalf of a lively presentation drawn from a ludicrous

contrast), he and his way of speaking are termed humorous. This manner belongs, however, to agreeable

rather than to fine art, because the object of the latter must always have an evident intrinsic worth about it,

and thus demands a certain seriousness in its presentation, as taste does in estimating it.

For a power of judgement to be dialectical it must first of all be rationalizing; that is to say, its judgements

must lay claim to universality,* and do so a priori, for it is in the antithesis of such judgements that dialectic

consists. Hence there is nothing dialectical in the irreconcilability of aesthetic judgements of sense (upon the

agreeable and disagreeable). And in so far as each person appeals merely to his own private taste, even the

conflict of judgements of taste does not form a dialectic of tastefor no one is proposing to make his own

judgement into a universal rule. Hence the only concept left to us of a dialectic affecting taste is one of a

dialectic of the critique of taste (not of taste itself) in respect of its principles: for, on the question of the

ground of the possibility of judgements of taste in general, mutually conflicting concepts naturally and

unavoidably make their appearance. The transcendental critique of taste will, therefore, only include a part

capable of bearing the name of a dialectic of the aesthetic judgement if we find an antinomy of the principles

of this faculty which throws doubt upon its conformity to law, and hence also upon its inner possibility.

*Any judgement which sets up to be universal may be termed a rationalizing judgement (indicium

ratiocinans); for so far as universal it may serve as the major premiss of a syllogism. On the other hand, only

a judgement which is thought as the conclusion of a syllogism, and, therefore, as having an a priori

The first commonplace of taste is contained in the proposition under cover of which every one devoid of taste

thinks to shelter himself from reproach: every one has his own taste. This is only another way of saying that

the determining ground of this judgement is merely subjective (gratification or pain), and that the judgement

Its second commonplace, to which even those resort who concede the right of the judgement of taste to

pronounce with validity for every one, is: there is no disputing about taste. This amounts to saying that, even

though the determining ground of a judgement of taste be objective, it is not reducible to definite concepts, so

that in respect of the judgement itself no decision can be reached by proofs, although it is quite open to us to

contend upon the matter, and to contend with right. For though contention and dispute have this point in

common, that they aim at bringing judgements into accordance out of and by means of their mutual

opposition; yet they differ in the latter hoping to effect this from definite concepts, as grounds of proof, and,

consequently, adopting objective concepts as grounds of the judgement. But where this is considered

Between these two commonplaces an intermediate proposition is readily seen to be missing. It is one which

has certainly not become proverbial, but yet it is at the back of every one's mind. It is that there may be

contention about taste (although not a dispute). This proposition, however, involves the contrary of the first

one. For in a manner in which contention is to be allowed, there must be a: hope of coming to terms. Hence

one must be able to reckon on grounds of judgement that possess more than private Validity and are thus not

merely subjective. And yet the above principle (Every one has his own taste) is directly opposed to this.

1. Thesis. The judgement of taste is not based upon concepts; for, if it were, it would be open to dispute

2. Antithesis. The judgement of taste is based on concepts; for otherwise, despite diversity of judgement,

there could be no room even for contention in the matter (a claim to the necessary agreement of others with

There is no possibility of removing the conflict of the above principles, which underlie every judgement of

taste (and which are only the two peculiarities of the judgement of taste previously set out in the Analytic)

except by showing that the concept to which the object is to refer in a judgement of this kind is not taken in

the same sense in both maxims of the aesthetic judgement; that this double sense, or point of view, in our

estimate, is necessary for our power of transcendental judgement; and that nevertheless the false appearance

arising from the confusion of one with the other is a natural illusion, and so unavoidable.

The judgement of taste must have reference to some concept or other, as otherwise it would be absolutely

impossible for it to lay claim to necessary validity for every one. Yet it need not on that account be provable

from a concept. For a concept may be either determinable, or else at once intrinsically undetermined and

indeterminable. A concept of the understanding, which is determinable by means of predicates borrowed

from sensible intuition and capable of corresponding to it, is of the first kind. But of the second kind is the

transcendental rational concept of the supersensible, which lies at the basis of all that sensible intuition and is,

Now the judgement of taste applies to objects of sense, but not so as to determine a concept of them for the

understanding; for it is not a cognitive judgement. Hence it is a singular representation of intuition referable

to the feeling of pleasure, and, as such, only a private judgement. And to that extent it would be limited in its

validity to the individual judging: the object is for me an object of delight, for others it may be otherwise;

