508 Notes to Pages 412-415
had an avid interest in this subject, and Karl Gottfried Hagen wrote one of the
first textbooks on pharmacy in 1786. It was called Grundriss der Experimental-
chemie zum Gebrauch bey dem Vortrage derselben (Basic Outline of Experimental
Chemistry for Use in Lectures); beginning with the third edition it was called
Grundsätze der Experimentalchemie (Basic Principles of Experimental Chemistry).
Kant called this textbook a "logical masterpiece." Hagen was a regular dinner
guest at Kant's house. See Wolfgang Caesar, "Karl Gottfried Hagen (1749-1829),"
Jahrbuch Der Albertus Universität Zu Königsberg 29 (1994), pp. 389-395.
- Ak 22, pp. 82f.
- Förster argues in his "Kant's Selbstsetzungslehre" that this is not a Fichtean in¬
fluence, appealing to other instances of "positing" in Kant. This approach has
precedents in Kant, but this does not make a Fichtean influence impossible.
Fichte was indebted to Kant on just these points, but the idea that "we make every¬
thing" is closer to Fichte's than it is to Kant's critical view. See also Förster, "Fichte,
Beck and Schelling in Kant's Opus Postumum,"pp. i58f. Förster emphasizes the
differences between Fichte and Kant as well as he can, but I do not think his ar¬
guments are successful in showing that Fichte did not influence Kant.
- Warda, "Ergänzungen zu E. Fromm's Lebensgeschichte Kants," p. 86.
- Kant, Briefwechsel, ed. Zweig, pp. 253f.
- Wasianski, Kant, p. 232.
- Ibid.
- Rink, Ansichten, p. 70.
- See Maker, Kant in Rede und Gespräch, p. 475 (from Der Freimütige, 1804), and
Rink, Ansichten, p. 71.
- Hasse, Merkwürdige Äußerungen, p. 4. See also Pörschke's comments to Fichte
in Maker, Kant in Rede und Gespräch, p. 442: "Kant, who no longer lectures, and
who has withdrawn from all society, the house of his friend Motherby excepted,
is slowly becoming less known even here; even his reputation is decreasing" (July
7, 1788).
- According to Hasse, Merkwürdige Äußerungen, p. 4, this was at the end of 1800.
- Jachmann, Kant, p. 203.
- Rink to Villers, a popularizer of Kant in France: "Please do not blame Kant for not
having answered your letter. He is old and weak. He answers almost no letter any
longer, though he receives so many ... I almost want to say he is incapable of
answering them." See Vaihinger, "Briefe aus dem Kantkreis," pp. 287f. This is
supported by his published correspondence. See Kant, Briefwechsel, ed. Schön-
dorfer and Maker. Kant was never a great correspondent. But after 1799, there
are very few letters, and many of them were short.
- Jachmann, Kant, p. 203; Rink to Villers in June 1801: "Kant's weakness is in¬
creasing dramatically {ungemein)" in Vaihinger, "Briefe aus dem Kantkreis," p. 292;
Hasse, Merkwürdige Äußerungen, p. 8: "From 1801 he had become noticeably
weaker. His thoughts were no longer as well ordered as before; but he still expe¬
rienced clear insights at frequent occasions, which went like lightning strikes
through his head. They proved his uncommon acuity, and deserved to be
recorded." What Hasse recorded shows nothing of the sort.
