第 20 页

must necessarily be submitted all objects of human intuition. And in

this manner the categories as mere forms of thought receive

objective reality, that is, application to objects which are given

to us in intuition, but that only as phenomena, for it is only of

phenomena that we are capable of a priori intuition.

This synthesis of the manifold of sensuous intuition, which is

possible and necessary a priori, may be called figurative (synthesis

speciosa), in contradistinction to that which is cogitated in the mere

category in regard to the manifold of an intuition in general, and

is called connection or conjunction of the understanding (synthesis

intellectualis). Both are transcendental, not merely because they

themselves precede a priori all experience, but also because they form

the basis for the possibility of other cognition a priori.

But the figurative synthesis, when it has relation only to the

originally synthetical unity of apperception, that is to the

transcendental unity cogitated in the categories, must, to be

distinguished from the purely intellectual conjunction, be entitled

the transcendental synthesis of imagination. Imagination is the

faculty of representing an object even without its presence in

intuition. Now, as all our intuition is sensuous, imagination, by

reason of the subjective condition under which alone it can give a

corresponding intuition to the conceptions of the understanding,

belongs to sensibility. But in so far as the synthesis of the

imagination is an act of spontaneity, which is determinative, and not,

like sense, merely determinable, and which is consequently able to

determine sense a priori, according to its form, conformably to the

unity of apperception, in so far is the imagination a faculty of

determining sensibility a priori, and its synthesis of intuitions

according to the categories must be the transcendental synthesis of

the imagination. It is an operation of the understanding on

sensibility, and the first application of the understanding to objects

of possible intuition, and at the same time the basis for the exercise

of the other functions of that faculty. As figurative, it is

distinguished from the merely intellectual synthesis, which is

produced by the understanding alone, without the aid of imagination.

Now, in so far as imagination is spontaneity, I sometimes call it also

the productive imagination, and distinguish it from the

reproductive, the synthesis of which is subject entirely to

empirical laws, those of association, namely, and which, therefore,

contributes nothing to the explanation of the possibility of a

priori cognition, and for this reason belongs not to transcendental

philosophy, but to psychology.

We have now arrived at the proper place for explaining the paradox

which must have struck every one in our exposition of the internal

sense (SS 6), namely- how this sense represents us to our own

consciousness, only as we appear to ourselves, not as we are in

ourselves, because, to wit, we intuite ourselves only as we are

inwardly affected. Now this appears to be contradictory, inasmuch as

we thus stand in a passive relation to ourselves; and therefore in the

systems of psychology, the internal sense is commonly held to be one

with the faculty of apperception, while we, on the contrary, carefully

distinguish them.

That which determines the internal sense is the understanding, and

its original power of conjoining the manifold of intuition, that is,

of bringing this under an apperception (upon which rests the

possibility of the understanding itself). Now, as the human

understanding is not in itself a faculty of intuition, and is unable

to exercise such a power, in order to conjoin, as it were, the

manifold of its own intuition, the synthesis of understanding is,

considered per se, nothing but the unity of action, of which, as such,

it is self-conscious, even apart from sensibility, by which, moreover,

it is able to determine our internal sense in respect of the

manifold which may be presented to it according to the form of

sensuous intuition. Thus, under the name of a transcendental synthesis

of imagination, the understanding exercises an activity upon the

passive subject, whose faculty it is; and so we are right in saying

that the internal sense is affected thereby. Apperception and its

synthetical unity are by no means one and the same with the internal

sense. The former, as the source of all our synthetical conjunction,

applies, under the name of the categories, to the manifold of

intuition in general, prior to all sensuous intuition of objects.

The internal sense, on the contrary, contains merely the form of

intuition, but without any synthetical conjunction of the manifold

therein, and consequently does not contain any determined intuition,

which is possible only through consciousness of the determination of

the manifold by the transcendental act of the imagination (synthetical

influence of the understanding on the internal sense), which I have

named figurative synthesis.

This we can indeed always perceive in ourselves. We cannot

cogitate a geometrical line without drawing it in thought, nor a

circle without describing it, nor represent the three dimensions of

space without drawing three lines from the same point perpendicular to

one another. We cannot even cogitate time, unless, in drawing a

straight line (which is to serve as the external figurative

representation of time), we fix our attention on the act of the

synthesis of the manifold, whereby we determine successively the

internal sense, and thus attend also to the succession of this

determination. Motion as an act of the subject (not as a determination

of an object),* consequently the synthesis of the manifold in space,

if we make abstraction of space and attend merely to the act by

which we determine the internal sense according to its form, is that

which produces the conception of succession. The understanding,

therefore, does by no means find in the internal sense any such

synthesis of the manifold, but produces it, in that it affects this

sense. At the same time, how "I who think" is distinct from the "I"

which intuites itself (other modes of intuition being cogitable as

at least possible), and yet one and the same with this latter as the

same subject; how, therefore, I am able to say: "I, as an intelligence

and thinking subject, cognize myself as an object thought, so far as I

am, moreover, given to myself in intuition- only, like other

phenomena, not as I am in myself, and as considered by the

understanding, but merely as I appear"- is a question that has in it

neither more nor less difficulty than the question- "How can I be an

object to myself?" or this- "How I can be an object of my own

intuition and internal perceptions?" But that such must be the fact,

if we admit that space is merely a pure form of the phenomena of

external sense, can be clearly proved by the consideration that we

cannot represent time, which is not an object of external intuition,

in any other way than under the image of a line, which we draw in

thought, a mode of representation without which we could not cognize

the unity of its dimension, and also that we are necessitated to

take our determination of periods of time, or of points of time, for

all our internal perceptions from the changes which we perceive in

outward things. It follows that we must arrange the determinations

of the internal sense, as phenomena in time, exactly in the same

manner as we arrange those of the external senses in space. And

consequently, if we grant, respecting this latter, that by means of

them we know objects only in so far as we are affected externally,

we must also confess, with regard to the internal sense, that by means

of it we intuite ourselves only as we are internally affected by

ourselves; in other words, as regards internal intuition, we cognize

our own subject only as phenomenon, and not as it is in itself.*[2]