For all that, the judgement of taste contains beyond doubt an enlarged reference on the part of the

representation of the object (and at the same time on the part of the subject also), which lays the foundation of

an extension of judgements of this kind to necessity for every one. This must of necessity be founded upon

some concept or other, but such a concept as does not admit of being determined by intuition, and affords no

knowledge of anything. Hence, too, it is a concept which does not afford proof of the judgement of taste. But

the mere pure rational concept of the supersensible lying at the basis of the object (and of the judging subject

for that matter) as object of sense, and thus as phenomenon, is just such a concept. For unless such a point of

view were adopted there would be no means of saving the claim of the judgement of taste to universal

validity. And if the concept forming the required basis were a concept of understanding, though a mere

confused one, as, let us say, of perfection, answering to which the sensible intuition of the beautiful might be

adduced, then it would be at least intrinsically possible to found the judgement of taste upon proofs, which

All contradiction disappears, however, if I say: The judgement of taste does depend upon a concept (of a

general ground of the subjective finality of nature for the power of judgement), but one from which nothing

can be cognized in respect of the object, and nothing proved, because it is in itself indeterminable and useless

for knowledge. Yet, by means of this very concept, it acquires at the same time validity for every one (but

with each individual, no doubt, as a singular judgement immediately accompanying his intuition): because its

determining ground lies, perhaps, in the concept of what may be regarded as the supersensible substrate of

The solution of an antinomy turns solely on the possibility of two apparently conflicting propositions not

being in fact contradictory, but rather being capable of consisting together, although the explanation of the

possibility of their concept transcends our faculties of cognition. That this illusion is also natural and for

human reason unavoidable, as well as why it is so, and remains so, although upon the solution of the apparent

contradiction it no longer misleads us, may be made intelligible from the above considerations.

For the concept, which the universal validity of a judgement must have for its basis, is taken in the same

sense in both the conflicting judgements, yet two opposite predicates are asserted of it. The thesis should

therefore read: The judgement of taste is not based on determinate concepts; but the antithesis: The

judgement of taste does rest upon a concept, although an indeterminate one (that, namely, of the

supersensible substrate of phenomena); and then there would be no conflict between them.

Beyond removing this conflict between the claims and counterclaims of taste we can do nothing. To supply

a determinate objective principle of taste in accordance with which its judgements might be derived, tested,

and proved, is an absolute impossibility, for then it would not be a judgement of taste. The subjective

principlethat is to say, the indeterminate idea of the supersensible within us can only be indicated as the

unique key to the riddle of this faculty, itself concealed from us in its sources; and there is no means of

The antinomy here exhibited and resolved rests upon the proper concept of taste as a merely reflective

aesthetic judgement, and the two seemingly conflicting principles are reconciled on the ground that they may

both be true, and this is sufficient. If, on the other hand, owing to the fact that the representation lying at the

basis of the judgement of taste is singular, the determining ground of taste is taken, as by some it is, to be

agreeableness, or, as others, looking to its universal validity, would have it, the principle of perfection, and if

the definition of taste is framed accordingly, the result is an antinomy which is absolutely irresolvable unless

we show the falsity of both propositions as contraries (not as simple contradictories). This would force the

conclusion that the concept upon which each is founded is selfcontradictory. Thus it is evident that the

removal of the antinomy of the aesthetic judgement pursues a course similar to that followed by the Critique

in the solution of the antinomies of pure theoretical reason; and that the antinomies, both here and in the

Critique of Practical Reason, compel us, whether we like it or not, to look beyond the horizon of the sensible,

and to seek in the supersensible the point of union of all our faculties a priori: for we are left with no other

We find such frequent occasion in transcendental philosophy for distinguishing ideas from concepts of the

understanding that it may be of use to introduce technical terms answering to the distinction between them. I

think that no objection will be raised to my proposing some. Ideas, in the most comprehensive sense of the

word, are representations referred to an object according to a certain principle (subjective or objective), in so

far as they can still never become a cognition of it. They are either referred to an intuition, in accordance with

a merely subjective principle of the harmony of the cognitive faculties (imagination and understanding), and

are then called aesthetic; or else they are referred to a concept according to an objective principle and yet are

incapable of ever furnishing a cognition of the object, and are called rational ideas. In the latter case, the

concept is a transcendent concept, and, as such, differs from a concept of understanding, for which an

adequately answering experience may always be supplied, and which, on that account, is called immanent.

An aesthetic idea cannot become a cognition, because it is an intuition (of the imagination) for which an

adequate concept can never be found. A rational idea can never become a cognition, because it involves a

concept (of the supersensible), for which a commensurate intuition can never be given.

