A Beginner's History of Philosophy, Vol. 2: Modern Philosophy

by Herbert Ernest Cushman

The central idea in Kant’s theory of morals is that rational spontaneity is exactly the same as freedom. This contrasts his theory with Hedonism. The value of man’s life depends on what he does spontaneously, not on what happens to him. This idea of freedom is the central thought in all Kant’s discussions of society. In his theory of government the republic is to be preferred to the monarchy, because of the opportunity to its citizens of spontaneous freedom; in religion the true church is composed of free beings worshiping God freely; in education self-activity is the sole principle of growth. Ethics is a system of the pure rational laws of freedom, just as science is a system of the pure rational laws of nature. If ethics has real validity its laws must be, as in science, a priori or derived from the reason itself, and synthetic or applicable to experience everywhere. If the moral law be valid it must be indifferent as to its content, and yet valid for all content irrespectively. The source of the principle of morals is thus the same as that of science: it is a priori. The principle of morals is universal in its application to experience, just as the a priori synthesis of knowledge is. However, just at that point the difference is to be seen between the foundation of science and that of morals—between the reason aspure and the reason as practical. Reason in the form of knowledge is restricted to experience; but reason in the form of the will, while applicable to experience, is not restricted to experience. If the understanding is without the content of experience, it is empty and useless. The understanding must always be a synthesis of a manifold. On the other hand, the practical reason needs no content. It is sufficient in itself. It need not be obeyed anywhere nor have any concrete content in the phenomenal world. It has no reference to what is but to what ought to be. The world of morality and the world of phenomena are different worlds. The world of morality is absolute reality, while the world of knowledge is only relative. The world of morality is the unconditioned, while that of knowledge is conditioned by experience. Morality applies not only to human beings, but to all rational beings, if any other rational beings exist. Knowledge, however, belongs to human beings alone. The moral law has not its home in the empirical, but in the transcendent, intelligible world, which to knowledge would be the world of Things-in-Themselves.

The Moral Law and the Two Questions concerning It. The questions of the Critique of Practical Reason are the same as those of the Dialectic: (1) Is there any a priori synthesis? This is not the question of the Analytic, which is, How is an a priori synthesis possible? (2) Can the human being be moral and still be a part of the world of phenomena and necessity? We shall now comment on the first of these problems. If the will has validity, it must be the expression of some universal and necessary principle. Can we find any such a priori principle in our consciousness?

1. The First Question concerning the Moral Law. If we search our consciousness, we shall find that there are two classes of incentives to action. The first are called the inclinations, or perhaps better the impulses. We may will because we desire to gain something, of use, pleasure, perfection, etc. Such an act of will is dependent upon the object that arouses it. Such an act of will would not be an example for any one else; for the circumstances that called it forth would be likely to be different in each case. For example, there is no consensus as to pleasure among individual men; and what is pleasant to one is unpleasant to another. The same is true about objects of use and ambition. In all these matters judgment does not help us in making our selection, for people who are the most discriminating often are the most unhappy and useless. All these things are indeed goods, but they are goods for the moment—goods that are dependent on something else, and not goods in themselves. They are legitimate ends enough, but they are so transitory that they cannot be valid. It is evident that when the will is governed by inclination, it is governed by an empirical (a posteriori), and not by a universal and necessary (a priori) principle. Such empirical principles are called by Kant hypothetical imperatives.

Let us look to the reason itself to see if the principle of its practice lies there; for it is certain that we shall not find the principle of universal validity for our will among our impulses. The reason is a spontaneous synthesis. It is a fact that any one may verify who will search his consciousness—that man may will from reason. The will may be impelled from within, and need not be compelled from without. The will may bean imperative in itself, proclaiming its right because it is reasonable, justifying itself because it is reasonable, functioning because it is the function of reason. Then is the will the expression of reason. It is the reason in practice. The will is unconditioned and free because it is the unconditioned reason acting. It is then autonomous. It has then validity because the reason is universal and necessary. This kind of willing Kant calls the categorical imperative. It is the moral law. It is a law unto itself, and it is the only basis for morality because it is the universally valid reason.

The categorical imperative is unique—there is nothing like it in human nature. It is the one kind of willing that has absolute validity; and that is because it is unique in having itself for its own end. The conscience may be said to be its expression in the individual. Kant formulates the valid command of the moral law as, “Act as if the maxim from which you act were to become through your will a universal law of nature.” The various maxims of morality, like “Thou shalt not lie,” occupy the same position to the will that the categories do to the understanding. They are the forms of the moral will. Actions should proceed from maxims rather than from impulses, and the moral maxims are adapted for all beings who act rationally. A specific act may become good because the moral law, that inspires it, is good. Nevertheless “nothing can possibly be conceived in the world or even out of it, which can be called good without qualification, except a good will.” The virtues or the gifts of fortune may be good and desirable; they may also be evil and mischievous, if they are not the expression of the moral will.

2. The Second Question concerning the MoralLaw. This leads us to the answer to the second question, How can such a purely necessary and universal principle be effective in human life? Of what service to man is a principle so formal that if the inclinations coöperate with it, the act is no longer moral? The moral law is not only transcendental, but it is transcendent, for it does not have experience as its content. It is its own content. It is independent of all experience in three ways: (1) In origin, it contains only a formal principle; (2) In content, it contains only a formal principle; (3) In validity, it is not concerned as to whether it is obeyed or not; it declares what ought to be, even if what ought to be is never done. The question always arises about Kant’s ethics, Of what service can such a remote and formal principle be? Morality takes place in the world of experience; and here is Kant’s principle of morality existing in the world of unconditioned reality. Of the usefulness of such a principle Kant’s explanation is not fully satisfactory. His ethics is fundamentally a rigorism, from which he is unable to escape. Duty and inclination are in antagonism. Only those acts of will are moral which are performed solely from the sense of duty. In themselves the natural inclinations are indifferent; when they oppose the moral will, they become bad; only when they are inspired by the moral will are they of ethical service. Moral action is therefore narrowed to that in which the imperative of duty is consciously paramount.

“The friends whom I love, I gladly would serve, but to this inclination incites me;

And so I am forced from virtue to swerve, since my act through affection delights me.

The friends, whom thou lovest, thou must first seek to scorn, for to no other way can I guide thee;

’Tis alone with disgust thou canst rightly perform the acts to which duty would lead thee.”[57]