MORAL PHILOSOPH Y. 
778 
when we confider a being as fubjedt to the law of Caufa- 
lity, and at the fame time as free. We may Hill further 
illuftrate this difficulty. In judging of a morally-bad ac¬ 
tion, it is firfl neceffary to confider it under the law of 
nature Causality, and as a necelfary refult of fome 
determining ground or motive which occurred in a pre-. 
ceding time. But how then can man be fp.ee in per¬ 
forming this adtion ? and how can it be faid that it ought 
to have been omitted ? We mull: be careful not to give 
an improper anfwer to this queftion, and thus to l'poil 
every tiling. If we endeavour to help ouffelves by con- 
fidering the determining grounds as confuting in the in¬ 
ternal reprefentation, and that the adtion, therefore, not 
having been effected by external caufes, mult be called 
free, we quite miftake the true conception of liberty, and 
of courfe mifconceive entirely the nature of the Moral 
Law. Whether the caufe of a certain eftedt be an objedt 
of external or of internal Senfe, its Caufality muft necef- 
farily be determined by a higher caufe, and every action 
mull be thought as neceffiirily determined by an inde¬ 
finite feries of thefe caufes. How is Liberty to be recon¬ 
ciled with this mechanifm of Nature in one and the fame 
adtion ? 
This queftion may be anfwered, according to the ex¬ 
planation given in the Critic of Speculative Reafon, in 
the following manner.—So long as l view myfelf as an 
objedt of experience, I muft -confider my adtions as necef- 
farily ftanding under the conditions of time, and can by 
no means conceive myfelf free. But, if I put experience 
out of the queftion, and confider my caufality as a. pure 
objcti, I think it indeed by the mere negative conception 
of Liberty, that is, as fomething which is not fubjedt to 
the natural law of Caufality; and this conception receives 
from the moral Law a pofitive fignification. Now, with 
refpedt to the adtions of a being confidered in this two¬ 
fold light, they are neceffarily determined; and the indi¬ 
vidual, as a phenomenon, cannot think himfelf free: but, 
as a noumenon, and thus not only by the negative con¬ 
ception of liberty, but as ftanding adtually under the 
moral law, which reafon holds up to him as a fa 61, he 
muft confider himfelf, with refpedt to thefe very adtions, 
as completely free. Indeed every man’s judgment of his 
own adtions, and the decifion of his confidence, confirm 
this. How could man ever repent of an evil deed, if he 
confidered himfelf as a phenomenon merely ? In that 
cafe all imputation of guilt would be abfurd, fince the 
adtion muft necefiarily happen according to the Caufality 
of Nature. Every one muft have experienced, that, how¬ 
ever leniently he judges of the morality of his adtions, 
though he may plead in his excufe his bad education, 
bad company, and bad temper, his internal judge pierces 
through all pretexts, and reproaches him, notwithftand- 
ing their plaufibility: which plainly proves that every 
man, in judging of his own adtions, has in view his two¬ 
fold charadter, though only in an obfcure manner; con- 
iidering himfelf in the one cafe as a phenomenon, and fo 
far fubjedt to the law of nature of caufality, and in the 
other as noumenon, and therefore free. Thus alfo ano¬ 
ther difficulty is removed that feems to oppofe liberty, 
as connedted with a being of Senfe. If we fuppofe that 
God, as the original being, is the caufe of the exiftence 
of Subftance; this feems to imply that all the adtions of 
a man, from the beginning of his exiftence, are deter¬ 
mined by his Creator, and that he cannot therefore adt 
freely in any one of them. But in the Critic of Specu¬ 
lative Reafon it has been fliown that the conception of 
Creation, as applied to the phenomena, is not at all ad- 
miflible; that we cannot indeed renounce the concep¬ 
tion of a Creator of the Univerfe, but that this original 
Being muft not on that account be confidered as the 
creator of the phenomena, but of the things in themfehes, 
whereby the general dependence merely of all beings 
upon one iingle being is denoted, but the manner of this 
dependence is not attempted to be exprefled. Should we 
wjih to confider God as the author of the exiftence of the 
phenomena, (however abfurd this thought may appear 
to thole who inveftigate the fubjedt by the thread of the 
Critic ;) the conception of Liberty is moft certainly loft, 
fince in that cafe mart differs from a machine only in 
this, that the latter is kept in motion by fprings of the 
external Senfe, but the former by fprings of the internal 
Senfe. Both are equally fubjedted to the mechanilm of 
Nature. If, on the other hand, we refer the conception 
of creation to the things in themfehes, and connedt with 
it nothing more than the notion of Dependence, without 
pretending to determine its nature; we find in the very 
conception of a noumenon that of Liberty, but only 
thought negatively; that is, thought only as an independ¬ 
ence of the Caufality of Nature. Its pofitive determi¬ 
nation remains as before. Thus indeed the difficulty 
is removed, without any attempt to render conceivable 
the poffibility of Liberty, which indeed far furpafles our 
powers. 