Now the aesthetic idea might, I think, be called an inexponible representation of the imagination, the rational

idea, on the other hand, an indemonstrable concept of reason. The production of both is presupposed to be not

altogether groundless, but rather (following the above explanation of an idea in general) to take place in

obedience to certain principles of the cognitive faculties to which they belong (subjective principles in the

Concepts of the understanding must, as such, always be demonstrable (if, as in anatomy, demonstration is

understood in the sense merely of presentation). In other words, the object answering to such concepts must

always be capable of being given an intuition (pure or empirical); for only in this way can they become

cognitions. The concept of magnitude may be given a priori in the intuition of space, e.g., of the right line,

etc.; the concept of cause in impenetrability, in the impact of bodies, etc. Consequently both may be verified

by means of an empirical intuition, i.e., the thought of them may be indicated (demonstrated, exhibited) in an

example; and this it must be possible to do: for otherwise there would be no certainty of the thought not being

In logic the expressions demonstrable or indemonstrable are ordinarily employed only in respect of

propositions. A better designation would be to call the former propositions only mediately, and the latter,

propositions immediately, certain. For pure philosophy, too, has propositions of both these kindsmeaning

thereby true propositions which are in the one case capable, and in the other incapable, of proof. But, in its

character of philosophy, while it can, no doubt, prove on a priori grounds, it cannot demonstrateunless we

wish to give the complete goby to the meaning of the word which makes demonstrate (ostendere, exhibere)

equivalent to giving an accompanying presentation of the concept in intuition (be it in a proof or in a

definition). Where the intuition is a priori this is called its construction, but when even the intuition is

empirical, we have still got the illustration of the object, by which means objective reality is assured to the

concept. Thus an anatomist is said to demonstrate the human eye when he renders the concept, of which he

has previously given a discursive exposition, intuitable by means of the dissection of that organ.

It follows from the above that the rational concept of the supersensible substrate of all phenomena generally,

or even of that which must be laid at the basis of our elective will in respect of moral laws, i.e., the rational

concept of transcendental freedom, is at once specifically an indemonstrableconcept, and a rational idea,

whereas virtue is so in a measure. For nothing can be given which in itself qualitatively answers in experience

to the rational concept of the former, while in the case of virtue no empirical product of the above causality

Just as the imagination, in the case of a rational idea, fails with its intuitions to attain to the given concept, so

understanding, in the case of an aesthetic idea, fails with its concepts ever to attain to the completeness of the

internal intuition which imagination conjoins with a given representation. Now since the reduction of a

representation of the imagination to concepts is equivalent to giving its exponents, the aesthetic idea may be

called on inexponible representation of the imagination (in its free play). I shall have an opportunity hereafter

of dealing more fully with ideas of this kind. At present I confine myself to the remark, that both kinds of

ideas, aesthetic ideas as well as rational, are bound to have their principles, and that the seat of these

principles must in both cases be reasonthe latter depending upon the objective, the former upon the

Consonantly with this, GENIUS may also be defined as the faculty of aesthetic ideas. This serves at the same

time to point out the reason why it is nature (the nature of the individual) and not a set purpose, that in

products of genius gives the rule to art (as the production of the beautiful). For the beautiful must not be

estimated according to concepts, but by the final mode in which the imagination is attuned so as to accord

with the faculty of concepts generally; and so rule and precept are incapable of serving as the requisite

subjective standard for that aesthetic and unconditioned finality in fine art which has to make a warranted

claim to being bound to please every one. Rather must such a standard be sought in the element of mere

nature in the subject, which cannot be comprehended under rules or concepts, that is to say, the supersensible

substrate of all the subject's faculties (unattainable by any concept of understanding), and consequently in that

which forms the point of reference for the harmonious accord of all our faculties of cognitionthe production

of which accord is the ultimate end set by the intelligible basis of our nature. Thus alone is it possible for a

subjective and yet universally valid principle a priori to lie at the basis of that finality for which no objective

The following important observation here naturally presents itself: There are three kinds of antinomies of

pure reason, which, however, all agree in forcing reason to abandon the otherwise very natural assumption

which takes the objects of sense for thingsinthemselves, and to regard them, instead, merely as

phenomena, and to lay at their basis an intelligible substrate (something supersensible, the concept of which

is only an idea and affords no proper knowledge). Apart from some such antinomy, reason could never bring

itself to take such a step asto adopt a principle so severely restricting the field of its speculation, and to

submit to sacrifices involving the complete dissipation of so many otherwise brilliant hopes. For even now

that it is recompensed for this loss by the prospect of a proportionately wider scope of action from a practical

point of view, it is not without a pang of regret that it appears to part company with those hopes, and to break

The reason for there being three kinds of antinomies is to be found in the fact that there are three faculties of

cognition, understanding, judgement, and reason, each of which, being a higher faculty of cognition, must

have its a priori principles. For, so far as reason passes judgement upon these principles themselves and their

employment, it inexorably requires the unconditioned for the given conditioned in respect of them all. This

can never be found unless the sensible, instead of being regarded as inherently appurtenant to

thingsinthemselves, is treated as a mere phenomenon, and, as such, being made to rest upon something

supersensible (the intelligible substrate of external and internal nature) as the thinginitself. There is then

