 Section 15 of the Critique of Practical Reason by Emanuel Kant translated by Thomas Kings Mill Abbott First Part Elements of Pure Practical Reason Book 2 Dialectic of Pure Practical Reason Chapter 2 of the Dialectic of Pure Reason in defining the conception of the Summon Bonum 5. The Existence of God as a Postulate of Pure Practical Reason This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org, recording by Anna Simon. In the foregoing analysis, the moral law led to a practical problem, which is prescribed by pure reason alone, without the aid of any sensible motives, namely, that of the necessary completeness of the first and principal element of the Summon Bonum, that is, morality, and as this can be perfectly solved only in eternity, to the postulate of immortality. The same law must also lead us to affirm the possibility of the second element of the Summon Bonum, that is, happiness proportioned to that morality, and this on grounds as disinterested as before, and solely from impartial reason, that is, it must lead to the supposition of the existence of a cause adequate to this effect, that is, it must lead to the supposition of the existence of a cause adequate to this effect. In other words, it must postulate the existence of God as the necessary condition of the possibility of the Summon Bonum, an object of the will which is necessarily connected with the moral legislation of pure reason. We proceed to exhibit this connection in a convincing manner. Consciousness is the condition of a rational being in the world with whom everything goes according to his wish and will. It rests, therefore, on the harmony of physical nature with his whole end, and likewise with the essential determining principle of his will. Now, the moral law as a law of freedom commands by determining principles, which ought to be quite independent of nature and of its harmony with our faculty of desire as springs. But the acting rational being in the world is not the cause of the world and of nature itself. There is not the least ground, therefore, in the moral law for a necessary connection between morality and proportioned happiness in a being that belongs to the world as part of it, and therefore dependent on it, and which for that reason cannot by his will be a cause of this nature, nor by his own power make it thoroughly harmonize as far as his happiness is concerned with his practical principles. Nevertheless, in the practical problem of pure reason, that is, the necessary pursuit of the sumum bonum, such a connection is postulated as necessary. We ought to endeavour to promote the sumum bonum, which therefore must be possible. Accordingly, the existence of a cause of all nature distinct from nature itself and containing the principle of this connection, namely of the exact harmony of happiness with morality, is also postulated. Now this supreme cause must contain the principle of the harmony of nature, not merely with the law of the will of rational beings, but with the conception of this law, insofar as they make it the supreme determining principle of the will, and consequently not merely with the form of morals, but with their morality as their motive, that is, with their moral character. Therefore the sumum bonum is possible in the world only on the supposition of a supreme being having a causality corresponding to moral character. Now a being that is capable of acting on the conception of laws is an intelligence, a rational being, and the causality of such a being according to this conception of laws is his will. Therefore the supreme cause of nature, which must be presupposed as a condition of the sumum bonum, is a being which is the cause of nature by intelligence and will, consequently its author, that is, God. It follows that the postulate of the possibility of the highest derived good, the best world, is likewise the postulate of the reality of a highest original good, that is to say of the existence of God. Now it was seen to be a duty for us to promote the sumum bonum. Consequently it is not merely allowable, but it is a necessity connected with duty as a requisite that we should presuppose the possibility of this sumum bonum, and as this is possible only on condition of the existence of God, it inseparably connects the supposition of this with duty, that is, it is morally necessary to assume the existence of God. It must be remarked here that this moral necessity is subjective, that is, it is a want, and not objective, that is, itself a duty, for there cannot be a duty to suppose the existence of anything, since this concerns only the theoretical employment of reason. Moreover it is not meant by this, that it is necessary to suppose the existence of God as a basis of all obligation in general, for this rests as has been sufficiently proved simply on the autonomy of reason itself. What belongs to duty here is only the endeavour to realise and promote the sumum bonum in the world, the possibility of which can therefore be postulated, and as our reason finds it not conceivable except on the supposition of a supreme intelligence, the admission of this existence is therefore connected with the consciousness of our duty, although the admission itself belongs to the domain of speculative reason. Considered in respect of this alone as a principle of explanation it may be called a hypothesis, but in reference to the intelligibility of an object given us by the moral law, the sumum bonum, and consequently of a requirement for practical purposes it may be called faith, that is to say a pure rational faith, since pure reason, both in its theoretical and practical use, is the sole source from which it springs. From this deduction it is now intelligible why the Greek schools could never attain the solution of their problem of the practical possibility of the sumum bonum, because they made the rule of the use which the will of man makes of his freedom, the sole and sufficient ground of this possibility, thinking that they had no need for that purpose of the existence of God. No doubt they were so far right that they established the principle of morals of itself independently of this postulate, from the relation of reason only to the will, and consequently made it the supreme practical condition of the sumum bonum, but it was not therefore the whole condition of its possibility. The Epicureans had indeed assumed as a supreme principle of morality a wholly false one, namely that of happiness, and had substituted for a law a maximum of arbitrary choice according to every man's inclination. They proceeded, however, consistently enough in this, that they degraded their sumum bonum likewise, just in proportion to the meanness of their fundamental principle, and looked for no greater happiness than can be attained by human prudence, including temperance and moderation of the inclinations, and this, as we know, would be scanty enough, and would be very different according to circumstances, not to mention the exceptions that their maxims must perpetually admit, and which make them incapable of being laws. The Stoics, on the contrary, had chosen their supreme practical principle quite rightly, making virtue the condition of the sumum bonum, but when they represented the degree of virtue required by its pure law as fully attainable in this life, they not only strained the moral powers of the man whom they called the wise beyond all the limits of his nature, and assumed the thing that contradicts all our knowledge of man, but also, and principally, they would not allow the second element of the sumum bonum, namely happiness, to be properly a special object of human desire, but made their wise man like a divinity in his consciousness of the excellence of his person wholly independent of nature as regards his own contentment. They exposed him indeed to the evils of life, but made him not subject to them, at the same time representing him also as free from moral evil. They thus, in fact, left out the second element of the sumum bonum, namely personal happiness, placing it solely in action and satisfaction with one's own personal worth, thus including it in the consciousness of being morally minded, in which they might have been sufficiently refuted by the voice of their own nature. The doctrine of Christianity, even if we do not yet consider it as a religious doctrine, gives, touching this point, a conception of the sumum bonum, the Kingdom of God, which alone satisfies the strictest demand of practical reason. The moral law is holy, unyielding, and demands holiness of morals, although all the moral perfection to which man can attain is still only virtue, that is, a rightful disposition arising from respect for the law, implying consciousness of a constant propensity to transgression, or at least a want of purity, that is, a mixture of many spurious, not moral, motives of obedience to the law, consequently a self-esteem combined with humility. In respect, then, of the holiness which the Christian law requires, this leaves the creature nothing but a progress in infinitum, but for that very reason it justifies him in hoping for an endless duration of his existence. The worth of a character perfectly according with the moral law is infinite, since the only restriction on all possible happiness in the judgment of a wise and all-powerful distributor of it is the absence of conformity of rational beings to their duty. But the moral law of itself does not promise any happiness, for according to our conceptions of an order of nature in general, this is not necessarily connected with obedience to the law. Now, Christian morality supplies this defect of the second indispensable element of the summum bonum by representing the world in which rational beings devote themselves with all their soul to the moral law as a kingdom of God, in which nature and morality are brought into harmony foreign to each of itself by a holy author who makes their derived summum bonum possible. Holiness of life is prescribed to them as a rule even in this life while the welfare proportion to it, namely bliss, is represented as attainable only in an eternity, because the former must always be the pattern of their conduct in every state and progress towards it is already possible and necessary in this life, while the latter, under the name of happiness, cannot be attained at all in this world so far as our own power is concerned and therefore is made simply an object of hope. Nevertheless, the Christian principle of morality itself is not theological, so as to be heteronomy, but is autonomy of pure practical reason, since it does not make the knowledge of God and his will the foundation of these laws but only of the attainment of the summum