Excerpt from The Formal and Material Elements of Kant's Ethics The primal fact that strikes one in Kant's Ethics, leaving out of view the fact that they are a necessary part of his complete method, is that he is thoroughly animated by the spirit of Stoicism; and that further, in this spirit, he is aiming more particularly at a refutation of the contemporary sensationalistic schools. In accomplishing the double object called forth by these two facts, and in fitting his doctrines into the terminology of the critical method, he had the misfortune to express himself in terms peculiar to Logic; thereby provoking a merely logical refutation, and one, on that account, often wide of the mark and quite blind to the ethical truth conveyed. The terminology thus adopted was that by which the elements of a science are classed under one of the two heads of Form or Matter. This division served Kant doubly thus: it allowed him to distinguish as the Greeks had done, between Reason, Will and Spirit on the one hand, and Sense, Impulse, Matter and Body on the other; at the same time by advocating an ethics of "form," he showed that he regarded the moral law as a product of Reasomin contrast to the Moral Sense foundation of the English scnool. For, he thought, Ethics must proceed from reason; and to be Ethics, must give a law, the a priori product of pure reason; and which, therefore, can be only the mere concept or form of a law. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

If there exists on any subject a philosophy (that is, a system of rational knowledge based on concepts), then there must also be for this philosophy a system of pure rational concepts, independent of any condition of intuition; in other words, a metaphysic. It may be asked whether metaphysical elements are required also for every practical philosophy, which is the doctrine of duties, and therefore also for Ethics.

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"Kant's Science of right ... was published in 1796, as the first part of his Metaphysic of morals, the ... sequel and completion of the Foundation for a metaphysic of morals, published in 1785."--Pref.

Fundamental Principles of the Metaphysics of Morals, also known as the Groundwork of the Metaphysic of Morals, is the first of Immanuel Kant's mature works on moral philosophy and remains one of the most influential in the field. Kant conceives his investigation as a work of foundational ethics—one that clears the ground for future research by explaining the core concepts and principles of moral theory and showing that they are normative for rational agents. Kant aspires to nothing less than this: to lay bare the fundamental principle of morality and show that it applies to us. The Metaphysics of Morals is a work of political and moral philosophy by Immanuel Kant. The work is divided into two main parts, "The Science of Right, which deals with the rights that people have or can acquire, and the Doctrine of Virtue, which deals with the virtues they ought to acquire." The Critique of Practical Reason is the second of Immanuel Kant's three critiques and deals with his moral philosophy. Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) was a German philosopher, who, according to the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy is "the central figure of modern philosophy." Kant argued that fundamental concepts of the human mind structure human experience, that reason is the source of morality, that aesthetics arises from a faculty of disinterested judgment, that space and time are forms of our understanding, and that the world as it is "in-itself" is unknowable. Contents: Fundamental Principles of the Metaphysic of Morals The Metaphysics of Morals Philosophy of Law (The Science of Right) The Metaphysical Elements of Ethics The Critique of Practical Reason: Theory of Moral Reasoning Perpetual Peace

"This book is a reader's guide to Kant's final work in moral philosophy, The Doctrine of Virtue - Part II of the 1797 Metaphysics of Morals. The guide has 5 parts plus a conclusion. Part I "Background" includes two chapters: 1. "Life and Work" and 2. "Philosophical Background." Part II, "General Introduction to the Metaphysics of Morals" covers the introduction to the entire work whose content is crucial for understanding the text. This part contains three chapters: 3. "On the Idea of and Necessity for a Metaphysics of Morals", 4. Mental Faculties, the Moral Law, and Human Motivation," and 5. "Preliminary Concepts and Division of the Metaphysics of Morals." Part III, "Introduction to the Doctrine of Virtue," includes four chapters that cover Kant's dedicated introduction to the Doctrine of Virtue: 6. "The Doctrine of Virtue as a Doctrine of Ends," 7. "General Ends that are also Duties," 8. Radical Evil and the Nature of Virtue," and 9. "The Science of Ethics." Part IV is devoted to Kant's system of duties of virtue that represents his normative ethical theory. It contains five chapters: 10. "Perfect Duties to Oneself as an Animal Being," 11. "Perfect Duties to Oneself as a Moral Being," 12. Imperfect Duties to Oneself," 13. "Duties of Love to Other Human Beings," 14. "The Vices of Hatred and Disrespect," and 15. "Friendship." Part V "The Doctrine of Methods of Ethics and Conclusion" includes chapter 16 "Moral Education and Practice." The book's conclusion reflects on the significance of the Doctrine of Virtue for understanding Kant's ethics"--