ich they rest, are apparently not those of common logic; a dimness
and doubt overhangs their conclusions; scarcely anything is proved in
a convincing manner. But this is no strange quality in such writings.
To an exoteric reader the philosophy of Kant almost always appears to
invert the common maxim; its end and aim seem not to be 'to make
abstruse things simple, but to make simple things abstruse.' Often a
proposition of inscrutable and dread aspect, when resolutely grappled
with, and torn from its shady den, and its bristling entrenchments of
uncouth terminology, and dragged forth into the open light of day, to
be seen by the natural eye, and tried by merely human understanding,
proves to be a very harmless truth, familiar to us from of old,
sometimes so familiar as to be a truism. Too frequently, the anxious
novice is reminded of Dryden in the _Battle of the Books_: there is a
helmet of rusty iron, dark, grim, gigantic; and within it, at the
farthest corner, is a head no bigger than a walnut. These are the
general errors of Kantean criticism; in the present works, they are by
no means of the worst or most pervading kind; and there is a
fundamental merit which does more than counterbalance them. By the aid
of study, the doctrine set before us can, in general, at length be
comprehended; and Schiller's fine intellect, recognisable even in its
masquerade, is ever and anon peering forth in its native form, which
all may understand, which all must relish, and presenting us with
passages that show like bright verdant islands in the misty sea of
metaphysics.

We have been compelled to offer these remarks on Kant's Philosophy;
but it is right to add that they are the result of only very limited
acquaintance with the subject. We cannot wish that any influence of
ours should add a note, however feeble, to the loud and not at all
melodious cry which has been raised against it in this country. When a
class of doctrines so involved in difficulties, yet so sanctioned by
illustrious names, is set before us, curiosity must have a theory
respecting them, and indolence and other humbler feelings are too
ready to afford her one. To call Kant's system a laborious dream, and
its adherents crazy mystics, is a brief method, brief but false. The
critic, whose philosophy includes the _craziness_ of men like these,
so easily and smoothly in its formulas, should render thanks to Heaven
for having gifted him with science and acumen, as few in an