bonum on condition of following these laws, and it does not even place the proper spring of disobedience in the desired results, but solely in the conception of duty, as that of which the faithful observance alone constitutes the worthiness to obtain those happy consequences. Footnote, it is commonly held that the Christian precept of morality has no advantage in respect of purity over the moral conceptions of the Stoics. The distinction between them is, however, very obvious. The Stoic system made the consciousness of strength of mind the pivot on which all moral dispositions should turn, and although its disciples spoke of duties and even defined them very well, yet they placed the spring and proper determining principle of the will in an elevation of the mind above the lower springs of the senses, which owe their power only to weakness of mind. With them, therefore, virtue was a sort of heroism in the wise man, raising himself above the animal nature of man, is sufficient for himself, and while he prescribes duties to others, is himself raised above them, and is not subject to any temptation to transgress the moral law. All this, however, they could not have done if they had conceived this law in all its purity and strictness as the precept of the Gospel does. When I give the name idea to a perfection to which nothing adequate can be given in experience, it does not follow that the moral ideas are things transcendent, that is, something of which we could not even determine the concept adequately, or of which it is uncertain whether there is any object corresponding to it at all, as is the case with the ideas of speculative reason. On the contrary, being types of practical perfection, they serve as the indispensable rule of conduct, and likewise as a standard of comparison. Now, if I consider Christian morals on their philosophical side, then compared with the ideas of the Greek schools, they would appear as follows. The ideas of the cynics, the Epicureans, the Stoics, and the Christians are simplicity of nature, prudence, wisdom, and holiness. In respect of the way of attaining them, the Greek schools were distinguished from one another, thus, that the cynics only required common sense, the others the path of science, but both found the mere use of natural powers sufficient for the purpose. Christian morality, because its precept is framed, as a moral precept must be, so pure and unyielding, takes from man all confidence that he can be fully adequate to it, at least in this life, but again sets it up by enabling us to hope that if we act as well as it is in our power to do, then what is not in our power will come into our aid from another source, whether we know how this may be or not. Aristotle and Plato differed only as to the origin of our moral conceptions, and footnote. In this manner, the moral laws led through the conception of the Summon Bonum as the object and final end of pure practical reason to religion, that is, to the recognition of all duties as divine commands, not as sanctions, that is to say, arbitrary ordinances of a foreign and contingent in themselves, but as essential laws of every free will in itself, which, nevertheless, must be regarded as commands of the supreme being, because it is only from a morally perfect, holy and good, and at the same time all powerful will, and consequently only through harmony with this will, that we can hope to attain the Summon Bonum which the moral law makes it our duty to take as the object of our endeavors. Here again, then, all remains disinterested and founded merely on duty, neither fear nor hope being made the fundamental springs, which, if taken as principles, would destroy the whole moral worth of actions. The moral law commands me to make the highest possible good in a world the ultimate object of all my conduct, but I cannot hope to affect this otherwise than by the harmony of my will with that of a holy and good author of the world, and although the conception of the Summon Bonum as a whole, in which the greatest happiness is conceived as combined in the most exact proportion with the highest degree of moral perfection, possible in creatures, includes my own happiness, yet it is not this that is the determining principle of the will which is enjoined to promote the Summon Bonum, but the moral law which, on the contrary, limits by strict conditions my unbounded desire of happiness. Hence also, morality is not properly the doctrine how we should make ourselves happy, but how we should become worthy of happiness. It is only when religion is added that there also comes in the hope of participating someday in happiness in proportion as we have endeavoured to be not unworthy of it. A man is worthy to possess a thing or a state when his possession of it is in harmony with the Summon Bonum. We can now easily see that all worthiness depends on moral conduct, since in the conception of the Summon Bonum this constitutes the condition of the rest, which belongs to one state, namely the participation of happiness. Now it follows from this that morality should never be treated as a doctrine of happiness, that is, an instruction how to become happy, for it has to do simply with a rational condition, conditio sine qua non, of happiness, not with the means of attaining it. But when morality has been completely expounded, which merely imposes duties instead of providing rules for selfish desires, then first after the moral desire to promote the Summon Bonum, to bring the Kingdom of God to us, has been awakened, a desire founded on a law, and which could not previously arise in any selfish mind, and went for the behoof of this desire the step to religion has been taken, then this ethical doctrine may be also called a doctrine of happiness, because the hope of happiness first begins with a religion only. We can also see from this that when we ask what is God's ultimate end in creating the world, we must not name the happiness of the rational beings in it, but the Summon Bonum, which adds a further condition to that wish of such beings, namely the condition of being worthy of happiness, that is, the morality of these same rational beings, a condition which alone contains the rule by which only they can hope to share in the former at the hand of a wise author. For, as wisdom, theoretically considered, signifies the knowledge of the Summon Bonum, and, practically, the accordance of the will with the Summon Bonum, we cannot attribute to a supreme independent wisdom an end based merely on goodness. For we cannot conceive the action of this goodness in respect to the happiness of rational beings, as suitable to the highest original good, except under restrictive conditions of harmony with the holiness of his will. Footnote. In order to make these characteristics of these conceptions clear, I add the remark that whilst we ascribe to God various attributes, the quality of which we also find applicable to creatures, only that in him they are raised to the highest degree, for example, power, knowledge, presence, goodness, etc., under the designations of omnipotence, omniscience, omnipresence, etc. There are three that are ascribed to God exclusively, and yet without the addition of greatness, and which are all moral. He is the only holy, the only blessed, the only wise, because these conceptions already imply the absence of limitation. In the order of these attributes he is also the holy lawgiver and creator, the good governor and preserver, and the just judge. Three attributes which include everything by which God is the object of religion, and in conformity with which the metaphysical perfections are added of themselves in the reason. End Footnote. Therefore those who place the end of creation in the glory of God, provided that this is not conceived anthropomorphically as a desire to be praised, have perhaps hit upon the best expression. For nothing glorifies God more than that which is the most estimable thing in the world, respect for his command, the observance of the holy duty that his law imposes on us, when there is added there too his glorious plan of crowning such a beautiful order of things with corresponding happiness. If the letter, to speak humanly, makes him worthy of love, by the former he is an object of adoration. Even men can never acquire respect by benevolence alone, though they may gain love, so that the greatest beneficence only procures them honor when it is regulated by worthiness. That in the order of ends, man, and with him every rational being, is an end in himself, that is, that he can never be used merely as a means by any, not even by God, without being at the same time an end also himself, that therefore humanity and our person must be holy to ourselves, this follows now of itself, because he is the subject of the moral law, in other words of that which is holy in itself. And on account of which, and in agreement with which alone, can anything be termed holy. For this moral law is founded on the autonomy of his will, as a free will which by its universal laws must necessarily be able to agree with that to which it is to submit itself. End of Section 15 Kingsmill Abbott First Part Elements of Pure Practical Reason Book II Dialectic of Pure Practical Reason Chapter II Of the Dialectic of Pure Reason In Defining the Conception of the Somum Bonum Six Of the Postulates of Pure Practical Reason Generally This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain, for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org. They all proceed from the principle of morality, which is not a postulate, but a law, by which reason determines the will directly, which will, because it is so determined as a pure will, requires these necessary conditions of obedience to its precept. These postulates are not theoretical dogmas, but suppositions practically necessary. While then they do not extend our speculative knowledge, they give objective reality to the ideas of speculative reason in general, by means of their reference to what is practical, and give it a right to concepts, the possibility even of which it could not otherwise venture to affirm. These postulates are those of immortality, freedom positively considered, as the causality of a being so far as he belongs to the intelligible world, and the existence of God. The first results from the practically necessary condition of a duration adequate to the complete fulfillment of the moral law, the second from the necessary supposition of independence of the sensible world, and of the faculty of determining one's will according to the law of an intelligible world, that is, of freedom. The third from the necessary condition of the existence of the summum bonum, in such an