In various public writings (partly in the reviews of some books, partly in special treatises) I have perceived with gratitude and enjoyment that the spirit of well groundedness has not died out in Germany, but has only been drowned out for a short time by the fashionable noise of a freedom of thought that fancies itself ingenious, and I see that the thorny paths of criticism, leading to a science of pure reason that is scholastically rigorous but as such the only lasting and hence the most necessary science, has not hindered courageous and clear minds from mastering them.