Immanuel Kant, who was born on 22 April 1722, is perhaps best known for two things: writing The Critique of Pure Reason (1781) – one of the most important and most difficult books in Western philosophy, and for being a man of such clinical regularity that the residents of his native Königsberg in East Prussia (present-day Kaliningrad) would set their watches according to the unvarying trajectory of his daily walks. Yet these two facts have helped to nurture a not entirely warm image of the man, leaving the impression that he was something of a cold fish.

As is often the case, the man who appears to us in print and the man who was known to friends and intimates were somewhat at odds. By all accounts, Kant was a warm and engaging character, whose forbidding writings even occasionally reveal flashes of humility and whose lectures were renowned for their wit and humour.

Kant and Green were united by a similar disposition – a love of regularity and self-discipline

Kant and Green were united by a similar disposition – a love of regularity and self-discipline

Nowhere was this more conspicuous than in his long-standing attachment to and affection for an Englishman named Joseph Green. Such was Green’s personal and intellectual sway on the philosopher that some contend that he should be given credit as a collaborator on The Critique........

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