intelligible world, by the supposition of the supreme independent good, that is, the existence of God. Thus the fact that respect for the moral law necessarily makes the summum bonum an object of our endeavors, and the supposition thence resulting of its objective reality lead through the postulates of practical reason to conceptions which speculate reason might indeed present as problems, but could never solve. Thus it leads, one, to that one in the solution of which the latter could do nothing but commit paralogisms, namely that of immortality, because it could not lay hold of the character of permanence, by which to complete the psychological conception of an ultimate subject necessarily ascribed to the soul and self-consciousness, so as to make it the real conception of a substance, a character which practical reason furnishes by the postulate of a duration required for accordance with the moral law in the summum bonum, which is the whole end of practical reason. Two. It leads to that of which speculative reason contained nothing but antinomy, the solution of which it could only found on a notion problematically conceivable indeed, but whose objective reality it could not prove or determine, namely the cosmological idea of an intelligible world and the consciousness of our existence in it by means of the postulate of freedom, the reality of which it lays down by virtue of the moral law, and with it likewise the law of an intelligible world to which speculative reason could only point, but could not define its conception. Three. What speculative reason was able to think, but was obliged to leave undetermined as a mere transcendental ideal, vis the theological conception of the first being. To this it gives significance, in a practical view, that is, as a condition of the possibility of the object of a will determined by that law, namely as the supreme principle of the summum bonum in an intelligible world by means of moral legislation in it invested with sovereign power. Is our knowledge, however, actually extended in this way by pure practical reason, and is that imminent in practical reason which for the speculative was only transcendent? Certainly, but only in a practical point of view. For we do not thereby take knowledge of the nature of our souls, nor of the intelligible world, nor of the supreme being, with respect to what they are in themselves, but we have merely combined the conceptions of them in the practical concept of the summum bonum as the object of our will, and this altogether a priori, but only by means of the moral law, and merely in reference to it, in respect of the object which it commands. But how freedom is possible, and how we are to conceive this kind of causality theoretically and positively, is not thereby discovered, but only that there is such a causality is postulated by the moral law and in its behoof. It is the same with the remaining ideas, the possibility of which no human intelligence will ever fathom, but the truth of which, on the other hand, no sophistry will ever rest from the conviction even of the commonest man. Seven. How is it possible to conceive an extension of pure reason in a practical point of view without its knowledge as speculative being enlarged at the same time? In order not to be too abstract, we will answer this question at once in its application to the present case. In order to extend a pure cognition practically there must be an a priori purpose given, that is, an end as object of the will which independently of all theological principle is presented as practically necessary by an imperative which determines the will directly, a categorical imperative, and in this case that is the summum bonum. This, however, is not possible without presupposing three theoretical conceptions, for which, because they are mere conceptions of pure reason, no corresponding intuition can be found, nor consequently by the path of theory any objective reality, namely freedom, immortality, and God. Thus by the practical law which commands the existence of the highest good possible in a world, the possibility of those objects of pure speculative reason is postulated, and the objective reality which the latter could not assure them. By this the theoretical knowledge of pure reason does indeed obtain an accession, but it consists only in this, that those concepts which otherwise it had to look upon as problematical, merely thinkable concepts, are now shown assertorially to be such as actually have objects, because practical reason indispensably requires their existence for the possibility of its object, the summum bonum, which practically is absolutely necessary, and this justifies theoretical reason in assuming them. But this extension of theoretical reason is no extension of speculative, that is, we cannot make any positive use of it in a theoretical point of view. For as nothing is accomplished in this by practical reason, further than that these concepts are real and actually have their possible objects, and nothing in the way of intuition of them is given thereby, which indeed could not be demanded, hence the admission of this reality does not render any synthetical proposition possible. Consequently this discovery does not in the least help us to extend this knowledge of ours in a speculative point of view, although it does in respect of the practical employment of pure reason. The above three ideas of speculative reason are still in themselves not cognitions, they are however transcendent thoughts in which there is nothing impossible. Now by help of an apodactic practical law being necessary conditions of that which it commands to be made an object, they acquire objective reality, that is, we learn from it that they have objects, without being able to point out how the conception of them is related to an object, and this too is still not a cognition of these objects, for we cannot thereby form any synthetical judgment about them, nor determine their application theoretically. Consequently we can make no theoretical rational use of them at all, in which use all speculative knowledge of reason consists. Nevertheless the theoretical knowledge, not indeed of these objects but of reason generally, is so far enlarged by this that by the practical postulates objects were given to those ideas a merely problematical thought having by this means first acquired objective reality. There is therefore no extension of the knowledge of given supersensible objects, but an extension of theoretical reason and of its knowledge in respect of the supersensible generally, in as much as it is compelled to admit that there are such objects, although it is not able to define them more closely, so as itself to extend this knowledge of the objects, which have now been given it on practical grounds and only for practical use. For this accession then pure theoretical reason, for which all those ideas are transcendent and without object, has simply to thank its practical faculty. In this they become imminent and constitutive, being the source of the possibility of realizing the necessary object of pure practical reason, the summum bonum. Whereas apart from this they are transcendent and merely regulative principles of speculative reason, which do not require it to assume a new object beyond experience, but only to bring its use in experience nearer to completeness. But when once reason is in possession of this accession, it will go to work with these ideas as speculative reason, properly only to assure the certainty of its practical use, in a negative manner, that is, not extending but clearing up its knowledge, so as on one side to keep off anthropomorphism, as the source of superstition, or seeming extension of these conceptions by supposed experience, and on the other side fanaticism, which promises the same by means of supersensible intuition or feelings of the like kind. All these are hindrances to the practical use of pure reason, so that the removal of them may certainly be considered an extension of our knowledge in a practical point of view, without contradicting the admission that for speculative purposes reason has not in the least gained by this. Every employment of reason in respect of an object requires pure concepts of the understanding, categories, without which no object can be conceived. These can be applied to the theoretical employment of reason, i.e. to that kind of knowledge, only in case and intuition, which is always sensible, is taken as a basis, and therefore merely in order to conceive by means of them an object of possible experience. Now here, what have to be thought by means of the categories in order to be known are ideas of reason which cannot be given in any experience. Only we are not here concerned with the theoretical knowledge of the objects of these ideas, but only with this, whether they have objects at all. This reality is supplied by pure practical reason, and theoretical reason has nothing further to do in this but to think those objects by means of categories. This, as we have elsewhere clearly shown, can be done well enough without needing any intuition, either sensible or super sensible, because the categories have their seat and origin in the pure understanding simply as the faculty of thought, before and independently of any intuition, and they always only signify an object in general, no matter what way it may be given to us. Now, when the categories are to be applied to these ideas, it is not possible to give them any object in intuition, but that such an object actually exists, and consequently that the category is a mere form of thought, is here not empty, but has significance. This is sufficiently assured them by an object which practical reason presents beyond doubt in the concept of the sumum bonum, the reality of the conceptions which are required for the possibility of the sumum bonum, without, however, affecting by this accession the least extension of our knowledge on theoretical principles. When these ideas of God, of an intelligible world, the kingdom of God, and of immortality are further determined by predicates taken from our own nature, we must not regard this determination as a sensualizing of those pure rational ideas, anthropomorphism, nor as a transcendent knowledge of super sensible objects, for these predicates are no others than understanding and will, considered too in the relation to each other in which they must be conceived in the moral law, and therefore only so far as a pure practical use is made of them. As to all the rest that belongs to these conceptions psychologically, that is, so far as we observe these faculties of ours empirically in their exercise, e.g., that the understanding of man