The Ends of Virtue

Abstract

The Doctrine of Virtue, the second part of Kant’s Metaphysics of Morals, is, without doubt, the work in which the greatest number of statements supporting the interpretation of his practical philosophy as I have presented it can be found. It is also the culminating treatment of strictly ethical questions that Kant had for many years been labouring to produce. lt is hence of prime importance in my treatment, as it was for Kant himself. In recent years, after two centuries of almost total neglect, this work has begun to receive critical attention. The nature of this attention has been such however as to concentrate primarily on ‘problems’ with this work rather than attempting to set out the prime principles underlying its architectonic. A prime reason for this has been a noted failure to reach consensus concerning this architectonic. Hence the prime task of this chapter is to present an account of the principles underlying the division of the material in this work and in the process to discuss some of the key features that come to light once this is done. I wish also to present a ‘difficulty’ of my own, a ‘difficulty’ concerning the treatment of one of the perfect duties to oneself and to trace the source of the unease I have with the treatment Kant gives to the area in question to some of the earlier statements of his position in lectures on the same area. The purpose of presenting this difficulty in the context of a chapter that is designed primarily to clear up difficulties is to begin the task of probing the resources of Kant’s treatment of ethics once this treatment has been clarified in its principles.