Immanuel Kant |
Immanuel Kant
DREAMS OF A VISIONARY
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The accuracy of scales used for commercial measurements, according to civil law,
is discovered if we let the merchandize and the weights exchange pans. So the
partiality of the scales of reason is revealed by the same trick, without which,
in philosophical judgments, no harmonious result can be obtained from the compound
weighings. I have purified my soul from prejudices; I have destroyed any blind
affection which ever crept in to procure in me an entrance for much fancied knowledge.
I now have nothing at heart; nothing is venerable to me but what enters by the path
of sincerity into a quiet mind open to all reasons— whether thereby my former
judgment is confirmed or abolished, or whether I am convinced or left in doubt.
Wherever I meet with something instructive, I appropriate it. The judgment of him
who refutes my reasons fashions my judgment, after I first have weighed it against
the scale of self-love, and afterwards in that scale against my presumed reasons,
and have found it to have a higher intrinsic value. (p. 14)
Formerly, I viewed human common sense only from the standpoint of my own; now I put myself into the position of another's reason outside of myself, and observe my judgments, together with their most secret causes, from the point of view of others. It is true that the comparison of both observations results in pronounced parallaxes, but it is the only means of preventing the optical delusion, and of putting the concept of the power of knowledge in human nature into its true place. You may say that this is very serious talk in connection with so trifling a problem as that under consideration, which deserves to be called a plaything rather than a serious occupation, and you are not exactly wrong in thus judging. (p. 15) But true wisdom is the companion of simplicity, and as with the latter, the heart rules the understanding, it generally renders unnecessary the great prepartions of scholars, and its aims do not need such means as can never be at the command of all men. What? Is it good to be virtuous only because there is another world, or will not actions be rewarded rather because they were good and virtuous in themselves? Does not man's heart contain immediate moral precepts, and is it absolutely necessary to link our thought to the other world for the sake of moving man here according to his destiny? Can he be called honest, can he be called virtuous, who would like to yield to his favorite vices if only he were not frightened by future punishments? Must we not rather say that indeed he shuns the doing of wicked things, but nurtures the vicious disposition in his soul; that he loves the advantages of actions similar to virtue, but hates virtue itself? In fact, experience teaches that very many who are instructed concerning the future world, and are convinced of it, nevertheless yield to vice and corruption, and only think upon means cunningly to escape the threatening consequences of the future. But there probably never was a righteous soul who could endure the thought that with death everything would end, and whose noble mind had not elevated itself to the hope of the future. Therefore it seems to be more in accordance with human nature and the purity of morals to base the expectation of a future world upon the sentiment of a good soul, than, conversely, to base the soul's good conduct upon the hope of another world. Of a similar nature is that moral faith, the simplicity of which can do without many a subtlety of reasoning, and which alone is appropriate to man in any state, because, without deviations, it guides him to his true aims. (p. 22) Let us therefore leave to speculation and to the care of idle men all the noisy systems of doctrine concerning such remote subjects. They are really immaterial to us, and the reason pro and con which, for the moment, prevail, may, perhaps, decide the applause of schools, but hardly anything about the future destiny of the righteous. Human reason was not given strong enough wings to part clouds so high above us, clouds which withhold from our eyes the secrets of the other world. The curious who inquire about it so anxiously may receive the simple but very natural reply that it would be best for them please to have patience until they get there. But as our fate in the other world probably depends very much on the manner in which we have conducted our office in the present world. I conclude with the words with which Voltaire, after so many sophistries, lets his honest Candide conclude: "Let us look after our happiness, go into the garden, and work." (p. 23)
— from Carl J. Friedrich (Ed.), The Philosophy of Kant, *****************************************************************
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