is discursive, and its notions therefore not intuitions but thoughts, these that follow one another in time, that his will has its satisfaction always dependent on the existence of its object, etc., which cannot be the case in the Supreme Being. From all this we abstract in that case, and then there remains of the notions by which we conceive a pure intelligence nothing more than just what is required for the possibility of conceiving a moral law. There is then a knowledge of God indeed, but only for practical purposes, and if we attempt to extend it to a theoretical knowledge, we find an understanding that has intuitions, not thoughts, a will that is directed to objects on the existence of which its satisfaction does not in the least depend. Not to mention the transcendental predicates as, for example, a magnitude of existence, that is, duration, which, however, is not in time, the only possible means we have of conceiving existence as magnitude. Now these are all attributes of which we can form no conception that would help to the knowledge of the object, and we learn from this that they can never be used for a theory of supersensible beings, so that on this side they are quite incapable of being the foundation of a speculative knowledge, and their use is limited simply to the practice of the moral law. This last is so obvious, and can be proved so clearly by fact, that we may confidently challenge all pretended natural theologians, a singular name, to specify, over and above the merely ontological predicates, one single attribute, whether of the understanding or of the will, determining this object of theirs, of which we could not show incontrovertibly that, if we abstract from it everything anthropomorphic, nothing would remain to us but the mere word, without our being able to connect with it the smallest notion by which we could hope for an extension of theoretical knowledge. But as to the practical, there still remains to us the attributes of understanding and will, the conception of a relation to which objective reality is given by the practical law, which determines a priori precisely this relation of the understanding to the will. When once this is done, then reality is given to the conception of the object of a will morally determined, the conception of the sumum bonum, and with it to the conditions of its possibility, the ideas of God, freedom, and immortality, but always only relatively to the practice of the moral law, and not for any speculative purpose. Learning is properly only the whole content of the historical sciences. Consequently it is only the teacher of revealed theology that can be called a learned theologian. If, however, we choose to call a man learned, who is in possession of the rational sciences, mathematics, and philosophy, although even this would be contrary to the signification of the word, which always counts as learning only that which one must be learned, and which therefore he cannot discover by himself by reason. Even in that case the philosopher would make too poor a figure with his knowledge of God as a positive science to let himself be called on that account a learned man. According to these remarks it is now easy to find the answer to the weighty question whether the notion of God is one belonging to physics, and therefore also to metaphysics, which contains the pure a priori principles of the former in their universal import, or to morals. If we have recourse to God as the author of all things, in order to explain the arrangements of nature or its changes, this is at least not a physical explanation, and is a complete confession that our philosophy has come to an end, since we are obliged to assume something of which in itself we have otherwise no conception, in order to be able to frame a conception of the possibility of what we see before our eyes. Metaphysics, however, cannot enable us to attain by certain inference from the knowledge of this world to the conception of God and to the proof of his existence, for this reason, that in order to say that this world could be produced only by a God, according to the conception implied by this word, we should know this world as the most perfect whole possible, and for this purpose should also know all possible worlds, in order to be able to compare them with this. In other words, we should be omniscient. It is absolutely impossible, however, to know the existence of this being from mere concepts, because every existential proposition, that is, every proposition that affirms the existence of a being of which I frame a concept, is a synthetic proposition, that is, one by which I go beyond that conception and affirm of it more than was thought in the conception itself, namely, that this concept in the understanding has an object corresponding to it outside the understanding, and this it is obviously impossible to elicit by any reasoning. There remains, therefore, only one single process possible for reason to attain this knowledge, namely, to start from the supreme principle of its pure practical use, which in every case is directed simply to the existence of something as a consequence of reason, and thus determine its object. Then its inevitable problem, namely, the necessary direction of the will to the Summon Bonum, discovers to us not only the necessity of assuming such a first being in reference to the possibility of this good in the world, but, what is most remarkable, something which reason in its progress on the path of physical nature altogether fail to find, namely, an accurately defined conception of this first being. As we can know only a small part of this world, and can still less compare it with all possible worlds, we may indeed from its order, design, and greatness infer a wise, good, powerful, etc. author of it, but not that he is all wise, all good, all powerful, etc. It may indeed very well be granted that we should be justified in supplying this inevitable defect by a legitimate and reasonable hypothesis, namely, that when wisdom, goodness, etc., are displayed in all the parts that offer themselves to our nearer knowledge, it is just the same in all the rest, and that it would therefore be reasonable to ascribe all possible perfections to the author of the world, but these are not strict logical inferences in which we can pride ourselves on our insight, but only permitted conclusions in which we may be indulged, and which require further recommendation before we can make use of them. On the path of empirical inquiry, then, physics, the conception of God remains always a conception of the perfection of the first being, not accurately enough determined to be held adequate to the conception of deity. With metaphysic in its transcendental part, nothing whatever can be accomplished. When I now try to test this conception by reference to the object of practical reason, I find that the moral principle admits as possible only the conception of an author of the world possessed of the highest perfection. He must be omniscient in order to know my conduct up to the inmost root of my mental state in all possible cases and into all future time. Omnipotent in order to allot to it its fitting consequences, similarly he must be omnipresent, eternal, etc. Thus the moral law by means of the conception of the summum bonum as the object of a pure practical reason determines the concept of the first being as the supreme being, a thing which the physical, and in its higher development, the metaphysical. In other words, the whole speculative course of reason was unable to affect. The conception of God, then, is one that belongs originally not to physics, i.e., to speculative reason, but to morals. The same may be said of the other conceptions of reason of which we have treated above as postulates of it in its practical use. In the history of Grecian philosophy we find no distinct traces of a pure rational theology earlier than Anaxagoras, but this is not because the older philosophers had not intelligence or penetration enough to raise themselves to it by the path of speculation, at least with the aid of a thoroughly reasonable hypothesis. What could have been easier, what more natural, than the thought which of itself occurs to everyone, to assume, instead of several causes of the world, instead of an indeterminate degree of perfection, a single, rational cause having all perfection. But the evils in the world seem to them to be much too serious objections, to allow them to feel themselves justified in such a hypothesis. They showed intelligence and penetration, then, in this very point, that they did not allow themselves to adopt it, but on the contrary looked about amongst natural causes, to see if they could not find in them the qualities and power required for a first being. But when this acute people had advanced so far in their investigations of nature, as to treat even moral questions philosophically, on which other nations had never done anything but talk, then first they found a new and practical want, which did not fail to give definiteness to their conception of the first being. And in this the speculative reason played the part of spectator, or at best had the merit of embellishing a conception that had not grown on its own ground, and of applying a series of confirmations from the study of nature now brought forward for the first time. Not indeed to strengthen the authority of this conception, which was already established. But rather to make a show with a supposed discovery of theoretical reason. From these remarks the reader of the critique of pure speculative reason will be thoroughly convinced how highly necessary that laborious deduction of the categories was, and how fruitful for theology and morals. For if, on the one hand, we place them in pure understanding, it is by this deduction alone that we can be prevented from regarding them, with Plato as innate, and founding on them extravagant pretensions to theories of the supersensible, to which we can see no end, and by which we should make theology a magic lantern of chimeras. On the other hand, if we regard them as acquired, this deduction saves us from restricting, with Epicurus, all and every use of them, even for practical purposes, to the objects and motives of the senses. But now that the critique has shown by that deduction, first, that they are not of empirical origin but have their seat and source a priori in the pure understanding, secondly, that as they refer to objects in general independently of the intuition of them, hence, although they cannot affect theoretical knowledge, except in application to empirical objects, yet, when applied to an object given by pure practical reason, they enable us to conceive the supersensible definitely, only so far, however, as it is defined by such predicates as are necessarily connected with the pure practical purpose given a priori and with its possibility. The speculative restriction of pure reason and its practical extension bring it into that relation of equality in which reason in general can be employed suitably to its end, and this example proves better than any other that the path to wisdom, if it is to be made sure, and not to be impassable or misleading, must with us men inevitably pass through science, but it is not till this is complete that we can be convinced that it leads to this goal. END OF SECTION XVI Section 17 of the Critique of Practical Reason by Emanuel Kant. Translated by Thomas Kingsmill Abbott. First part. Elements of Pure Practical Reason, Book II. Dialectic of Pure Practical Reason, Chapter II. Of the dialectic of pure reason in defining the conception of the sumum bonum. VIII. Of belief from a requirement of pure reason. