1785

                    INTRODUCTION TO THE METAPHYSIC OF MORALS

                                by Immanuel Kant

                            translated by W. Hastie
DIVISIONS

     GENERAL DIVISIONS OF THE METAPHYSIC OF MORALS

  I. DIVISION OF THE METAPHYSIC OF MORALS AS A SYSTEM OF

                   DUTIES GENERALLY.

  1. All duties are either duties of right, that is, juridical
duties (officia juris), or duties of virtue, that is, ethical duties
(officia virtutis s. ethica). Juridical duties are such as may be
promulgated by external legislation; ethical duties are those for
which such legislation is not possible. The reason why the latter
cannot be properly made the subject of external legislation is because
they relate to an end or final purpose, which is itself, at the same
time, embraced in these duties, and which it is a duty for the
individual to have as such. But no external legislation can cause
any one to adopt a particular intention, or to propose to himself a
certain purpose; for this depends upon an internal condition or act of
the mind itself. However, external actions conducive to such a
mental condition may be commanded, without its being implied that
the individual will of necessity make them an end to himself.

  But why, then, it may be asked, is the science of morals, or moral
philosophy, commonly entitled- especially by Cicero- the science of
duty and not also the science of right, since duties and rights
refer to each other? The reason is this. We know our own freedom- from
which all moral laws and consequently all rights as well as all duties
arise- only through the moral imperative, which is an immediate
injunction of duty; whereas the conception of right as a ground of
putting others under obligation has afterwards to be developed out
of it.

  2. In the doctrine of duty, man may and ought to be represented in
accordance with the nature of his faculty of freedom, which is
entirely supra-sensible. He is, therefore, to be represented purely
according to his humanity as a personality independent of physical
determinations (homo noumenon), in distinction from the same person as
a man modified with these determinations (homo phenomenon). Hence
the conceptions of right and end when referred to duty, in view of
this twofold quality, give the following division:

  DIVISION OF THE METAPHYSIC OF MORALS ACCORDING TO THE OBJECTIVE

                  RELATION OF THE LAW OF DUTY.

                         I. The Right of Humanity.
I. Juridical   Oneself     in our own person (juridicial

      Duties     to or     duties towards oneself)             Perfect

                Others                                            Duty

                        II. The Right of Mankind.

                            in others (juridical duties

                            towards others.)

                       III. The End of Humanity.
II. Ethical   Oneself       in our person (eithical duties

     Duties     to or       towards oneself)                 Imperfect

               Others                                             Duty

                        IV. The End of Mankind.

                            in others (ethical duties

                            towards others.)

  II. DIVISION OF THE METAPHYSIC OF MORALS ACCORDING TO RELATIONS

                      OF OBLIGATION.

  As the subjects between whom a relation of right and duty is
apprehended- whether it actually exists or not- admit of being
conceived in various juridical relations to each other, another
division may be proposed from this point of view, as follows:

  DIVISION POSSIBLE ACCORDING TO THE SUBJECTIVE RELATION OF

      THOSE WHO BIND UNDER OBLIGATIONS, AND THOSE WHO ARE

                 BOUND UNDER OBLIGATIONS.

  1. The juridical relation of man to beings who have neither right
nor duty:

  Vacat. There is no such relation, for such beings are irrational,
and they neither put us under obligation, nor can we be put under
obligation by them.