Immanuel Kant Quotes on Nature
Immanuel Kant was a German philosopher of the Enlightenment born in Konigsberg, Prussia. This page collects quotes attributed to Immanuel Kant on the topic of nature, drawn from across the philosopher's works.
Quotes
-
“Two things fill the mind with ever new and increasing admiration and awe, the more often and steadily we reflect upon them: the starry heavens above me and the moral law within me.”
Two things fill the mind with ever-increasing wonder and awe, the more often and the more intensely the mind of thought is drawn to them: the starry heavens above me and the moral law within me. -
“Out of the crooked timber of humanity, no straight thing was ever made.”
Idea for a General History with a Cosmopolitan Purpose (1784), Proposition 6. | Variant translations: Out of timber so crooked as that from which man is made nothing entirely straight can be built. | From such crooked wood as that which man is made of, nothing straight can be fashioned. | Never a straight thing was made from the crooked timber of man. -
Attributed to Immanuel Kant:
“He who is cruel to animals becomes hard also in his dealings with men.”
-
“Religion is too important a matter to its devotees to be a subject of ridicule. If they indulge in absurdities, they are to be pitied rather than ridiculed.”
A lecture at Königsberg (1775), as quoted in A New Dictionary of Quotations on Historical Principles from Ancient and Modern Sources (1946) by H. L. Mencken , p. 1017 -
“Moral Teleology supplies the deficiency in physical Teleology , and first establishes a Theology ; because the latter, if it did not borrow from the former without being observed, but were to proceed consistently, could only found a Demonology , which is incapable of any definite concept.”
Immanuel Kant , Kant's Critique of Judgment (1892) Tr. J.H. Bernard