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. A want or requirement of pure reason in its speculative use leads only to a hypothesis that of pure practical reason to a postulate. For in the former case I ascend from the result as high as I please in the series of causes, not in order to give objective reality to the results, e.g. the causal connection of things and changes in the world, but in order thoroughly to satisfy my inquiring reason in respect of it. Thus I see before me order and design in nature, and need not resort to speculation to assure myself of their reality, but to explain them I have to presuppose a deity as their cause, and then, since the inference from an effect to a definite cause is always uncertain and doubtful, especially to a cause so precise and so perfectly defined as we have to conceive in God, hence the highest degree of certainty to which this presupposition can be brought is that it is the most rational opinion for us men. On the other hand, a requirement of the pure practical reason is based on a duty, that of making something, the sumum bonum, the object of my will, so as to promote it with all my powers, in which case I must suppose its possibility, and consequently, also the conditions necessary thereto, namely, God, freedom, and immortality, since I cannot prove these by my speculative reason, although neither can I refute them. This duty is founded on something that is indeed quite independent of these suppositions and is of itself apodietically certain, namely, the moral law, and so far it needs no further support by theoretical views as to the inner constitution of things, the secret final aim of the order of the world, or a presiding ruler thereof, in order to bind me in the most perfect manner to act in unconditional conformity to the law. But the subjective effect of this law, namely, the mental disposition conformed to it and made necessary by it, to promote the practically possible sumum bonum, this presupposes at least that the latter is possible, for it would be practically impossible to strive after the object of a conception which at bottom was empty and had no object. Now the above-mentioned postulates concern only the physical or metaphysical conditions of the possibility of the sumum bonum, in a word, those which lie in the nature of things. Not, however, for the sake of an arbitrary speculative purpose, but of a practically necessary end of a pure rational will, which in this case does not choose but obeys an inexorable command of reason, the foundation of which is objective in the constitution of things as they must be universally judged by pure reason, and is not based on inclination, for we are in no wise justified in assuming, on account of what we wish on merely subjective grounds, that the means thereto are possible or that its object is real. This, then, is an absolutely necessary requirement, and what it presupposes is not merely justified as an allowable hypothesis, but as a postulate in practical point of view, and admitting that the pure moral law inexorably binds every man as a command, not as a rule of prudence, the righteous man might say, I will that there be a God, that my existence in this world be also an existence outside the chain of physical causes, and in a pure world of understanding, and, lastly, that my duration be endless. I firmly abide by this, and will not let this faith be taken from me, for in this instance alone my interest, because I must not relax anything of it, inevitably determines my judgment, without regarding self-istries, however unable I may be to answer them or to oppose them with others more plausible. In order to prevent misconception in the use of a notion as yet so unusual as that of a faith of pure practical reason, let me be permitted to add one more remark. It might almost seem as if this rational faith were announced—it might almost seem as if this rational faith were here announced as itself a command, namely, that we should assume the Summon Bonum as possible. But a faith that is commanded is nonsense. Let the preceding analysis, however, be remembered of what is required to be supposed in the conception of the Summon Bonum, and it will be seen that it cannot be commanded to assume this possibility, and no practical disposition of mind is required to admit it. But that speculative reason must concede it without being asked, for no one can affirm that it is impossible in itself that rational beings in the world should, at the same time, be worthy of happiness in conformity with the moral law and also possess this happiness proportionately. Now, in respect of the first element of the Summon Bonum, namely, that which concerns morality, the moral law gives merely a command, and to doubt the possibility of that element would be the same as to call in question the moral law itself. But as regards the second element of that object, namely, happiness perfectly proportioned to that worthiness, it is true that there is no need of a command to admit its possibility in general, for theoretical reason has nothing to say against it. But the manner in which we have to conceive this harmony of the laws of nature, with those of freedom, has in it something in respect of which we have a choice, because theoretical reason decides nothing with apodictic certainty about it, and in respect of this there may be a moral interest which turns the scale. I had said above that in a mere course of nature in the world an accurate correspondence between happiness and moral worth is not to be expected and must be regarded as impossible, and that therefore the possibility of the Summon Bonum cannot be admitted from this side except on the supposition of a moral author of the world. I purposely reserve the restriction of this judgment to the subjective conditions of our reason, in order not to make use of it until the manner of this belief should be defined more precisely. The fact is that the impossibility referred to is merely subjective, that is, our reason finds it impossible for it to render conceivably in the way of a mere course of nature a connection so exactly proportioned and so thoroughly adapted to an end, between two sets of events happening according to such distinct laws, although as with everything else in nature that is adapted to an end it cannot prove, that is, show by sufficient objective reason, that it is not possible by universal laws of nature. Now, however, a deciding principle of a different kind comes into play to turn the scale in this uncertainty of speculative reason. The command to promote the Summon Bonum is established on an objective basis, in practical reason. The possibility of the same in general is likewise established on an objective basis in theoretical reason, which has nothing to say against it. But reason cannot decide objectively in what way we are to conceive this possibility, whether by universal laws of nature without a wise author presiding over nature, or only on supposition of such an author. Now here there comes in a subjective condition of reason, the only way theoretically possible for it, of conceiving the exact harmony of the kingdom of nature with the kingdom of morals, which is the condition of the possibility of the Summon Bonum, and at the same time the only one conducive to morality, which depends on an objective law of reason. Now, since the promotion of the Summon Bonum and therefore the supposition of its possibility are objectively necessary, though only as a result of practical reason, while at the same time the manner in which we would conceive it rests with our own choice, and in this choice a free interest of pure practical reason decides for the assumption of a wise author of the world, it is clear that the principle that herein determines our judgment, though as a want it is subjective, yet at the same time being the means of promoting what is objectively practically necessary, is the foundation of a maxim of belief in a moral point of view, that is, a faith of pure practical reason. This then is not commanded, but being a voluntary determination of our judgment, conducive to the moral, commanded purpose, and moreover harmonizing with the theoretical requirement of reason, to assume that existence and to make it the foundation of our further employment of reason. It has itself sprung from the moral disposition of mind, it may therefore at times waver even in the well disposed, but can never be reduced to unbelief. 9. Of the wise adaption of man's cognitive faculties to his practical destination. 