Note 1197 — Chapter II · SYSTEM OF ALL PRINCIPLES OF PURE UNDERSTANDING

Cf. Riehl, Philosophischer Kriticismus (second edition), i. pp. 551-2. While recognising the above main point, Riehl seems to assert that empirical sequence determines the application of the causal concept. It would be truer, and more in accordance with the position which Kant is endeavouring to establish, to assert that appeal to constancy of sequence enables us to determine which antecedents of any given event are causal conditions. The principle of causality is already applied when the sequent experiences are apprehended as sequent events. This ambiguity, however, would seem to be due only to Riehl’s mode of expression. For, as he himself says (p. 551), the law of causality is a ground of experience, and cannot therefore be derived from it. Cf. above, pp. 267-8, 367.