A word by Seneca sets the tune for Kant’s debut—“Nothing is more important than to go where one ought to go, instead of following the herd, like cattle, and go where they went”.[10]  Kant expresses the hope that “the freedom I take of contradicting great men won’t be construed as a crime” (1:7.6–9). He needed hope because he had made up his mind. He knew what he was doing, and he was defiant. “My basis is as follows,” he writes (1:10.25–7), “I have already marked out the path that I shall take. I shall set out on my course, and nothing shall stop me from proceeding along it”.