(1) for the cognitive faculty an antinomy of reason in respect of the theoretical employment of understanding

carried to the point of the unconditioned; (2) for the feeling of pleasure and displeasure an antinomy of reason

in respect of the aesthetic employment of judgement; (3) for the faculty Of desire an antinomy in respect of

the practical employment of selflegislative reason. For all these faculties have their fundamental a priori

principles, and, following an imperative demand of reason, must be able to judge and to determine their

As to two of the antinomies of these higher cognitive faculties, those, namely, of their theoretical and of their

practical employment, we have already shown elsewhere both that they are inevitable, if no cognisance is

taken in such judgements of a supersensible substrate of the given objects as phenomena, and, on the other

hand, that they can be solved the moment this is done. Now, as to the antinomy incident to the employment

of judgement in conformity with the demand of reason, and the solution of it here given, we may say that to

avoid facing it there are but the following alternatives. It is open to us to deny that any a priori principle lies

at the basis of the aesthetic judgement of taste, with the result that all claim to the necessity of a universal

consensus of opinion is an idle and empty delusion, and that a judgement of taste only deserves to be

considered to this extent correct, that it so happens that a number share the same opinion, and even this, not,

in truth, because an a priori principle is presumed to lie at the back of this agreement, but rather (as with the

taste of the palate) because of the contingently resembling organization of the individuals. Or else, in the

alternative, we should have to suppose that the judgement of taste is in fact a disguised judgement of reason

on the perfection discovered in a thing and the reference of the manifold in it to an end, and that it is

consequently only called aesthetic on account of the confusion that here besets our reflection, although

fundamentally it is teleological. In this latter case the solution of the antinomy with the assistance of

transcendental ideas might be declared otiose and nugatory, and the above laws of taste thus reconciled with

the objects of sense, not as mere phenomena, but even as thingsinthemselves. How unsatisfactory both of

those alternatives alike are as a means of escape has been shown in several places in our exposition of

If, however, our deduction is at least credited with having been worked out on correct lines, even though it

may not have been sufficiently clear in all its details, three ideas then stand out in evidence. Firstly, there is

the supersensible in general, without further determination, as substrate of nature; secondly, this same

supersensible as principle of the subjective finality of nature for our cognitive faculties; thirdly, the same

supersensible again, as principle of the ends of freedom, and principle of the common accord of these ends

The principle of taste may, to begin with, be placed on either of two footings. For taste may be said invariably

to judge on empirical grounds of determination and such, therefore, as are only given a posteriori through

sense, or else it may be allowed to judge on an a priori ground. The former would be the empiricism of the

critique of taste, the latter its rationalism. The first would obliterate the distinction that marks off the object of

our delight from the agreeable; the second, supposing the judgement rested upon determinate concepts, would

obliterate its distinction from the good. In this way beauty would have its locus standi in the world

completely denied, and nothing but the dignity of a separate name, betokening, maybe, a certain blend of both

the abovenamed kinds of delight, would be left in its stead. But we have shown the existence of grounds of

delight which are a priori, and which therefore, can consist with the principle of rationalism, and which are

As against the above, we may say that the rationalism of the principle of taste may take the form either of the

realism of finality or of its idealism. Now, as a judgement of taste is not a cognitive judgement, and as beauty

is not a property of the object considered in its own account, the rationalism of the principle of taste can never

be placed in the fact that the finality in this judgement is regarded in thought as objective. In other words, the

judgement is not directed theoretically, nor, therefore, logically, either (no matter if only in a confused

estimate), to the perfection of the object, but only aesthetically to the harmonizing of its representation in the

imagination with the essential principles of judgement generally in the subject. For this reason the judgement

of taste, and the distinction between its realism and its idealism, can only, even on the principle of

rationalism, depend upon its subjective finality interpreted in one or other of two ways. Either such subjective

finality is, in the first case, a harmony with our judgement pursued as an actual (intentional) end of nature (or

of art), or else, in the second case, it is only a supervening final harmony with the needs of our faculty of

judgement in its relation to nature and the forms which nature produces in accordance with particular laws,

The beautiful forms displayed in the organic world all plead eloquently on the side of the realism of the

aesthetic finality of nature in support of the plausible assumption that beneath the production of the beautiful

there must lie a preconceived idea in the producing causethat is to say an end acting in the interest of our

imagination. Flowers, blossoms, even the shapes of plants as a whole, the elegance of animal formations of

all kinds, unnecessary for the discharge of any function on their part, but chosen as it were with an eye to our

taste; and, beyond all else, the variety and harmony in the array of colours (in the pheasant, in crustacea, in

insects, down even to the meanest flowers), so pleasing and charming to the eyes, but which, inasmuch as

they touch the bare surf ace, and do not even here in any way all act the structure, of these creaturesa matter

which might have a necessary bearing on their internal endsseem to be planned entirely with a view to

outward appearance: all these lend great weight to the mode of explanation which assumes actual ends of

