Immanuel Kant's Critique of Pure Reason — trans. F. Max Müller

ends. As a condition, therefore, of, it may be, a contingent, but not unimportant end, namely, in order to have a guidance in the investigation of nature, it is necessary to admit a wise author of the world. The result of my experiment confirms the usefulness of this supposition so many times, while nothing decisive can be adduced against it, that I am really saying far too little, if I call my acceptation of it a mere opinion, and it may be said, even with regard to these theoretical matters, that I firmly believe in God. Still, if we use our words strictly, this belief must always be called doctrinal, and not practical, such as the theology of nature (physical theology) must al- [p. ^2'j'\ ways and necessarily produce. In the same wisdom, and in the prominent endowments of human nature, combined with the inadequate shortness of life,- another sufficient ground may'be found for the doctrinal belief in the future life of the human soul.

The expression of belief is in such cases an expression of modesty from the objective point of view, and yet, at the same time, a firm confidence from a snbjective. If even I were to call this purely theoretical acceptance an hypothesis only, which I am entitled to assume, I should profess to be in possession of a more complete concept of the nature of a cause of the world, and of another world, than I really can produce. If I accept anything, even as an hypothesis only, I must know it at least so much according to its properties, that I need not imagine its concepts^ but its existence only. But the word belief refers only to the guidance which an idea gives me, and to its subjective influence on the conduct of my reason, which makes me hold it fast, though I may not be able to give an account of it from a speculative point of view.

664 Carton of Picre Reason

Purely doctrinal belief, however, has always a somewhat unstable character. Speculative difficulties often make us lose hold of it, though in the end we always [p. 828] return to it.

It is quite different with moral belief. For here action is absolutely necessary, that is, I must obey the moral law on all points. The end is here firmly established, and, according to all we know, one only condition is possible under which that end could agree with all other ends, and thus acquire practical validity, namely, the existence of a God and of a future world. I also know it for certain that no one is cognisant of other conditions which could lead to the same unity of ends under the moral law. As, then, • the moral precept is at the same time my maxim, reason commanding that it should be so, I shall inevitably believe in the existence of God, and in a future lif^, and I feel certain that nothing can shake this belief, because all my moral principles would be overthrown at the same time, and I cannot surrender them without becoming hateful in my own eyes.

We see, therefore, that, even after the failure of all the ambitious schemes of reason to pass beyond the limits of all experience, enough remains to make us satisfied for practical purposes. No one, no doubt, will be able to boast again that he kriows that there is a God and a future life. For a man who knows that, is the very man [p. 829] whom I have been so long in search of. As all knowledge, if it refers to an object of pure reason, can be communicated, I might hope that, through his teaching, my own knowledge would be increased in the most wonderful way. No, that conviction is not a logical, but a moral certainty ; and, as it rests on subjective grounds (of the moral sentiCanon of Pure Reason 665 ment), I must not even say that it is morally certain that there is a God, etc., but that / am morally certain, etc. What I really mean is, that the belief in a God and in another world is so interwoven with my moral sentiment, that as there is little danger of my losing the latter, there is quite as little fear lest I should ever be deprived of the former.

The only point that may rouse misgivings is that this rational belief is based on the supposition of moral sentiments. If we surrender this, and take a man who is entirely indifferent with regard to moral laws, the question proposed by reason becomes merely a problem for speculation, and may in that case be still supported with strong grounds from analogy, but not such to which the most obstinate scepticism has to submit.^