f the laws of nature and
consequently of the formal unity of nature, such an assertion is
nevertheless correct and in accordance with the object, i. e. with
experience."[95] The explanation of the paradox is found in the fact
that objects of nature are phenomena. "But if we reflect that this
nature is in itself nothing else than a totality[96] of phenomena and
consequently no thing in itself but merely a number of representations
of the mind, we shall not be surprised that only in the radical
faculty of all our knowledge, viz. transcendental apperception, do we
see it in that unity through which alone it can be called object of
all possible experience, i. e. nature."[97] "It is no more surprising
that the laws of the phenomena in nature must agree with the
understanding and with its _a priori_ form, that is, its faculty of
connecting the manifold in general, than that the phenomena themselves
must agree with the _a priori_ form of our sensuous perception. For
laws exist in the phenomena as little as phenomena exist in
themselves; on the contrary, laws exist only relatively to the subject
in which the phenomena inhere, so far as it has understanding, just as
phenomena exist only relatively to the subject, so far as it has
senses. To things in themselves their conformity to law would
necessarily also belong independently of an understanding which knows
them. But phenomena are only representations of things which exist
unknown in respect of what they may be in themselves. But, as mere
representations, they stand under no law of connexion except that
which the connecting faculty prescribes."[98]

[94] A. 125, Mah. 214.

[95] A. 127, Mah. 216.

[96] _Inbegriff._

[97] A. 114, Mah. 206.

[98] B. 164, M. 100.

In the second place, this last paragraph contains the real reason from
the point of view of the deduction[99] of the categories for what may
be called the negative side of his doctrine, viz. that the categories
only apply to objects of experience and not to things in themselves.
According to Kant, we can only say that certain principles of
connexion apply to a reality into which we introduce the connexion.
Things in themselves, if connected, are connected in themselves and
apart from us. Hence there can be no guarantee that any principles of
connexion which we might assert them to possess are those which they
do possess.

[99] The main passage (B. 146-9, M. 90-2), in which he argues