10. If human nature is destined to endeavor after the sumum bonum, we must suppose also that the measure of its cognitive faculties, and particularly their relation to one another, is suitable to this end. Now the critique of pure speculative reason proves that this is incapable of solving satisfactorily the most weighty problems that are proposed to it, although it does not ignore the natural and important hints received from the same reason, nor the great steps that it can make to approach this great goal that is set before it, which, however, it can never reach of itself, even with the help of the greatest knowledge of nature. Nature then seems here to have provided us only in a stepmotherly fashion with the faculty required for our end. Suppose now that in this matter nature had conformed to our wish, and had given us that capacity of discernment, or that enlightenment, which we would godly possess, or which some imagine they actually possess, what would in all probability be the consequence? Unless our whole nature were at the same time changed, our inclinations, which always have the first word, would first of all demand their own satisfaction, and, joined with rational reflection, the greatest possible and most lasting satisfaction under the name of happiness. The moral law would afterward speak, in order to keep them within their proper bounds, and even to subject them all to a higher end, which has no regard to inclination. But instead of the conflict that the moral disposition has now to carry on with the inclinations, in which, though after some defeats, moral strength of mind may be gradually acquired, God and eternity with their awful majesty would stand unceasingly before our eyes, for what we can prove perfectly is to us as certain as that of which we are assured by the sight of our eyes. Transgression of the law would, no doubt, be avoided. What is commanded would be done, but the mental disposition, from which actions ought to proceed, cannot be infused by any command, and in this case the spur of action is ever active and external, so that reason has no need to exert itself in order to gather strength to resist the inclinations by a lively representation of the dignity of the law. Hence most of the actions that conform to the law would be done from fear, a few only from hope, and none at all from duty, and the moral worth of actions, on which alone in the eyes of supreme wisdom the worth of the person, and even that of the world depends, would cease to exist. As long as the nature of man remains what it is, his conduct would thus be turned into mere mechanism, in which, as in a puppet show, everything would gesticulate well, but there would be no life in the figures. Now, when it is quite otherwise with us, when with all the effort of our reason we have only a very obscure and doubtful view into the future, when the Governor of the world allows us only to conjecture his existence and his majesty, not to behold them or prove them clearly, and on the other hand the moral law within us, without promising or threatening anything with certainty, demands of us disinterested respect, and only when this respect has become active and dominant, does it allow us by means of its prospect into the world of the supersensible, and then only with weak glances, all this being so, there is room for true moral disposition, immediately devoted to the law, and a rational creature can become worthy of sharing in the sumum bonum that corresponds to the worth of his person and not merely to his actions. Thus what the study of nature and of man teaches us sufficiently elsewhere may well be true here also, that the unsearchable wisdom by which we exist is not less worthy of admiration in what it has denied than in what it has granted. By the methodology of pure practical reason we are not to understand the mode of proceeding with pure practical principles, whether in study or in exposition, with a view to a scientific knowledge of them, which alone is what is properly called method elsewhere in theoretical philosophy. For popular knowledge requires a manner, science, a method, that is, a process according to principles of reason by which alone the manifold of any branch of knowledge can become a system. On the contrary, by this methodology is understood the mode in which we can give the laws of pure practical reason access to the human mind and influence on its maxims, that is, by which we can make the objectively practical reason subjectively practical also. Now it is clear enough that those determining principles of the will, which alone make maxims properly moral and give them a moral worth, namely the direct conception of the law and the objective necessity of obeying it as our duty, must be regarded as the proper springs of actions, since otherwise legality of actions might be produced but not morality of character. But it is not so clear. On the contrary, it must at first sight seem to everyone very improbable that even subjectively that exhibition of pure virtue can have more power over the human mind and supply a far stronger spring even for effecting that legality of actions and can produce more powerful resolutions to prefer the law from pure respect for it to every other consideration. Then all the deceptive allurements of pleasure are of all that may be reckoned as happiness, or even then all threatening of pain and misfortune. Nevertheless, this is actually the case, and if human nature were not so constituted, no mode of presenting the law by roundabout ways and indirect recommendations would ever produce morality of character. All would be simple hypocrisy. The law would be hated, or at least despised, while it was followed for the sake of one's own advantage. The letter of the law, legality, would be found in our actions, but not the spirit of it in our minds, morality. And as with all our efforts we could not quite free ourselves from reason in our judgment, we must inevitably appear in our own eyes worthless, depraved man, even though we should seek to compensate ourselves for this mortification before the inner tribunal, by enjoying the pleasure that a supposed natural or divine law might be imagined to have connected with it a sort of police machinery, regulating its operations by what was done without troubling itself about the motives for doing it. It cannot indeed be denied that in order to bring an uncultivated or degraded mind into the track of moral goodness, some preparatory guidance is necessary, to attract it by a view of its own advantage, or to alarm it by fear of loss. But as soon as this mechanical work, these leading strings, have produced some effect, then we must bring before the mind the pure moral motive, which not only because it is the only one that can be the foundation of a character, a practically consistent habit of mind with unchangeable maxims, but also because it teaches a man to fill his own dignity, gives the mind a power unexpected even by himself, to tear himself from all sensible attachments so far as they would feign have the rule, and to find a rich compensation for the sacrifice he offers in the independence of his rational nature and the greatness of soul to which he sees that he is destined. We will therefore show, by such observations as everyone can make, that this property of our minds, this receptivity for a pure moral interest, and consequently the moving force of the pure conception of virtue, when it is properly applied to the human heart, is the most powerful spring, and when a continued and punctual observance of moral maxims is in question, the only spring of good conduct. It must, however, be remembered that if these observations only prove the reality of such a feeling, but do not show any moral improvement brought about by it, this is no argument against the only method that exists of making the objectively practical laws of pure reason subjectively practical, through the mere force of the conception of duty, nor does it prove that this method is a vain delusion, for as it has never yet come into vogue, experience can say nothing of its results. One can only ask for proofs of the receptivity for such springs, and these I will now bravely present, and then sketch the method of founding and cultivating genuine moral dispositions. When we attend to the course of conversation in mixed companies, consisting not merely of learned persons and subtle reasoners, but also of men of business, or of women, we observe that, besides storytelling and jesting, another kind of entertainment finds a place in them, namely argument. For stories, if they are to have novelty and interest, are soon exhausted, and jesting is likely to become insipid. Now, of all argument, there is none in which persons are more ready to join who find any other subtle discussion tedious, none that brings more liveliness into the company, than that which concerns the moral worth of this or that action by which the character of some person is to be made out. Persons, to whom in other cases anything subtle and speculative in theoretical questions is dry and irksome, presently join in when the question is to make out the moral import of a good or bad action that has been related, and they display an exactness, a refinement, a subtlety, in ex-cogitating everything that can lessen the purity of purpose, and consequently the degree of virtue in it, which we do not expect from them in any other kind of speculation. In these criticisms, persons who are passing judgment on others often reveal their own character. Some, in exercising their judicial office, especially upon the dead, seem inclined chiefly to defend the goodness that is related of this or that deed against all injurious charges of insincerity, and ultimately to defend the whole moral worth of the person against the reproach of dissimilation and secret witness. Others, on the contrary, turn their thoughts more upon attacking this worth by accusation and fault-finding. We cannot always, however, attribute to these letter the intention of arguing away virtue altogether out of all human examples in order to make it an empty name. Often, on the contrary, it is only Wellman's trickness in determining the true moral import of actions according to an uncompromising law. Comparison with such a law, instead of with examples, lowers self-conceit immoral matters very much, and not merely teaches humility, but makes everyone feel it when he examines himself closely. Nevertheless, we can for the most part observe in those who defend the purity of purpose in giving examples that where there is the presumption of uprightness, they are anxious to remove even the least spot, lest, if all examples had their truthfulness disputed, and if the purity of all human virtue were denied, it might in the end be regarded as a mere phantom, and so all effort to attain it be made light of as vain affectation and elusive concede. I do not know why the educators of youth have not long since made use of this propensity of reason to enter with pleasure upon the most subtle examination of the practical questions that are thrown up, and why they have not, after first laying the foundation of a purely moral catechism, searched through the biographies of ancient and modern times with the view of having at hand instances of the duties laid down in which, especially by comparison of similar actions under different circumstances, they might exercise the critical judgment of their scholars in remarking their greater or less moral significance. This is a thing in which they would find that even early youth, which is still unripe for speculation of other kinds, would soon become very acute and not a little interested, because it feels the progress of its faculty of judgment, and what is most important, they could hope with confidence that the frequent practice of knowing and approving good conduct in all its