2o8 Kant: A Biographyand aesthetic harmony were important to him, it was ultimately the summum
bonum that was important. In his "Essay on the First Principle of Morals,"
Lenz argued, very much like Kant, that morals "must be based on firm and
inviolable principles," and that there are no actions that are more in con¬
flict with human nature than those without a goal.^76 He also affirmed the
centrality of the summum bonum, and the idea that the summum bonum should
be sought within us. He agreed that there was not just one principle of
morality but two. He developed the view that these two principles of moral¬
ity could be found in the inclination to become perfect and the inclination
to become happy, that there is a moral faith, and that this faith is the com-
plementum moralitatis. All of these ideas were compatible with Kant's. To
some extent, they were just extensions of the views Kant held during the
period in which Lenz was his student.
Perhaps one might go further and say that Kant influenced the very way
in which this essay is written.^77 Lenz alluded to his "usual way to spread
out some easy and apparently unconnected remarks about the first prin¬
ciples of morals," and said "opinions ... will count for me as genuine coin
until I can exchange them for better ones." In this he was closer to the Kant
of the Observations than to the Kant of the Inaugural Dissertation, but he
was close to Kant. There is a certain family resemblance between the writ¬
ings of Lenz and Herder, and the early Kant may have been responsible
for this, at least in part. He may have had a more important and, as it were,
subterranean influence on thinkers who developed very differently from
the way in which he developed. This influence was not so much on the ra¬
tionalistic elements of the eighteenth century, but on those who were op¬
posed to a one-sided reliance on reason.
Kraus, who came to study at the University of Königsberg in October
1770, was similar to Lenz in his intellectual outlook.^78 He officially entered
the University of Königsberg on April 13,1771, and that is where he stayed
until his death.^79 Apart from some trips to other parts of Germany, he re¬
mained for the rest of his life in Königsberg. In time, he became one of
Kant's closest friends and colleagues. Kraus was the nephew of Pastor Buch-
holz, who was his mother's brother. When he first came to Königsberg his
uncle supervised him. Since Buchholz was also Hamann's confessor, Kraus
was almost immediately introduced into the intellectual circles of Königs¬
berg. Like all beginning students, he started out with courses in the faculty
of philosophy. He attended Kant's lectures during his very first semester,
became interested, and soon had heard all of them,