On the other hand, not alone does reason, with its maxims enjoining upon us in all cases to avoid, as far as

possible, any unnecessary multiplication of principles, set itself against this assumption, but we have nature

in its free formations displaying on all sides extensive mechanical proclivity to producing forms seemingly

made, as it were, for the aesthetic employment of our judgement, without affording the least support to the

supposition of a need for anything over and above its mechanism, as mere nature, to enable them to be final

for our judgement apart from their being grounded upon any idea. The above expression, "free formations" of

nature, is, however, here used to denote such as are originally set up in a fluid at rest where the volatilization

SS 58. The idealism of the finality alike of nature and of art, as the unique principle of the aesthetic judgement. 94

or separation of some constituent (sometimes merely of caloric) leaves the residue on solidification to assume

a definite shape or structure (figure or texture) which differs with specific differences of the matter, but for

the same matter is invariable. Here, however, it is taken for granted that, as the true meaning of a fluid

requires, the matter in the fluid is completely dissolved and not a mere admixture of solid particles simply

The formation, then, takes place by a concursion, i.e., by a sudden solidification not by a gradual transition

from the fluid to the solid state, but, as it were, by a leap. This transition is termed crystallization. Freezing

water offers the most familiar instance of a formation of this kind. There the process begins by straight

threads of ice forming. These unite at angles of 60", whilst others similarly attach themselves to them at every

point until the whole has turned into ice. But while this is going on, the water between the threads of ice does

not keep getting gradually more viscous, but remains as thoroughly fluid as it would be at a much higher

temperature, although it is perfectly icecold. The matter that frees itself that makes its sudden escape at the

moment of solidificationis a considerable quantum of caloric. As this was merely required to preserve

fluidity, its disappearance leaves the existing ice not a whit colder than the water which but a moment before

There are many salts and also stones of a crystalline figure which owe their origin in like manner to some

earthly substance being dissolved in water under the influence of agencies little understood. The drusy

configurations of many minerals, of the cubical sulphide of lead, of the red silver ore, etc., are presumably

also similarly formed in water, and by the concursion of their particles, on their being forced by some cause

or other to relinquish this vehicle and to unite among themselves in definite external shapes.

But, further, all substances rendered fluid by heat, which have become solid as the result of cooling, give,

when broken, internal evidences of a definite texture, thus suggesting the inference that only for the

interference of their own weight or the disturbance of the air, the exterior would also have exhibited their

proper specific shape. This has been observed in the case of some metals where the exterior of a molten mass

has hardened, but the interior remained fluid, and then. owing to the withdrawal of the still fluid portion in

the interior, there has been an undisturbed concursion of the remaining parts on the inside. A number of such

mineral crystallizations, such as spars, hematite, aragonite, frequently present extremely beautiful shapes

such as it might take art all its time to devise; and the halo in the grotto of Antiparos is merely the work of

The fluid state is, to all appearance, on the whole older than the solid, and plants as well as animal bodies are

built up out of fluid nutritive substance, so far as this takes form undisturbedin the case of the latter,

admittedly, in obedience, primarily, to a certain original bent of nature directed to ends (which, as will be

shown in Part II, must not be judged aesthetically, but teleologically by the principle of realism); but still all

the while, perhaps, also following the universal law of the affinity of substances in the way they shoot

together and form in freedom. In the same way, again, where an atmosphere, which is a composite of

different kinds of gas, is charged with watery fluids, and these separate from it owing to a reduction of the

temperature, they produce snowfigures of shapes differing with the actual composition of the atmosphere.

These are frequently of very artistic appearance and of extreme beauty. So without at all derogating from the

teleological principle by which an organization is judged, it is readily conceivable how with beauty of

flowers, of the plumage of birds, of crustacea, both as to their shape and their colour, we have only what may

be ascribed to nature and its capacity for originating in free activity aesthetically final forms, independently

of any particular guiding ends, according to chemical laws, by means of the chemical integration of the

But what shows plainly that the principle of the ideality of the finality in the beauty of nature is the one upon

which we ourselves invariably take our stand in our aesthetic judgements, forbidding us to have recourse to

any realism of a natural end in favour of our faculty of representation as a principle of explanation, is that in

SS 58. The idealism of the finality alike of nature and of art, as the unique principle of the aesthetic judgement. 95

our general estimate of beauty we seek its standard a priori in ourselves, and, that the aesthetic faculty is itself

legislative in respect of the judgement whether anything is beautiful or not. This could not be so on the

assumption of a realism of the finality of nature; because in that case we should have to go to nature for

instruction as to what we should deem beautiful, and the judgement of taste would be subject to empirical

principles. For in such an estimate the question does not turn on what nature is, or even on what it is for us in

the way of an end, but on how we receive it. For nature to have fashioned its forms for our delight would

inevitably imply an objective finality on the part of nature, instead of a subjective finality resting on the play

of imagination in its freedom, where it is we who receive nature with favour, and not nature that does us a

favour. That nature affords us an opportunity for perceiving the inner finality in the relation of our mental

powers engaged in the estimate of certain of its products, and, indeed, such a finality as arising from a

supersensible basis is to be pronounced necessary and of universal validity, is a property of nature which

cannot belong to it as its end, or rather, cannot be estimated by us to be such an end. For otherwise the

judgement that would be determined by reference to such an end would found upon heteronomy, instead of