purity, and, on the other hand, of remarking with regret or contempt the least deviation from it, although it may be pursued only as a sport in which children may compete with one another, yet will leave a lasting impression of a steam on the one hand and disgust on the other, and so, by the mere habit of looking on such actions as deserving approval or blame, a good foundation would be laid for uprightness in the future course of life. Only I wish they would spare them the example of so-called noble, supermeritorious actions, in which are sentimental books so much abound, and would refer all to duty merely, and to the worth that a man can and must give himself in his own eyes by the consciousness of not having transgressed it, since whatever runs up into empty wishes and longings after inaccessible perfection produces mere heroes of romance, who, while they peak themselves on their feeling for transcendent greatness, release themselves in return from the observance of common and everyday obligations, which then seem to them petty and insignificant. Footnote It is quite proper to extol actions that display a great, unselfish, sympathizing mind or humanity, but in this case we must fix attention not so much on the elevation of soul, which is very fleeting and transitory, as on the subjection of the heart to duty, from which a more enduring impression may be expected, because this implies principle, whereas the former only implies abolition. One need only reflect a little, and he will always find a debt that he has by some means incurred towards the human race, even if it were only this by the inequality of men in the civil constitution, and joy's advantages on account of which others must be the more in want, which will prevent the thought of duty from being repressed by the self-complacent imagination of merit, and footnote. But if it is asked what then is really pure morality by which as a touchstone we must test the moral significance of every action, then I must admit that it is only philosophers that can make the decision of this question doubtful, for to common sense it has been decided long ago, not indeed by abstract general formulae, but by habitual use, like the distinction between the right and left hand. We will then point out the criterion of pure virtue in an example first, and imagining that it is set before a boy of say ten years old for his judgment, we will see whether he would necessarily judge so of himself without being guided by his teacher. Tell him the history of an honest man, whom men want to persuade to join the culminators of an innocent and powerless person, say Anne Boleyn, accused by Henry VIII of England. He is offered advantages, great gifts, or high rank. He rejects them. This will excite mere approbation and applause in the mind of the hero. Now begins the threatening of loss. Amongst these producers are his best friends, who now renounce his friendship. Near Kinsfolk, who threatened to disinherit him, he being without fortune. Powerful persons who can persecute and harass him in all places and circumstances. A prince who threatens him with loss of freedom, yay, loss of life. Then, to fill the measure of suffering, and that he may feel the pain that only the morally good heart can feel very deeply, let us conceive his family threatened with extreme distress and want, and treating him to yield. Conceive himself, though upright, yet with feelings not hard or insensible, either to compassion or to his own distress. Conceive him, I say, at the moment when he wishes that he had never lived to see the day that exposed him to such unutterable anguish, yet remaining true to his uprightness of purpose, without wavering or even doubting. Then will my youthful hearer be raised gradually from mere approval to admiration, from that to amazement, and finally to the greatest veneration, and a lively wish that he himself could be such a man, though certainly not in such circumstances. Yet virtue is here worth so much only because it costs so much, not because it brings any profit. All the admiration and even the endeavour to resemble this character rest wholly on the purity of the moral principle, which can only be strikingly shown by removing from the springs of action everything that man may regard as part of happiness. Morality, then, must have the more power over the human heart the more purely it is exhibited. Once it follows that, if the law of morality and the image of holiness and virtue are to exercise any influence at all on our souls, they can do so only so far as they are laid to heart in their purity as modus, unmixed with any view to prosperity, for it is in suffering that they display themselves most nobly. Now that whose removal strengthens the effect of a moving force must have been a hindrance, consequently every a mixture of modus taken from our own happiness is a hindrance to the influence of the moral law on the heart. I affirm further that even in that admired action, if the motive from which it was done was a high regard for a duty, then it is just this respect for the law that has the greatest influence on the mind of the spectator, not any pretension to a supposed inward greatness of mind or noble meritorious sentiments. Consequently, duty, not merit, must have not only the most definite, but when it is represented in the true light of its inviolability, the most penetrating influence on the mind. It is more necessary than ever to direct attention to this method in our times, when men hope to produce more effect on the mind with soft tender feelings or high flown puffing up pretensions, which rather wither the heart than strengthen it, than by a plain and earnest representation of duty, which is more suited to human imperfection and to progress in goodness. To set before children as a pattern actions that are called noble, magnanimous, meritorious, with the notion of captivating them by infusing enthusiasm for such actions is to defeat our end, for as they are still so backward in the observance of the commonest duty and even in the correct estimation of it, this means simply to make them fantastical romances by times. But even with the instructed and experienced part of mankind, this supposed spring has, if not an injurious, at least no genuine moral effect on the heart, which, however, is what it was desired to produce. All feelings, especially those that are to produce unwanted exertions, must accomplish their effect at the moment they are at their height and before the calm down. Otherwise they affect nothing. For as there was nothing to strengthen the heart but only to excite it, it naturally returns to its normal, moderate tone, and thus falls back into its previous lenge. Principles must be built on conceptions. On any other basis there can only be paroxysms, which can give the person no moral worth, nay, not even confidence in himself, without which the highest good in man, consciousness of the morality of his mind and character, cannot exist. Now, if these conceptions are to become subjectively practical, we must not rest satisfied with admiring the objective law of morality and esteeming it highly in reference to humanity, but we must consider the conception of it in relation to man as an individual, and then this law appears in a form indeed that is highly deserving of respect, but not so pleasant as if it belonged to the element to which he is naturally accustomed. But, on the contrary, as often compelling him to quit this element, not without self-denial, and to but take himself to a higher, in which he can only maintain himself with trouble and with unseizing apprehension of a relapse. In a word the moral law demands obedience from duty, not from predilection, which cannot and ought not to be presupposed at all. Let us now see in an example whether the conception of an action as a noble and magnanimous one has more subjective moving power than if the action is conceived merely as duty in relation to the solemn law of morality, the action by which a man endeavours at the greatest peril of life to rescue people from shipwreck at last losing his life in the attempt is reckoned on one side as duty, but on the other and for the most part as a meritorious action. But our esteem for it is much weakened by the notion of duty to himself, which seems in this case to be somewhat infringed. More decisive is the magnanimous sacrifice of life for the safety of one's country, and yet there still remains some scruple whether it is a perfect duty to devote oneself to this purpose spontaneously and unbidden, and the action has not in itself the full force of a pattern and impulse to imitation. But, if an indispensable duty being questioned, the transgression of which violates the moral law itself and without regard to the welfare of mankind and as it were tramples on its holiness, such as are usually called duties to God, because in him we conceive the ideal of holiness in substance, then we give our most perfect esteem to the pursuit of it at the sacrifice of all that can have any value for the dearest inclinations, and we find our soul strengthened and elevated by such an example, when we convince ourselves by contemplation of it, that human nature is capable of so great an elevation above every motive that nature can oppose to it. Juvenile describes such an example in a climax which makes the reader feel vividly the force of the spring that is contained in the pure law of duty as duty. Esto bonus miles tuto bonus arbiter idem integer, ambigue si quando si tabere testis incerta querei, valares liket imperet utsis falsus, et at moto dictet periuria tauro, sumum crede neifas animam prefere pudori, et propte vita vivendi perdere causas. footnote juvenile satiri be you a good soldier, a faithful tutor, an uncorrupted empire also, if you are summoned as a witness in a doubtful and uncertain thing, though valares should command that you should be false and should dictate perjuries with the bull brought to you, believe it the highest impiety to prefer life to reputation and for the sake of life to lose the causes of living. end footnote when we can bring any flattering thought of merit into our action, then the motive is already somewhat alloyed with self-love and has therefore some assistance from the side of the sensibility, but to postpone everything to the holiness of duty alone, and to be conscious that we can, because our own reason recognizes this as its command and says that we ought to do it, this is, as it were, to raise ourselves altogether above the world of sense, and there is inseparably involved in the same a consciousness of the law as a spring of a faculty that controls the sensibility, and although this is not always attended with