In concluding this analytic, we.may remark the accu¬ 
rate agreement of the refults of the Critic of Speculative 
Reafon with thofe of Pradfical Reafon. In the illuftra¬ 
tion of the Antinomies of Pure Reafon, a great difference 
was obferved between the unconditioned of the Mathema¬ 
tical Categories and that of the Dynamical; which arofe 
from this, that the former contained a fynthefis of fome¬ 
thing homogetieal■ (namely Intuition), and confequently 
that no part of it can be confidered as unconditioned, 
fince the queftion regards a phenomenon as an objedt 5 
that is, as the aggregate of the empirical variety which is 
reprefented by the Categories. Now, if by the expref- 
fions beginning of the world, boundary of the world, Ji triple 
parts of a phenomenon, the unconditioned be underftood, 
and yet looked for only in the phenomena; this uncon¬ 
ditioned muft always remain a nihil negativum. The Dy¬ 
namical Categories, on the other hand, fince they refer 
to the exiftence of objedts, allow us, in the enquiry after 
the unconditioned, to leave out of the queftion the man¬ 
ner in which the objedt is given in the intuition, (the 
Phenomenon.) We thus obtain the reprefentation of an 
objedt, (as of fomething that exifts ablolutely, necefla- 
rily, and which is not fubjedted to the law of Caufality ;) 
which, though it has no real fignification, is however not 
contradidtory: it is therefore the reprefentation of an 
ens rutionis, Had the Critic of Speculative Reafon not 
fecured the conception of liberty from the charge of 
contradidtion, Pure Reafon could not have been allowed 
to poflefs any pradtical faculty, notwithftanding the fadt 
of the moral law which implies it, -without admitting the 
fuppofition that it had committed an error. But, as the 
Critic of Speculative Reafon made no reference to Prac¬ 
tical Reafon, and was ftill able to preferve the concep¬ 
tion of Liberty, though but in a negative fenfe, and the 
Critic of Pradtical Reafon having now given to it a 
pofitive fignification; this entirely-unintentional agree¬ 
ment of the two Critics is a confirmation of the whole. 
Book II. 
DIALECTIC of PURE PRACTICAL REASON. 
Introduction. — Of the DialeSlic of Pure Practical 
Reafon in general. 
When pure Speculative Reafon feeks the uncondi¬ 
tioned in the feries of Phenomena, and aferibes objedtive 
reality to that which is ufeful only as a regulative Prin¬ 
ciple to give fyftematic unity to the phenomena, it is al¬ 
ways diuleSic. Every member of this feries prefuppoles 
a higher condition, and no one can be received as the 
abfolutely unconditioned. Again, to confider the whole 
feries as ablolutely unconditioned is abfurd, becaufe, if 
every member be conditioned, the w'hole muft be condi¬ 
tioned ; and indeed it can never be confidered as com¬ 
pleted. 
Pure Pradtical Reafon is in this refpedt the fame. The 
highelt good is a conception of Pradtical Reafon; and 
its nature is fucli, that Reafon mult neceflarily fall into 
an 
