Van. H. Manning

“The great difference between Kant and Hegel has often been emphasized. And there was a great difference. Hegel said that Kant studied the theory of knowledge too much in distinction from metaphysics. Hence all his dualism. Kant had studied the categories only as to their subjectivity and objectivity; Hegel would study them in their own medium, the medium of pure thought, and while in action. So he sought to identify logic, epistemology and metaphysics. Thus also, he thinks to bring the land of the noumena within our ken. There is a direct bridge that connects us with the infinite. How does he seek to do this? By emphasizing Kant’s position of the creativity of the human mind. Hegel’s position is therefore in the main, one and the same with Kant’s. This is important to bear in mind. Their differences should not blind us to their unity. The late English Hegelians such as the Caird brothers, T. H. Green and others, have emphasized the difference between Kant and Hegel and found in the advance of Hegel over Kant the greatest salvation for theological knowledge. Hegel has forever banished the dualism, the Wolffian dualism of Kant, so that now God and man are brought together in intimate and genuine fellowship with one another. But what unity has thus been effected? It is a unity that leads to identification. It is a unity that lead to monism. It becomes the unity of the night in which all cows are black or the night in which all cats are gray.””