ABSTRACT
In his first creative period in the 1750s Kant attempted to harmonise metaphysics with Newtonian science. This project carried substantial theological commitments, continuous with much of the tradition. What was still missing was a more detailed rational theology, including a proof of a theistic God. The New Elucidation had advanced a proof of the existence of a necessary being, and had sketched a second proof, concerning the existence of a personal God. The first was the modal argument, the second the ‘connectedness’ proof, based on Kant’s nomological understanding of physico-theology. But details were missing, and it was not clear how the two approaches to God related to one another.
