The Online Library of Liberty

A project of Liberty Fund, Inc.

• Memoir of Kant.
• I. Fundamental Principles of the Metaphysics of Morals
• Preface.
• First Section.: Transition From the Common Rational Knowledge of Morality to the Philosophical.
• Second Section.: Transition From Popular Moral Philosophy to the Metaphysic of Morals.
• Third Section.: Transition From the Metaphysic of Morals to the Critique of Pure Practical Reason.
• II. Critical Examination of Practical Reason.
• Preface.
• Introduction.
• Of the Idea of a Critique of Practical Reason.
• Part First.: Elements of Pure Practical Reason.
• Book I.: The Analytic of Pure Practical Reason.
• Book II.: Dialectic of Pure Practical Reason.
• Part Second.: Methodology of Pure Practical Reason.
• Methodology of Pure Practical Reason.
• Conclusion.
• III. Introduction to the Metaphysic of Morals; and Preface to the Metaphysical Elements of Ethics.
• Introduction to the Metaphysic of Morals.
• Preface to the Metaphysical Elements of Ethics.
• Introduction to Ethics.
• On Conscience.
• IV. First Part of the Philosophical Theory of Religion.
• Of the Indwelling of the Bad Principle Along With the Good; Or, On the Radical Evil In Human Nature.
• I.: Of the Original Incapacity For Good In Human Nature.
• II.: Of the Propensity to Evil In Human Nature.
• III.: Man Is By Nature Bad.
• IV.: On the Origin of the Evil In Human Nature.
• General Remark.1on the Restoration of the Original Capacity For Good to Its Full Power.
• Appendix.
• I.: —on a Supposed Right to Tell Lies From Benevolent Motives. 1
• II.: —on the Saying “necessity Has No Law”.

PREFACE to the METAPHYSICAL ELEMENTS OF ETHICS.

IF there exists on any subject a philosophy (that is, a system of rational knowledge based on concepts), then there must also be for this philosophy a system of pure rational concepts, independent on any condition of intuition—in other words, a Metaphysic. It may be asked whether metaphysical elements are required also for every practical philosophy, which is the doctrine of duties [deontology], and therefore also for Ethics, in order to be able to present it as a true science (systematically), not merely as an aggregate of separate doctrines (fragmentarily). As regards pure jurisprudence no one will question this requirement; for it concerns only what is formal in the elective will, which has to be limited in its external relations according to laws of freedom; without regarding any end which is the matter of this will. Here, therefore, deontology is a mere scientific doctrine (doctrina scientiæ). 1

(218) Now in this philosophy (of Ethics) it seems contrary to the idea of it that we should go back to metaphysical elements in order to make the notion of duty purified from everything empirical (from every feeling) a motive of action. For what sort of notion can we form of the mighty power and herculean strength which would be sufficient to overcome the vice-breeding inclinations, if Virtue is to borrow her “arms from the armoury of metaphysics,” which is a matter of speculation that only few men can handle. Hence all ethical teaching in lecture-rooms, pulpits, and popular books, when it is decked out with fragments of metaphysics, becomes ridiculous. But it is not, therefore, useless, much less ridiculous, to trace in metaphysics the first principles of Ethics; for it is only as a philosopher than any one can reach the first principles of this conception of duty, otherwise we could not look for either certainty or purity in the ethical teaching. To rely for this reason on a certain feeling [or sense], which on account of the effect expected from it is called moral, may, perhaps, even satisfy the popular teacher, provided he desires as the criterion of a moral duty to consider the problem: “if everyone in every case made your maxim the universal law, how could this law be consistent with itself?” (219) But if it were merely feeling that made it our duty to take this principle as a criterion, then this would not be dictated by reason, but only adopted instinctively, and therefore blindly.

But in fact, whatever men imagine, no moral principle is based on any feeling, but such a principle is really nothing else than an obscurely conceived metaphysic which inheres in every man’s reasoning faculty; as the teacher will easily find who tries to catechize his pupil in the Socratic method about the imperative of duty and its application to the moral judgment of his actions. The mode of stating it need not be always metaphysical, and the language need not necessarily be scholastic, unless the pupil is to be trained to be a philosopher. But the thought must go back to the elements of metaphysics, without which we cannot expect any certainty or purity, or even motive power in Ethics.

If we deviate from this principle and begin from pathological, or purely sensitive, or even moral feeling (from what is subjectively practical instead of what is objective), that is, from the matter of the will, the End, not from its form, that is the law, in order from thence to determine duties; then, certainly, there are no metaphysical elements of Ethics, for feeling by whatever it may be excited is always physical. But then ethical teaching, whether in schools, or lecture-rooms, &c., is corrupted in its source. For it is not a matter of indifference by what motives or means one is led to a good purpose (the obedience to duty). However disgusting, then, metaphysics may appear to those pretended philosophers who dogmatize oracularly, or even brilliantly, about the doctrine of duty, it is, nevertheless, an indispensable duty for those who oppose it to go back to its principles, even in Ethics, and to begin by going to school on its benches.

