This is Kant’s take on a system of morality derived solely from a priori logic. “The concept of freedom is a pure rational concept, which for this very reason is transcendent for theoretical philosophy, that is, it is a concept such that no instance corresponding to it can be given in any possible experience…. But in reason’s practical use the concept of freedom proves its reality by practical principles, which are laws of a causality of pure reason for determining choice independently of any empirical conditions…. On this concept of freedom, which is positive (from a practical point of view), are based unconditional practical laws, which are called moral…. Moral laws are imperatives (commands or prohibitions) and indeed categorical (unconditional) imperatives…. By categorical imperatives certain actions are permitted or forbidden, that is, morally possible or impossible, while some of them or their opposites are morally necessary, that is, obligatory. For those actions, then, there arises the concept of a duty, observance or transgression of which is indeed connected with a pleasure or displeasure of a distinctive kind (moral feeling), although in practical laws of reason we take no account of these feelings.” Kant continues by stressing his concept of the categorical imperative, “A categorical (unconditional) imperative is one that represents an action as objectively necessary and makes it necessary not indirectly, through the representation of some end that can be attained by the action, but through the mere representation of this action itself (its form), and hence directly. No other practical doctrine can furnish instances of such imperatives than that which prescribes obligation (the doctrine of morals)…. A categorical imperative, because it asserts an obligation with respect to certain actions, is a morally practical law…. A categorical imperative is a law that either commands or prohibits, depending upon whether it represents as a duty the commission or omission of an action.” Finally, in Kant’s deontological system, people are always ends unto themselves and never just a means to another’s own ends. “For a human being can never be treated merely as a means to the purposes of another or be put among the objects of rights to things: his innate personality protects him from this, even though he can be condemned to lose his civil personality.”
Kant stresses the a priori nature of his moral system. “But in fact no moral principle is based, as people sometimes suppose, on any feeling whatsoever. Any such principle is really an obscurely thought metaphysics that is inherent in every human being because of his rational predisposition…. But his thought must go all the way back to the elements of metaphysics, without which no certitude or purity can be expected in the doctrine of virtue…. If one departs from this principle and begins with pathological or pure aesthetic or even moral feeling (with what is subjectively rather than objectively practical); if, that is, one begins with the matter of the will, the end, instead of with the form of the will, the law, in order to determine duties on this basis, then there will indeed be no metaphysical first principles of the doctrine of virtue…. After it has been made so clear that the principle of duty is derived from pure reason, one cannot help wondering how this principle could be reduced again to a doctrine of happiness.”
Furthermore, Kant parses out the difference between the external law that governs us, from the internal duties that must govern each individual unto himself. “In ancient times “ethics” signified the doctrine of morals (philosophia moralis) in general, which was also called the doctrine of duties. Later on it seemed better to reserve the name “ethics” for one part of moral philosophy, namely for the doctrine of those duties that do not come under external laws…. The very concept of duty is already the concept of a necessitation (constraint) of free choice through the law. This constraint may be an external constraint or a self-constraint. The moral imperative makes this constraint known through the categorical nature of its pronouncement (the unconditional ought)…. It is this self-constraint in opposite directions and its unavoidability that makes known the inexplicable property of freedom itself…. Only an end that is also a duty can be called a duty of virtue…. What essentially distinguishes a duty of virtue from a duty of right is that external constraint to the latter kind of duty is morally possible, whereas the former is based only on free self-constraint.”
Finally, Kant stresses that each man must know himself. “Know your heart – whether it is good or evil, whether the source of your actions is pure or impure, and what can be imputed to you as belonging originally to the substance of a human being or as derived (acquired or developed) and belonging to your moral condition…. Moral cognition of oneself, which seeks to penetrate into the depths (the abyss) of one’s heart which are quite difficult to fathom, is the beginning of all human wisdom…. Impartiality in appraising oneself in comparison with the law, and sincerity in acknowledging to oneself one’s inner moral worth or lack of worth are duties to oneself that follow directly from this first command to cognize oneself.”
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