- Even supposing, however, that all finite
rational beings were thoroughly agreed as to
what were the objects of their feelings of
pleasure and pain, and also as to the means
which they must employ to attain the one and
avoid the other; still, they could by no means
set up the principle of self-love as a practical
law, for this unanimity itself would be only
contingent.
-
- The principle of determination would still
be only subjectively valid and merely empirical,
and would not possess the necessity which is
conceived in every law, namely, an objective
necessity arising from a priori grounds; unless,
indeed, we hold this necessity to be not at all
practical, but merely physical, viz., that our
action is as inevitably determined by our
inclination, as yawning when we see
others yawn.
-
- It would be better to maintain that there
are no practical laws at all, but only counsels
for the service of our desires, than to raise
merely subjective principles to the rank of
practical laws, which have objective necessity,
and not merely subjective, and which must be
known by reason a priori, not by experience
(however empirically universal this may be).
Even the rules of corresponding phenomena are
only called laws of nature (e.g., the mechanical
laws), when we either know them really a priori,
or (as in the case of chemical laws) suppose
that they would be known a priori from objective
grounds if our insight reached further.
-
- But in the case of merely subjective
practical principles, it is expressly made a
condition that they rest, not on objective, but
on subjective conditions of choice, and hence
that they must always be represented as mere
maxims, never as practical laws. This second
remark seems at first sight to be mere verbal
refinement, but it defines the terms of the most
important distinction which can come into
consideration in practical investigations.
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