A Palingenesis and Its Consequences 151man of character over the oscillations of feelings and passions, his realiza¬
tion that the moral law gives human beings dignity far beyond any other
animal, and his self-mastery by maxims — all these aspects of Kant's view
of character align him more closely with these pre-Christian philosophers
than with the Pietists.^18 Indeed, even the Platonic ideal of the "wise and
serene character, always consistent with itself" is closer to Kant's view than
is that of the latter-day Christians.^19
The new Immanuel Kant that emerged after 1764 was different in other
respects as well. Again, this was the result of maxims. In a rare autobio¬
graphical note Kant tells us:
Because of my narrow and flat chest, which leaves little room for the movements of
heart and lung, I have a natural inclination to hypochondria, which in my earlier years
bordered on despair of living. But the consideration that the cause of this congestion of
the heart was merely mechanical and could not be changed soon made me completely
disregard it so that there was calmness and joy in my head even though I felt constricted
in my chest...^20
This sounds very much like a description of a mild form of angina pec-
toris (chest pains caused by insufficient oxygenation of the heart muscle).
Since this condition was first accurately described by London physician
William Heberdeen in 1768, we may assume that at least the description
of his ailment goes back to the time around 1768, though Kant may have
viewed it in a similar way even earlier.
Kant felt that to escape hypochondriacal states we should go about our
"daily business" (Tagesordnung) and concentrate on the things we must do.
Our maxim should be to focus on other matters and especially on philo¬
sophical problems, and this, Kant is sure, will enable us to overcome the
states of anxiety to which we might otherwise fall victim. Orderliness is a
source of mental health. A life in accordance with maxims not only makes
us virtuous, but has other "advantages" as well.^21
Though the history of hypochondria goes back to antiquity, it was an
especially fashionable disease in the eighteenth century. It was all the rage
among intellectuals.^22 Throughout "most of its history -it was linked to
melancholia, which, being one of the four directions a personality could
tend toward, was a common temperamental type."^23 Richard Burton in his
successful book on The Anatomy of Melancholy of 1621 differentiated among
many kinds of melancholy, of which "hypochondriacal melancholy" was
only one. It arose for him "from the bowels, liver, spleen, or membrane called
mesentenum" and was also called "windy melancholy, which Laurentius