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PREFACE.
PREFACE.
This work is called the Critique of Practical Reason, not of the pure practical reason, although its parallelism with the speculative critique would seem to require the latter term. The reason of this appears sufficiently from the treatise itself. Its business is to show that there is pure practical reason, and for this purpose it criticizes the entire practical faculty of reason. If it succeeds in this, it has no need to criticize the pure faculty itself in order to see whether reason in making
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INTRODUCTION.
INTRODUCTION.
The theoretical use of reason was concerned with objects of the cognitive faculty only, and a critical examination of it with reference to this use applied properly only to the pure faculty of cognition; because this raised the suspicion, which was afterwards confirmed, that it might easily pass beyond its limits, and be lost among unattainable objects, or even contradictory notions. It is quite different with the practical use of reason. In this, reason is concerned with the grounds of determin
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CHAPTER I. Of the Principles of Pure Practical Reason.
CHAPTER I. Of the Principles of Pure Practical Reason.
BOOK 1|CHAPTER 1 ^paragraph 5...
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I. DEFINITION.
I. DEFINITION.
Practical principles are propositions which contain a general determination of the will, having under it several practical rules. They are subjective, or maxims, when the condition is regarded by the subject as valid only for his own will, but are objective, or practical laws, when the condition is recognized as objective, that is, valid for the will of every rational being. BOOK 1|CHAPTER 1 ^paragraph 10...
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REMARK.
REMARK.
Supposing that pure reason contains in itself a practical motive, that is, one adequate to determine the will, then there are practical laws; otherwise all practical principles will be mere maxims. In case the will of a rational being is pathologically affected, there may occur a conflict of the maxims with the practical laws recognized by itself. For example, one may make it his maxim to let no injury pass unrevenged, and yet he may see that this is not a practical law, but only his own maxim;
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BOOK1|CHAPTER1 ^paragraph 15
BOOK1|CHAPTER1 ^paragraph 15
All practical principles which presuppose an object (matter) of the faculty of desire as the ground of determination of the will are empirical and can furnish no practical laws. By the matter of the faculty of desire I mean an object the realization of which is desired. Now, if the desire for this object precedes the practical rule and is the condition of our making it a principle, then I say (in the first place) this principle is in that case wholly empirical, for then what determines the choic
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COROLLARY.
COROLLARY.
All material practical rules place the determining principle of the will in the lower desires; and if there were no purely formal laws of the will adequate to determine it, then we could not admit any higher desire at all....
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BOOK1|CHAPTER1 ^paragraph 30
BOOK1|CHAPTER1 ^paragraph 30
It is surprising that men, otherwise acute, can think it possible to distinguish between higher and lower desires, according as the ideas which are connected with the feeling of pleasure have their origin in the senses or in the understanding; for when we inquire what are the determining grounds of desire, and place them in some expected pleasantness, it is of no consequence whence the idea of this pleasing object is derived, but only how much it pleases. Whether an idea has its seat and source
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BOOK1|CHAPTER1 ^paragraph 35
BOOK1|CHAPTER1 ^paragraph 35
To be happy is necessarily the wish of every finite rational being, and this, therefore, is inevitably a determining principle of its faculty of desire. For we are not in possession originally of satisfaction with our whole existence- a bliss which would imply a consciousness of our own independent self-sufficiency this is a problem imposed upon us by our own finite nature, because we have wants and these wants regard the matter of our desires, that is, something that is relative to a subjective
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IV. THEOREM II.
IV. THEOREM II.
A rational being cannot regard his maxims as practical universal laws, unless he conceives them as principles which determine the will, not by their matter, but by their form only. BOOK 1|CHAPTER 1 ^paragraph 45 By the matter of a practical principle I mean the object of the will. This object is either the determining ground of the will or it is not. In the former case the rule of the will is subjected to an empirical condition (viz., the relation of the determining idea to the feeling of pleasu
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REMARK.
REMARK.
The commonest understanding can distinguish without instruction what form of maxim is adapted for universal legislation, and what is not. Suppose, for example, that I have made it my maxim to increase my fortune by every safe means. Now, I have a deposit in my hands, the owner of which is dead and has left no writing about it. This is just the case for my maxim. I desire then to know whether that maxim can also bold good as a universal practical law. I apply it, therefore, to the present case, a
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VI. PROBLEM II.
VI. PROBLEM II.
Supposing that a will is free, to find the law which alone is competent to determine it necessarily. BOOK 1|CHAPTER 1 ^paragraph 60 Since the matter of the practical law, i.e., an object of the maxim, can never be given otherwise than empirically, and the free will is independent on empirical conditions (that is, conditions belonging to the world of sense) and yet is determinable, consequently a free will must find its principle of determination in the law, and yet independently of the matter of
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REMARK.
REMARK.
Thus freedom and an unconditional practical law reciprocally imply each other. Now I do not ask here whether they are in fact distinct, or whether an unconditioned law is not rather merely the consciousness of a pure practical reason and the latter identical with the positive concept of freedom; I only ask, whence begins our knowledge of the unconditionally practical, whether it is from freedom or from the practical law? Now it cannot begin from freedom, for of this we cannot be immediately cons
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VII. FUNDAMENTAL LAW OF THE PURE PRACTICAL REASON.
