 Without doubt, the romantics criticized Kant’s categorical imperative as proposing a problematically universalistic ethics that discourages the free expression of unique personalities. They viewed such a universalist ethics as problematic because they regarded individual expression and the development of a unique, characteristic and unified self as intrinsically and morally valuable. Yet, the romantics were also critical of extreme individualism, such as the one they found promoted by some Enlightenment thinkers. In other words, they challenged those individualists who criticized any form of social and communal participation as potentially a form of passive submission to external authority.