oth set an end outside of
man himself as the basis of their ethical doctrine. Kant was
dissatisfied with this explanation of the moral life. The question,
therefore, which arises is, Whence comes the idea of duty which is an
undeniable fact of our experience? If it came merely from without, it
could never speak to us with absolute authority, nor claim unquestioning
obedience. That which comes from without depends for its justification
upon some consequence external to our action, and must be based, indeed,
upon some excitement of reward or pain. But that would destroy it as a
moral good; since nothing can be morally good that is not pursued for its
own sake. Kant, therefore, seeks to show that the law of the moral life
must originate within us, must spring from an inherent principle of our
own rational nature. Hence the distinctive feature of Kant's moral
theory is the enunciation of the 'Categorical Imperative'--the supreme
inner demand of reason. From this principle of autonomy there arise at
once the notions of man's freedom and the law's {112} universality.
Self-determination is the presupposition of all morality. But what is
true for one is true for all. Each man is a member of a rational order,
and possesses the inalienable independence and the moral dignity of being
an end in himself. Hence the formula of all duty is, 'Act from a maxim
at all times fit to be a universal law.'

It is the merit of Kant that he has given clear expression to the majesty
of the moral law. No thinker has more strongly asserted man's spiritual
nature or done more to free the ideal of duty from all individual
narrowness and selfish interest. But Kant's principle of duty labours
under the defect, that while it determines the form, it tells us nothing
of the content of duty. We learn from him the grandeur of the moral law,
but not its essence or motive-power. He does not clearly explain what it
is in the inner nature of man that gives to obligation its universal
validity or even its dominating force. As a recent writer truly says,
'In order that morality may be possible at all, its law must be realised
_in_ me, but while the way in which it is realised is mine, the content
is not mine; otherwise the whole conception of obligation is
destroyed.'[13] If the soul's function is purely formal how can we
attain to a self-contained life? Moreover, if the freedom which Kant
assigns to man is really to achieve a higher ideal and br