VII. FUNDAMENTAL LAW OF THE PURE PRACTICAL REASON.
Act so that the maxim of thy will can always at the same time hold good as a principle of universal legislation. BOOK 1|CHAPTER 1 ^paragraph 70...
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REMARK.
REMARK.
Pure geometry has postulates which are practical propositions, but contain nothing further than the assumption that we can do something if it is required that we should do it, and these are the only geometrical propositions that concern actual existence. They are, then, practical rules under a problematical condition of the will; but here the rule says: We absolutely must proceed in a certain manner. The practical rule is, therefore, unconditional, and hence it is conceived a priori as a categor
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BOOK1|CHAPTER1 ^paragraph 75
BOOK1|CHAPTER1 ^paragraph 75
Pure reason is practical of itself alone and gives (to man) a universal law which we call the moral law....
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BOOK1|CHAPTER1 ^paragraph 80
BOOK1|CHAPTER1 ^paragraph 80
The fact just mentioned is undeniable. It is only necessary to analyse the judgement that men pass on the lawfulness of their actions, in order to find that, whatever inclination may say to the contrary, reason, incorruptible and self-constrained, always confronts the maxim of the will in any action with the pure will, that is, with itself, considering itself as a priori practical. Now this principle of morality, just on account of the universality of the legislation which makes it the formal su
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VIII. THEOREM IV.
VIII. THEOREM IV.
The autonomy of the will is the sole principle of all moral laws and of all duties which conform to them; on the other hand, heteronomy of the elective will not only cannot be the basis of any obligation, but is, on the contrary, opposed to the principle thereof and to the morality of the will. BOOK 1|CHAPTER 1 ^paragraph 85 In fact the sole principle of morality consists in the independence on all matter of the law (namely, a desired object), and in the determination of the elective will by the
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REMARK.
REMARK.
Hence a practical precept, which contains a material (and therefore empirical) condition, must never be reckoned a practical law. For the law of the pure will, which is free, brings the will into a sphere quite different from the empirical; and as the necessity involved in the law is not a physical necessity, it can only consist in the formal conditions of the possibility of a law in general. All the matter of practical rules rests on subjective conditions, which give them only a conditional uni
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REMARK II.
REMARK II.
The direct opposite of the principle of morality is, when the principle of private happiness is made the determining principle of the will, and with this is to be reckoned, as I have shown above, everything that places the determining principle which is to serve as a law, anywhere but in the legislative form of the maxim. This contradiction, however, is not merely logical, like that which would arise between rules empirically conditioned, if they were raised to the rank of necessary principles o
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SUBJECTIVE.
SUBJECTIVE.
BOOK 1|CHAPTER 1 ^paragraph 110 BOOK 1|CHAPTER 1 ^paragraph 115...
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OBJECTIVE.
OBJECTIVE.
BOOK 1|CHAPTER 1 ^paragraph 120 Those of the upper table are all empirical and evidently incapable of furnishing the universal principle of morality; but those in the lower table are based on reason (for perfection as a quality of things, and the highest perfection conceived as substance, that is, God, can only be thought by means of rational concepts). But the former notion, namely, that of perfection, may either be taken in a theoretic signification, and then it means nothing but the completen
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BOOK1|CHAPTER1 ^paragraph 125
BOOK1|CHAPTER1 ^paragraph 125
This Analytic shows that pure reason can be practical, that is, can of itself determine the will independently of anything empirical; and this it proves by a fact in which pure reason in us proves itself actually practical, namely, the autonomy shown in the fundamental principle of morality, by which reason determines the will to action. It shows at the same time that this fact is inseparably connected with the consciousness of freedom of the will, nay, is identical with it; and by this the will
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CHAPTER II. Of the Concept of an Object of Pure Practical Reason.
CHAPTER II. Of the Concept of an Object of Pure Practical Reason.
By a concept of the practical reason I understand the idea of an object as an effect possible to be produced through freedom. To be an object of practical knowledge, as such, signifies, therefore, only the relation of the will to the action by which the object or its opposite would be realized; and to decide whether something is an object of pure practical reason or not is only to discern the possibility or impossibility of willing the action by which, if we had the required power (about which e
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I. QUANTITY.
I. QUANTITY.
BOOK 1|CHAPTER 2 ^paragraph 20 Subjective, according to maxims (practical opinions of the individual) Objective, according to principles (Precepts) A priori both objective and subjective principles of freedom (laws) BOOK 1|CHAPTER 2 ^paragraph 25...
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II. QUALITY.
II. QUALITY.
Practical rules of action (praeceptivae) Practical rules of omission (prohibitivae) Practical rules of exceptions (exceptivae) BOOK 1|CHAPTER 2 ^paragraph 30...
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III. RELATION.
III. RELATION.
To personality To the condition of the person. Reciprocal, of one person to the others of the others. BOOK 1|CHAPTER 2 ^paragraph 35...
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IV. MODALITY.