The principle of the idealism of finality is still more clearly apparent in fine art. For the point that sensations

do not enable us to adopt an aesthetic realism of finality (which would make art merely agreeable instead of

beautiful) is one which it enjoys in common with beautiful nature. But the further point that the delight

arising from aesthetic ideas must not be made dependent upon the successful attainment of determinate ends

(as an art mechanically directed to results), and that, consequently, even in the case of the rationalism of the

principle, an ideality of the ends and not their reality is fundamental, is brought home to us by the fact that

fine art, as such, must not be regarded as a product of understanding and science, but of genius, and must,

therefore, derive its rule from aesthetic ideas, which are essentially different from rational ideas of

Just as the ideality of objects of sense as phenomena is the only way of explaining the possibility of their

forms admitting of a priori determination, so, also, the idealism of the finality in estimating the beautiful in

nature and in art is the only hypothesis upon which a critique can explain the possibility of a judgement of

taste that demands a priori validity for every one (yet without basing the finality represented in the object

Intuitions are always required to verify the reality of our concepts. If the concepts are empirical, the intuitions

are called examples: if they are pure concepts of the understanding, the intuitions go by the name of

schemata. But to call for a verification of the objective reality of rational concepts, i.e., of ideas, and, what is

more, on behalf of the theoretical cognition of such a reality, is to demand an impossibility, because

All hypotyposis (presentation, subjectio sub adspectum) as a rendering in terms of sense, is twofold. Either it

is schematic, as where the intuition corresponding to a concept comprehended by the understanding is given a

priori, or else it is symbolic, as where the concept is one which only reason can think, and to which no

sensible intuition can be adequate. In the latter case the concept is supplied with an intuition such that the

procedure of judgement in dealing with it is merely analogous to that which it observes in schematism. In

other words, what agrees with the concept is merely the rule of this procedure, and not the intuition itself.

Hence the agreement is merely in the form of reflection, and not in the content.

Notwithstanding the adoption of the word symbolic by modern logicians in a sense opposed to an intuitive

mode of representation, it is a wrong use of the word and subversive of its true meaning; for the symbolic is

only a mode of any intrinsic connection with the intuition of sentation is, in fact, divisible into the schematic

and the symbolic. Both are hypotyposes, i.e., presentations (exhibitiones), not mere marks. Marks are merely

designations of concepts by the aid of accompanying sensible signs devoid of any intrinsic connection with

the intuition of the object. Their sole function is to afford a means of reinvoking the concepts according to the

imagination's law of associationa purely subjective role. Such marks are either words or visible (algebraic or

*The intuitive mode of knowledge must be contrasted with the discursive mode (not with the symbolic). The

former is either schematic, by mean demonstration, symbolic, as a representation following a mere analogy.

All intuitions by which a priori concepts are given a foothold are, therefore, either schemata or symbols.

Schemata contain direct, symbols indirect, presentations of the concept. Schemata effect this presentation

demonstratively, symbols by the aid of an analogy (for which recourse is had even to empirical intuitions), in

which analogy judgement performs a double function: first in applying the concept to the object of a sensible

intuition, and then, secondly, in applying the mere rule of its reflection upon that intuition to quite another

object, of which the former is but the symbol. In this way, a monarchical state is represented as a living body

when it is governed by constitutional laws, but as a mere machine (like a handmill) when it is governed by an

individual absolute will; but in both cases the representation is merely symbolic. For there is certainly no

likeness between a despotic state and a handmill, whereas there surely is between the rules of reflection upon

both and their causality. Hitherto this function has been but little analysed, worthy as it is of a deeper study.

Still this is not the place to dwell upon it. In language we have many such indirect presentations modelled

upon an analogy enabling the expression in question to contain, not the proper schema for the concept, but

merely a symbol for reflection. Thus the words ground (support, basis), to depend (to be held up from above),

to flow from (instead of to follow), substance (as Locke puts it: the support of accidents), and numberless

others, are not schematic, but rather symbolic hypotyposes, and express concepts without employing a direct

intuition for the purpose, but only drawing upon an analogy with one, i.e., transferring the reflection upon an

object of intuition to quite a new concept, and one with which perhaps no intuition could ever directly

correspond. Supposing the name of knowledge may be given to what only amounts to a mere mode of

representation (which is quite permissible where this is not a principle of the theoretical determination of the

object in respect of what it is in itself, but of the practical determination of what the idea of it ought to be for

us and for its final employment), then all our knowledge of God is merely symbolic; and one who takes it,

with the properties of understanding, will, and so forth, which only evidence their objective reality in beings

of this world, to be schematic, falls into anthropomorphism, just as, if he abandons every intuitive element, he

falls into Deism which furnishes no knowledge whatsoevernot even from a practical point of view.

