of a direct inclination or some satisfaction related to it indirectly through reason); I should
do so solely because the maxim which excludes it from my duty cannot be comprehended
as a universal law in one and the same volition.Classification of All Possible Principles of Morality Following from the Assumed
Principle of HeteronomyHere as everywhere in the pure use of reason so long as a critical examination of
it is lacking, human reason tries all possible wrong ways before it succeeds in finding
the one true way.
All principles which can be taken from this point of view are either empirical or
rational. The former, drawn from the principles of happiness, are based on physical or
moral feeling; the latter, drawn from the principle of perfection, are based either on the
rational concept of perfection as a possible result or on the concept of an independent
perfection (the will of God) as the determining ground of the will.
Empirical principles are not at all suited to serve as the basis of moral laws. For if
the basis of the universality by which they should be valid for all rational beings with-
out distinction (the unconditional practical necessity which is thereby imposed upon
them) is derived from a particular tendency of human nature or the accidental circum-
stance in which it is found, that universality is lost. But the principle of one’s own hap-
piness is the most objectionable of the empirical principles. This is not merely because
it is false and because experience contradicts the supposition that well-being is always
proportional to good conduct, nor yet because this principle contributes nothing to the
establishment of morality inasmuch as it is a very different thing to make a man happy
from making him good, and to make him prudent and farsighted for his own advantage
is far from making him virtuous. Rather, it is because this principle supports morality
with incentives which undermine it and destroy all its sublimity, for it puts the motives
to virtue and those to vice in the same class, teaching us only to make a better calcula-
tion while obliterating the specific difference between them. On the other hand, there is
the alleged special sense,* the moral feeling. The appeal to it is superficial, since those
who cannot think expect help from feeling, even with respect to that which concerns
universal laws; they do so even though feelings naturally differ so infinitely in degree
that they are incapable of furnishing a uniform standard of the good and bad, and also in
spite of the fact that one cannot validly judge for others by means of one’s own feeling.
Nevertheless, the moral feeling is nearer to morality and its dignity, inasmuch as it pays
virtue the honor of ascribing the satisfaction and esteem for her directly to morality, and
does not, as it were, say to her face that it is not her beauty but only our advantage
which attaches us to her.
Among the rational principles of morality, there is the ontological concept of
perfection. It is empty, indefinite, and consequently useless for finding in the
immeasurable field of possible reality the greatest possible sum which is suitable to
us; and, in specifically distinguishing the reality which is here in question from all
other reality, it inevitably tends to move in a circle and cannot avoid tacitly presup-
posing the morality which it ought to explain. Nevertheless, it is better than the the-
ological concept, which derives morality from a most perfect divine will. It is better882 IMMANUELKANT
443
*I count the principle of moral feeling under that of happiness, because every empirical interest
promises to contribute to our well-being by the agreeableness that a thing affords, either directly and without
a view to future advantage or with a view to it. We must likewise, with Hutcheson, count the principle of sym-
pathy with the happiness of others under the moral sense which he assumed.442