IV. MODALITY.
The Permitted and the Forbidden Duty and the contrary to duty. Perfect and imperfect duty. BOOK 1|CHAPTER 2 ^paragraph 40 It will at once be observed that in this table freedom is considered as a sort of causality not subject to empirical principles of determination, in regard to actions possible by it, which are phenomena in the world of sense, and that consequently it is referred to the categories which concern its physical possibility, whilst yet each category is taken so universally that the
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CHAPTER III. Of the Motives of Pure Practical Reason.
CHAPTER III. Of the Motives of Pure Practical Reason.
What is essential in the moral worth of actions is that the moral law should directly determine the will. If the determination of the will takes place in conformity indeed to the moral law, but only by means of a feeling, no matter of what kind, which has to be presupposed in order that the law may be sufficient to determine the will, and therefore not for the sake of the law, then the action will possess legality, but not morality. Now, if we understand by motive (elater animi) the subjective g
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BOOK II. Dialectic of Pure Practical Reason.
BOOK II. Dialectic of Pure Practical Reason.
Pure reason always has its dialetic, whether it is considered in its speculative or its practical employment; for it requires the absolute totality of the 'conditions of what is given conditioned, and this can only be found in things in themselves. But as all conceptions of things in themselves must be referred to intuitions, and with us men these can never be other than sensible and hence can never enable us to know objects as things in themselves but only as appearances, and since the uncondit
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CHAPTER II. Of the Dialectic of Pure Reason in defining the Conception of the "Summum Bonum".
CHAPTER II. Of the Dialectic of Pure Reason in defining the Conception of the "Summum Bonum".
The conception of the summum itself contains an ambiguity which might occasion needless disputes if we did not attend to it. The summum may mean either the supreme (supremum) or the perfect (consummatum). The former is that condition which is itself unconditioned, i.e., is not subordinate to any other (originarium); the second is that whole which is not a part of a greater whole of the same kind (perfectissimum). It has been shown in the Analytic that virtue (as worthiness to be happy) is the su
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I. The Antinomy of Practical Reason.
I. The Antinomy of Practical Reason.
BOOK 2|CHAPTER 2 ^paragraph 10 In the summum bonum which is practical for us, i.e., to be realized by our will, virtue and happiness are thought as necessarily combined, so that the one cannot be assumed by pure practical reason without the other also being attached to it. Now this combination (like every other) is either analytical or synthetical. It has been shown that it cannot be analytical; it must then be synthetical and, more particularly, must be conceived as the connection of cause and
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II. Critical Solution of the Antinomy of Practical Reason.
II. Critical Solution of the Antinomy of Practical Reason.
The antinomy of pure speculative reason exhibits a similar conflict between freedom and physical necessity in the causality of events in the world. It was solved by showing that there is no real contradiction when the events and even the world in which they occur are regarded (as they ought to be) merely as appearances; since one and the same acting being, as an appearance (even to his own inner sense), has a causality in the world of sense that always conforms to the mechanism of nature, but wi
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III. Of the Primacy of Pure Practical Reason in its Union with the Speculative Reason.
III. Of the Primacy of Pure Practical Reason in its Union with the Speculative Reason.
BOOK 2|CHAPTER 2 ^paragraph 25 By primacy between two or more things connected by reason, I understand the prerogative, belonging to one, of being the first determining principle in the connection with all the rest. In a narrower practical sense it means the prerogative of the interest of one in so far as the interest of the other is subordinated to it, while it is not postponed to any other. To every faculty of the mind we can attribute an interest, that is, a principle, that contains the condi
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IV. The Immortality of the Soul as a Postulate of Pure Practical Reason.
IV. The Immortality of the Soul as a Postulate of Pure Practical Reason.
The realization of the summum bonum in the world is the necessary object of a will determinable by the moral law. But in this will the perfect accordance of the mind with the moral law is the supreme condition of the summum bonum. This then must be possible, as well as its object, since it is contained in the command to promote the latter. Now, the perfect accordance of the will with the moral law is holiness, a perfection of which no rational being of the sensible world is capable at any moment
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V. The Existence of God as a Postulate of Pure Practical Reason.
V. The Existence of God as a Postulate of Pure Practical Reason.
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 principle element of the summum bonum, viz., 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 summum bonum, viz., happiness proportioned to that morality,
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VI. Of the Postulates of Pure Practical Reason Generally.
VI. Of the Postulates of Pure Practical Reason Generally.
BOOK 2|CHAPTER 2 ^paragraph 60 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
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BOOK2|CHAPTER2 ^paragraph 70
BOOK2|CHAPTER2 ^paragraph 70
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 presupposi
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VIII. Of Belief from a Requirement of Pure Reason.
VIII. Of Belief from a Requirement of Pure Reason.
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 result (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 speculati
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IX. Of the Wise Adaptation of Man's Cognitive Faculties to his Practical Destination.
IX. Of the Wise Adaptation of Man's Cognitive Faculties to his Practical Destination.
If human nature is destined to endeavour after the summum 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 to th
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Methodology of Pure Practical Reason.
Methodology of Pure Practical Reason.
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, i.e., 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
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