*Motion of an object in space does not belong to a pure science,

consequently not to geometry; because, that a thing is movable

cannot be known a priori, but only from experience. But motion,

considered as the description of a space, is a pure act of the

successive synthesis of the manifold in external intuition by means of

productive imagination, and belongs not only to geometry, but even

to transcendental philosophy.

*[2] I do not see why so much difficulty should be found in

admitting that our internal sense is affected by ourselves. Every

act of attention exemplifies it. In such an act the understanding

determines the internal sense by the synthetical conjunction which

it cogitates, conformably to the internal intuition which

corresponds to the manifold in the synthesis of the understanding. How

much the mind is usually affected thereby every one will be able to

perceive in himself.

SS 21

On the other hand, in the transcendental synthesis of the manifold

content of representations, consequently in the synthetical unity of

apperception, I am conscious of myself, not as I appear to myself, nor

as I am in myself, but only that "I am." This representation is a

thought, not an intuition. Now, as in order to cognize ourselves, in

addition to the act of thinking, which subjects the manifold of

every possible intuition to the unity of apperception, there is

necessary a determinate mode of intuition, whereby this manifold is

given; although my own existence is certainly not mere phenomenon

(much less mere illusion), the determination of my existence* Can only

take place conformably to the form of the internal sense, according to

the particular mode in which the manifold which I conjoin is given

in internal intuition, and I have therefore no knowledge of myself

as I am, but merely as I appear to myself. The consciousness of self

is thus very far from a knowledge of self, in which I do not use the

categories, whereby I cogitate an object, by means of the

conjunction of the manifold in one apperception. In the same way as

I require, for the sake of the cognition of an object distinct from

myself, not only the thought of an object in general (in the

category), but also an intuition by which to determine that general

conception, in the same way do I require, in order to the cognition of

myself, not only the consciousness of myself or the thought that I

think myself, but in addition an intuition of the manifold in

myself, by which to determine this thought. It is true that I exist as

an intelligence which is conscious only of its faculty of

conjunction or synthesis, but subjected in relation to the manifold

which this intelligence has to conjoin to a limitative conjunction

called the internal sense. My intelligence (that is, I) can render

that conjunction or synthesis perceptible only according to the

relations of time, which are quite beyond the proper sphere of the

conceptions of the understanding and consequently cognize itself in

respect to an intuition (which cannot possibly be intellectual, nor

given by the understanding), only as it appears to itself, and not

as it would cognize itself, if its intuition were intellectual.

*The "I think" expresses the act of determining my own existence. My

existence is thus already given by the act of consciousness; but the

mode in which I must determine my existence, that is, the mode in

which I must place the manifold belonging to my existence, is not

thereby given. For this purpose intuition of self is required, and

this intuition possesses a form given a priori, namely, time, which is

sensuous, and belongs to our receptivity of the determinable. Now,

as I do not possess another intuition of self which gives the

determining in me (of the spontaneity of which I am conscious),

prior to the act of determination, in the same manner as time gives

the determinable, it is clear that I am unable to determine my own

existence as that of a spontaneous being, but I am only able to

represent to myself the spontaneity of my thought, that is, of my

determination, and my existence remains ever determinable in a

purely sensuous manner, that is to say, like the existence of a

phenomenon. But it is because of this spontaneity that I call myself

an intelligence.

Transcendental Deduction of the universally possible

employment in experience of the Pure Conceptions

of the Understanding. SS 22

In the metaphysical deduction, the a priori origin of categories was

proved by their complete accordance with the general logical of

thought; in the transcendental deduction was exhibited the possibility

of the categories as a priori cognitions of objects of an intuition in

general (SS 16 and 17).At present we are about to explain the

possibility of cognizing, a priori, by means of the categories, all

objects which can possibly be presented to our senses, not, indeed,

according to the form of their intuition, but according to the laws of

their conjunction or synthesis, and thus, as it were, of prescribing

laws to nature and even of rendering nature possible. For if the

categories were inadequate to this task, it would not be evident to us

why everything that is presented to our senses must be subject to

those laws which have an a priori origin in the understanding itself.

I premise that by the term synthesis of apprehension I understand

the combination of the manifold in an empirical intuition, whereby

perception, that is, empirical consciousness of the intuition (as

phenomenon), is possible.

We have a priori forms of the external and internal sensuous

intuition in the representations of space and time, and to these

must the synthesis of apprehension of the manifold in a phenomenon

be always comformable, because the synthesis itself can only take

place according to these forms. But space and time are not merely

forms of sensuous intuition, but intuitions themselves (which

contain a manifold), and therefore contain a priori the

determination of the unity of this manifold.* (See the Transcendent