Now, I say, the beautiful is the symbol of the morally good, and only in this light (a point of view natural to

every one, and one which every one exacts from others as a duty) does it give us pleasure with an attendant

claim to the agreement of every one else, whereupon the mind becomes conscious of a certain ennoblement

and elevation above mere sensibility to pleasure from impressions of sense, and also appraises the worth of

others on the score of a like maxim of their judgement. This is that intelligible to which taste, as noticed in

the preceding paragraph, extends its view. It is, that is to say, what brings even our higher cognitive faculties

into common accord, and is that apart from which sheer contradiction would arise between their nature and

the claims put forward by taste. In this faculty, judgement does not find itself subjected to a heteronomy of

laws of experience as it does in the empirical estimate of thingsin respect of the objects of such a pure

delight it gives the law to itself, just as reason does in respect of the faculty of desire. Here, too, both on

account of this inner possibility in the subject, and on account of the external possibility of a nature

harmonizing therewith, it finds a reference in itself to something in the subject itself and outside it, and which

is not nature, nor yet freedom, but still is connected with the ground of the latter, i.e., the supersensiblea

something in which the theoretical faculty gets bound up into unity with the practical in an intimate and

obscure manner. We shall bring out a few points of this analogy, while taking care, at the same time, not to

(1) The beautiful pleases immediately (but only in reflective intuition, not, like morality, in its concept). (2) It

pleases apart from all interest (pleasure in the morally good is no doubt necessarily bound up with an interest,

but not with one of the kind that are antecedent to the judgement upon the delight, but with one that

judgement itself for the first time calls into existence). (3) The freedom of the imagination (consequently of

our faculty in respect of its sensibility) is, in estimating the beautiful, represented as in accord with the

understanding's conformity to law (in moral judgements the freedom of the will is thought as the harmony of

the latter with itself according to universal laws of Reason). (4) The subjective principles of the estimate of

the beautiful is represented as universal, i.e., valid for every man, but as incognizable by means of any

universal concept (the objective principle of morality is set forth as also universal, i.e., for all individuals,

and, at the same time, for all actions of the same individual, and, besides, as cognizable by means of a

universal concept). For this reason the moral judgement not alone admits of definite constitutive principles,

but is only possible by adopting these principles and their universality as the ground of its maxims.

Even common understanding is wont to pay regard to this analogy; and we frequently apply to beautiful

objects of nature or of art names that seem to rely upon the basis of a moral estimate. We call buildings or

trees majestic and stately, or plains laughing and gay; even colours are called innocent, modest, soft, because

they excite sensations containing something analogous to the consciousness of the state of mind produced by

moral judgements. Taste makes, as it were, the transition from the charm of sense to habitual moral interest

possible without too violent a leap, for it represents the imagination, even in its freedom, as amenable to a

final determination for understanding, and teaches us to find, even in sensuous objects, a free delight apart

The division of a critique into elementology and methodologya division which is introductory to scienceis

one inapplicable to the critique of taste. For there neither is, nor can be, a science of the beautiful, and the

judgement of taste is not determinable by principles. For, as to the element of science in every art a matter

which turns upon truth in the presentation of the object of the artwhile this is, no doubt, the indispensable

condition (conditio sine qua non) of fine art, it is not itself fine art. Fine art, therefore, has only got a manner

(modus), and not a method of teaching (methodus). The master must illustrate what the pupil is to achieve

and how achievement is to be attained, and the proper function of the universal rules to which he ultimately

reduces his treatment is rather that of supplying a convenient text for recalling its chief moments to the pupil's

mind, than of prescribing them to him. Yet, in all this, due regard must be paid to a certain ideal which art

must keep in view, even though complete success ever eludes its happiest efforts. Only by exciting the pupil's

imagination to conformity with a given concept, by pointing out how the expression falls short of the idea to

which, as aesthetic, the concept itself fails to attain, and by means of severe criticism, is it possible to prevent

his promptly looking upon the examples set before him as the prototypes of excellence, and as models for

him to imitate, without submission to any higher standard or to his own critical judgement. This would result

in genius being stifled, and, with it, also the freedom of the imagination in its very conformity to lawa

freedom without which a fine art is not possible, nor even as much as a correct taste of one's own for