effect, yet frequent engagement with this spring, and the at first minor attempts at using it, give hope that this effect may be wrought, and that by degrees the greatest, and that a purely moral interest in it, may be produced in us. The method then takes the following course. At first we are only concerned to make the judging of actions by moral laws a natural employment accompanying all our own free actions, as well as the observation of those of others, and to make it, as it were, a habit, and to sharpen this judgment, asking first whether the action conforms objectively to the moral law and to what law, and we distinguish the law that merely furnishes a principle of application from that which is really obligatory. As, for instance, the law what men's wants require from me, as contrasted with that which their rights demand, the letter of which prescribes essential, the former only non-essential duties, and thus we teach how to distinguish different kinds of duties which meet in the same action. The other point to which attention must be directed is the question whether the action was also, subjectively, done for the sake of the moral law, so that it not only is morally correct as a deed, but also, by the maxim from which it is done, has moral worth as a disposition. Now, there is no doubt that this practice, and the resulting culture of our reason, in judging merely of the practical, must gradually produce a certain interest even in the law of reason, and consequently, in morally good actions. For we ultimately take a liking for a thing, the contemplation of which makes us feel that the use of our cognitive faculties is extended, and this extension is especially furthered by that in which we find moral correctness, since it is only in such an order of things that reason, with its faculty of determining a priori on principle what ought to be done, can find satisfaction. An observer of nature takes liking at last to objects that at first offend at his senses, when he discovers in them the great adaptation of their organisation to design, so that his reason finds food in its contemplation. So Leibniz spared an insect that he had carefully examined with the microscope, and replaced it on its leaf, because he had found himself instructed by the view of it, and had, as it were, received a benefit from it. But this employment of the faculty of judgment, which makes us feel our own cognitive powers, is not yet the interest in actions and in their morality itself. It merely causes us to take pleasure in engaging in such criticism, and it gives to virtue, or the disposition that conforms to moral laws, a form of beauty, which is admired, but not on that account sought after. Laudator et algette. As everything, the contemplation of which produces a consciousness of the harmony of our powers of conception, and in which we feel the whole of our faculty of knowledge, understanding, and imagination, strengthened, produces a satisfaction which may also be communicated to others, while nevertheless the existence of the object remains indifferent to us, being only regarded as the occasion of our becoming aware of the capacities in us which are elevated above mere animal nature. Now however the second exercise comes in, the Living Exhibition of Morality of Character by Examples, in which attention is directed to purity of will, first only as a negative perfection, insofar as, in an action done from duty, no motors of inclination have any influence in determining it. By this the pupil's attention is fixed upon the consciousness of his freedom, and although this renunciation at first excites a feeling of pain, nevertheless, by its withdrawing the pupil from the constraint of even real ones, there is proclaimed to him at the same time a deliverance from the manifold dissatisfaction in which all these ones entangle him, and the mind is made capable of receiving the sensation of satisfaction from other sources. The heart is freed and lightened of a burden that always secretly presses on it, when instances of pure moral resolution reveal to the man an inner faculty of which otherwise he has no right knowledge, the inward freedom to release himself from the boisterous opportunity of inclinations, to such a degree that none of them, not even the dearest, shall have any influence on a resolution for which we are now to employ our reason. Suppose a case where I alone know that the wrong is on my side, and although a free confession of it, and the offer of satisfaction, are so strongly opposed by vanity, selfishness, and even and otherwise not illegitimate antipathy to the man whose rights are impaired by me, I am nevertheless able to discard all these considerations. In this there is implied consciousness of independence on inclinations and circumstances, and of the possibility of being sufficient for myself, which is solitary to me in general, for other purposes also. And now the law of duty, in consequence of the positive worth which obedience to it makes us feel, finds easier access through the respect for ourselves in the consciousness of our freedom. When this is well established, when a man dreads nothing more than to find himself on self-examination, worthless and contemptible in his own eyes, then every good moral disposition can be grafted on it, because this is the best, nay, the only guard that can keep off from the mind the pressure of ignoble and corrupting motives. I have only intended to point out the most general maxims of the methodology of moral cultivation and exercise, as the manifold variety of duties requires special rules for each kind, and this would be a prolix affair. I shall be readily excused if in a work like this, which is only preliminary, I content myself with these outlines. Conclusion Two things fill the mind with ever new and increasing admiration and all, the oftener and the more steadily we reflect on them, the starry heavens above and the moral law within. I have not to search for them and conjecture them as though they were veiled in darkness or were in the transcendent region beyond my horizon. I see them before me and connect them directly with the consciousness of my existence. The former begins from the place I occupy in the external world of sense and enlarges my connection therein to an unbounded extent with worlds upon worlds and systems of systems, and moreover into limitless times of their periodic motion, its beginning and continuance. The second begins from my invisible self, my personality, and exhibits me in a world which has true infinity, but which is traceable only by the understanding, and with which I discern that I am not in a merely contingent but in a universal and necessary connection, as I am also thereby with all those visible worlds. The former view of a countless multitude of worlds annihilates as it were my importance as an animal creature, which after it has been for a short time provided with vital power, one knows not how, must again give back the matter of which it was formed to the planet it inhabits, a mere speck in the universe. The second, on the contrary, infinitely elevates my worth as an intelligence by my personality, in which the moral law reveals to me a life independent of animality and even of the whole sensible world, at least so far as may be inferred from the destination assigned to my existence by this law, a destination not restricted to conditions and limits of this life but reaching into the infinite. But though admiration and respect may excite to inquiry, they cannot supply the want of it. What then is to be done in order to enter on this in a useful manner, and one adapted to the loftiness of the subject? Examples may serve in this as a warning and also for imitation. The contemplation of the world began from the noblest spectacle that the human senses present to us, and that our understanding can bear to follow in their vast reach. And it ended in astrology. Morality began with the noblest attribute of human nature, the development and cultivation of which give a prospect of infinite utility, and ended in fanaticism or superstition. So it is with all crude attempts where the principal part of the business depends on the use of reason, a use which does not come of itself like the use of defeat by frequent exercise, especially when attributes are in question which cannot be directly exhibited in common experience. But after the maxim had come into vogue, though late, to examine carefully beforehand all the steps that reason proposes to take, and not to let it proceed otherwise than in the track of a previously well-considered method, then the study of the structure of the universe took quite a different direction, and thereby attained an incomparably happier result. The fall of a stone, the motion of a sling, resolved into their elements and the forces that are manifested in them, and treated mathematically, produced at last that clear and hence-forward unchangeable insight into the system of the world which, as observation is continued, may hope always to extend itself, but need never fear to be compelled to retreat. This example may suggest to us to enter on the same path in treating of the moral capacities of our nature, and may give us hope of a like good result. We have at hand the instances of the moral judgment of reason. By analysing these into their elementary conceptions, and in the fold of mathematics adopting a process similar to that of chemistry, the separation of the empirical from the rational elements that may be found in them, by repeated experiments and common sense, we may exhibit both pure and learn with certainty what each part can accomplish of itself, so as to prevent on the one hand the errors of a still crude untrained judgment, and on the other hand, what is far more necessary, the extravagances of genius, by which, as by the adepts of the philosopher's stone, without any methodical study or knowledge of nature, visionary treasures are promised and the true are thrown away. In one word, science, critically undertaken and methodically directed, is a narrow gate that leads to the true doctrine of practical wisdom, if we understand by this not merely what one ought to do, but what ought to serve teachers as a guide to construct well and clearly the rote wisdom which everyone should travel, and secure others from going astray. Philosophy must always continue to be the guardian of this science, and although the public does not take any interest in its subtle investigations, it must take an interest in the resulting doctrines, which such an examination first puts in a clear light. End of Section 18. End of the Critique of Practical Reason by Emmanuel Kant, translated by Thomas Kingsmill Abbott.