GUIDE TO THE PHILOSOPHY 1938 - 1947.pdf - Rare Books at ...

OBJECTIVE INTUITIONISM 213
not blind us to the existence of this natural tendency to
pursue what Socrates would have called the Good.
The truth that wrong conduct requires an incentive,
right conduct none, illustrates and reinforces Kant's distinction
between the categorical and the hypothetical
imperatives. The moral law, as he would say, takes no
account of it is consequences; obeyed, when it is obeyed,
for its own sake, whereas action prompted by desire always
has in view the achievement ofsome end beyond the action.
Criticism of Kant's Moral Theory.
(i) THAT KANT GIVES.NO GUIDE TO DUTY. A general
criticism of the doctrines which objective-intuitionists hold
in common will be found in Chapter VIII. The views of
Kant are, however, so distinctive that they are entitled to
consideration in their own right, apart from the general
doctrines which they exemplify. Of the many serious
objections to which Kant's moral theory is exposed, the
majority are in the nature of criticisms of his general
metaphysical position, with its sharp separation between
the world of things as they are and the world of things
as they appear, rather than of his ethical doctrines proper.
These it is beyond the scope of the present book to discuss, 1
yet, since the ethical theory entails the metaphysical, they
are in truth criticisms of the one no less than of the other.
Other criticisms, however, apply specifically to the
ethical doctrine. Three of these may be mentioned.
In an earlier
1
chapter, 1 urged that the problem of ethics
is a double one; there is the problem of how to do your
duty, and the problem of how to find out what your duty
is. In the discussion referred to, I criticized Socrates's
doctrine that virtue is knowledge on the ground that,
while it made ample provision for the recognition of the
Good, it did not deal with the problem of our frequent
failure to pursue the Good that we recognize; that, in
1 Some account of them will be found in my Gmd* to Philosopip,
Chapter XIV. *
1 Chapter II, pp. 42-46.