KANTATA MIRABILIS

The pearls of Kantian wisdom are so unexpectedly exceptional and breathtaking that I have decided to do this entry differently from the previous selections of this nature: I am presenting Kant’s dicta here in larger quantity than normally, but at the same time with very little commentary: let them speak for themselves. Yet, despite this entry’s consequent paucity of my personal originality, I am giving it the postable status, as, surely, Kant deserves it, especially in the larger context of this Kantian series.

(Never say never, though, and it is possible that later on I shall supply my commentary no matter what…)

“Two things awe me most, the starry sky above me and the moral law within me.”

“He who is cruel to animals becomes hard also in his dealings with men. We can judge the heart of a man by his treatment of animals.”

“Immaturity is the incapacity to use one's intelligence without the guidance of another.”

“If man makes himself a worm, he must not complain when he is trodden on.”

“Experience without theory is blind, but theory without experience is mere intellectual play.”

“Always recognize that human individuals are ends, and do not use them as means to your end.”

“Do what is right, though the world may perish.” (Compare this to Nietzsche’s Fiat veritas, pereat vita.)

“So act that your principle of action might safely be made a law for the whole world.”

“Religion is the recognition of all our duties as divine commands.”

“The death of dogma is the birth of morality.”

“Perpetual Peace is only found in the graveyard.”

“It is not God's will merely that we should be happy, but that we should make ourselves happy.” (Compare this to the Jeffersonian pursuit of happiness, which acquires a new meaning with Kant.)

“May you live your life as if the maxim of your actions were to become universal law.”

“No-one can compel me to be happy in accordance with his conception of the welfare of others, for each may seek his happiness in whatever way he sees fit, so long as he does not infringe upon the freedom of others to pursue a similar end, which can be reconciled with the freedom of everyone else within a workable general law – i.e. he must accord to others the same right as he enjoys himself.”

“Intuition and concepts constitute... the elements of all our knowledge, so that neither concepts without an intuition in some way corresponding to them, nor intuition without concepts, can yield knowledge.” (When we substitute intuition and concepts by irrationality and rationality, we get the meaning of my own thesis on this subject.)

“The only objects of practical reason are therefore those of good and evil. For, by the former is meant an object necessarily desired according to a principle of reason; by the latter one necessarily shunned, also according to a principle of reason.”

“All the interests of my reason, speculative, as well as practical, combine in the three following questions: 1. What can I know? 2. What ought I to do? 3. What may I hope?”

“A categorical imperative would be one which represented an action as objectively necessary in itself, without reference to any other purpose.”

“Metaphysics is a dark ocean without shores or lighthouse, strewn with many a philosophic wreck.”

“Ingratitude is the essence of vileness.”