The propaedeutic to all fine art, so far as the highest degree of its perfection is what is in view, appears to lie,

not in precepts, but in the culture of the mental powers produced by a sound preparatory education in what

are called the humanioraso called, presumably, because humanity signifies, on the one hand, the universal

feeling of sympathy, and, on the other, the faculty of being able to communicate universally one's inmost

selfproperties constituting in conjunction the befitting social spirit of mankind, in contradistinction to the

narrow life of the lower animals. There was an age and there were nations in which the active impulse

towards a social life regulated by lawswhat converts a people into a permanent communitygrappled with

the huge difficulties presented by the trying problem of bringing freedom (and therefore equality also) into

union with constraining force (more that of respect and dutiful submission than of fear). And such must have

been the age, and such the nation, that first discovered the art of reciprocal communication of ideas between

the more cultured and ruder sections of the community, and how to bridge the difference between the

amplitude and refinement of the former and the natural simplicity and originality of the latterin this way

hitting upon that mean between higher culture and the modest worth of nature, that forms for taste also, as a

sense common to all mankind, that true standard which no universal rules can supply.

Hardly will a later age dispense with those models. For nature will ever recede farther into the background, so

that eventually, with no permanent example retained from the past, a future age would scarce be in a position

to form a concept of the happy union, in one and the same people, of the lawdirected constraint belonging to

the highest culture, with the force and truth of a free nature sensible of its proper worth.

However, taste is, in the ultimate analysis, a critical faculty that judges of the rendering of moral ideas in

terms of sense (through the intervention of a certain analogy in our reflection on both); and it is this rendering

also, and the increased sensibility, founded upon it, for the feeling which these ideas evoke (termed moral

sense), that are the origin of that pleasure which taste declares valid for mankind in general and not merely

for the private feeling of each individual. This makes it clear that the true propaedeutic for laying the

foundations of taste is the development of moral ideas and the culture of the moral feeling. For only when

sensibility is brought into harmony with moral feeling can genuine taste assume a definite unchangeable

8. III. The Critique of Judgement as a means of connecting the two Parts of Philosophy in a whole., page = 11

10. V. The Principle of the formal finality of Nature is a transcendental Principle of Judgement., page = 14

11. VI. The Association of the Feeling of Pleasure with the Concept of the Finality of Nature., page = 17

14. IX. Joinder of the Legislations of Understanding and Reason by means of Judgement., page = 21

15. FIRST PART CRITIQUE OF AESTHETIC JUDGEMENT SECTION I. ANALYTIC OF AESTHETIC JUDGEMENT. BOOK I. Analytic of the Beautiful. FIRST MOMENT. Of the Judgement of Taste*: Moment of Quality. , page = 23

17. SS 2. The delight which determines the judgement of taste is independent of all interest., page = 23

20. SS 5. Comparison of the three specifically different kinds of delight., page = 26

21. SS 6. The beautiful is that which, apart from concepts, is represented as the Object of a universal delight., page = 27

22. SS 7. Comparison of the beautiful with the agreeable and the good by means of the above characteristic., page = 27

23. SS 8. In a judgement of taste the universality of delight is only represented as subjective., page = 28

24. SS 9. Investigation of the question of the relative priority in a judgement of taste of the feeling of pleasure and the estimating of the object., page = 29

26. SS 11. The sole foundation of the judgement of taste is the form of finality of an object (or mode of representing it)., page = 32

28. SS 13. The pure judgement of taste is independent of charm and emotion., page = 33

30. SS 15. The judgement of taste is entirely independent of the concept of perfection., page = 35

31. SS 16. A judgement of taste by which an object is described as beautiful, under the condition of a definite concept, is not pure., page = 36

34. SS 19. The subjective necessity attributed to a judgement of taste is conditioned., page = 40

35. SS 20. The condition of the necessity advanced by a judgement of taste is the idea of a common sense., page = 41

37. SS 22. The necessity of the universal assent that is thought in a judgement of taste, is a subjective necessity which, under the presupposition of a common sense, is represented as objective., page = 41

39. SS 23. Transition from the faculty of estimating the beautiful to that of estimating the sublime., page = 44

40. SS 24. Subdivision of an investigation of the feeling of the sublime., page = 45

42. SS 26. The estimation of the magnitude of natural things requisite for the idea of the sublime., page = 47

46. SS 30. The deduction of aesthetic judgements upon objects of nature must not be directed to what we call sublime in nature, but only to the beautiful., page = 62

51. SS 35. The principle of taste is the subjective principle of the general power of judgement., page = 66

53. SS 37. What exactly it is that is asserted a priori of an object in a judgement of taste., page = 67

61. SS 45. Fine art is an art, so far as it has at the same time the appearance of being nature., page = 77

63. SS 47. Elucidation and confirmation of the above explanation of genius., page = 78

66. SS 50. The combination of taste and genius in products of fine art., page = 83

68. SS 52. The combination of the fine arts in one and the same product., page = 87

69. SS 53. Comparative estimate of the aesthetic worth of the fine arts., page = 87

74. SS 58. The idealism of the finality alike of nature and of art, as the unique principle of the aesthetic judgement., page = 98