Bertman, Martin A. "Kant Contra Herder: Almost Against Nature." FLORIDA PHILOSOPHICAL REVIEW 6.1 (2006): 53-63.

Abstract: Since Kant limits knowledge to phenomena and espouses a Newtonian model for science, he came into conflict with a biological or organic model of nature that animated the aesthetic attitude of romanticism. The focus of the opposition was his former pupil Herder – 'the father of German historicism' – who lived in the Weimar of Goethe and Schiller. Kant's speculations go beyond nature to the noumenal to ground ethics. He justifies this "rational faith" by assuming God has a teleological program in nature that ultimately brings progress in culture in a republican form of government that represents the noumenal ethical law. This opposes Herder’s doctrine of organic culture and political nations, each distinct in their creative determinants. The PDF may be downloaded here: http://www.cah.ucf.edu/philosophy/fpr/journals/volume6/issue1/bertman9.pdf.