(220) We may fairly wonder how, after all previous explanations of the principles of duty, so far as it is derived from pure reason, it was still possible to reduce it again to a doctrine of Happiness—in such a way, however, that a certain moral happiness not resting on empirical causes was ultimately arrived at, a self-contradictory nonentity. In fact, when the thinking man has conquered the temptations to vice, and is conscious of having done his (often hard) duty, he finds himself in a state of peace and satisfaction which may well be called happiness, in which Virtue is her own reward. Now, says the Eudaemonist, this delight, this happiness, is the real motive of his acting virtuously. The notion of duty, says he, does not immediately determine his will; it is only by means of the happiness in prospect that he is moved to do his duty. Now, on the other hand, since he can promise himself this reward of virtue only from the consciousness of having done his duty, it is clear that the latter must have preceded: that is, he must feel himself bound to do his duty before he thinks, and without thinking, that happiness will be the consequence of obedience to duty. He is thus involved in a circle in his assignment of cause and effect. He can only hope to be happy if he is conscious of his obedience to duty; 1 and he can only be moved to obedience to duty if he foresees that he will thereby become happy. But in this reasoning there is also a contradiction. For, on the one side, he must obey his duty, without asking what effect this will have on his happiness, consequently, from a moral principle (221); on the other side, he can only recognize something as his duty when he can reckon on happiness which will accrue to him thereby, and consequently on a pathological principle, which is the direct opposite of the former.

I have in another place (the Berlin “Monatsschrift” 2 ), reduced, as I believe, to the simplest expressions the distinction between pathological and moral pleasure. The pleasure, namely, which must precede the obedience to the law in order that one may act according to the law, is pathological, and the process follows the physical order of nature; that which must be preceded by the law in order that it may be felt is in the moral order. If this distinction is not observed; if eudaemonism (the principle of happiness) is adopted as the principle instead of eleutheronomy (the principle of freedom of the inner legislation), the consequence is the euthanasia (quiet death) of all morality.

The cause of these mistakes is no other than the following: Those who are accustomed only to physiological explanations will not admit into their heads the categorical imperative from which these laws dictatorially proceed, notwithstanding that they feel themselves irresistibly forced by it. Dissatisfied at not being able to explain what lies wholly beyond that sphere, namely, freedom of the elective will, elevating as is this privilege that man has of being capable of such an idea, they are stirred up by the proud claims of speculative reason, which feels its power so strongly in other fields, just as if they were allies leagued in defence of the omnipotence of theoretical reason, and roused by a general call to arms to resist that idea; and thus at present, and perhaps for a long time to come, though ultimately in vain, to attack the moral concept of freedom, and if possible render it doubtful.

[1]

One who is acquainted with practical philosophy is not, therefore, a practical philosopher. The latter is he who makes the rational end the principle of his actions, while at the same time he joins with this the necessary knowledge which, as it aims at action, must not be spun out into the most subtle threads of metaphysic, unless a legal duty is in question; in which case meum and tuum must be accurately determined in the balance of justice (218), on the principle of equality of action and reaction, which requires something like mathematical proportion, but not in the case of a mere ethical duty. For in this case the question is not only to know what it is a duty to do (a thing which on account of the ends that all men naturally have can be easily decided), but the chief point is the inner principle of the will, namely, that the consciousness of this duty be also the spring of action, in order that we may be able to say of the man who joins to his knowledge this principle of wisdom, that he is a practical philosopher.

[1]

[Compare the remarks of Dr. Adams: “The pleasures of self-approbation and esteem which follow virtue certainly arise from a conscious sense of having made virtue and not pleasure our choice; not from preferring one interest or pleasure to another, but from acting according to right without any other consideration whatsoever. It seems essential to this pleasure that no motive of interest have any part in the choice or intention of the agent. And (2) To make this pleasure an object to the mind, the virtue whose principle we are seeking after must be already formed. For, let it be observed, that the pleasures we are speaking of are themselves virtuous pleasures; such as none but virtuous minds are capable of proposing to themselves or of enjoying. To the sensual or voluptuous, the pleasures that arise from denying our appetites or passions have no existence. These cannot, therefore, be the motive to that virtue which is already presupposed. . . . It is the same love of virtue which makes it first the object of our pursuit, and, when acquired, the subject of our triumph and joy. To do a virtuous action for the sake of these virtuous pleasures is to choose virtue for the sake of being virtuous, which is to rest in it as an end, or to pursue it without regard to any other object or interest.”—Sermon on the Obligation of Virtue (1754), Note 2.]

[2]

[The essay referred to is that “On the Radical Evil in Human Nature.”]