Aesthetical and philosophical essays : $b introducing the dissertation on the "connection between the animal and spiritual man"Schiller, Friedrich
Philosophy
Aesthetical and philosophical essays : $b introducing the dissertation on the "connection between the animal and spiritual man"
Schiller, Friedrich
Aesthetics; Philosophy
In the same way that our being consists of two principles and natures,
so also and consequently our feelings are divided into two kinds,
entirely different. As reasonable beings we experience a feeling of
approbation or of disapprobation; as sensuous creatures we experience
pleasure or displeasure. The two feelings, approbation and pleasure,
repose on satisfaction: one on a satisfaction given to a requirement of
reason—reason has only requirements, and not wants. The other depends on
a satisfaction given to a sensuous want—sense only knows of wants, and
cannot prescribe anything. These two terms—requirements of reason, wants
of the senses—are mutually related, as absolute necessity and the
necessity of nature. Accordingly, both are included in the idea of
necessity, but with this difference, that the necessity of reason is
unconditional, and the necessity of sense only takes place under
conditions. But, for both, satisfaction is a purely contingent thing.
Accordingly every feeling, whether of pleasure or approbation, rests
definitively on an agreement between the contingent and the necessary.
If the necessary has thus an imperative character, the feeling
experienced will be that of approbation. If necessity has the character
of a want, the feeling experienced will be that of pleasure, and both
will be strong in proportion as the satisfaction will be contingent.
Now, underlying every moral judgment there is a requirement of reason
which requires us to act conformably with the moral law, and it is an
absolute necessity that we should wish what is good. But as the will is
free, it is physically an accidental thing that we should do in fact
what is good. If we actually do it, this agreement between the
contingent in the use of free will and the imperative demand of reason
gives rise to our assent or approbation, which will be greater in
proportion as the resistance of the inclinations made this use that we
make of our free will more accidental and more doubtful. Every æsthetic
judgment, on the contrary, refers the object to the necessity which
cannot help willing imperatively, but only desires that there should be
an agreement between the accidental and its own interest. Now what is
the interest of imagination? It is to emancipate itself from all laws,
and to play its part freely. The obligation imposed on the will by the
moral law, which prescribes its object in the strictest manner, is by no
means favorable to this need of independence. And as the moral
obligation of the will is the object of the moral judgment, it is clear
that in this mode of judging, the imagination could not find its
interest. But a moral obligation imposed on the will cannot be
conceived, except by supposing this same will absolutely independent of
the moral instincts and from their constraint. Accordingly the
_possibility_ of the moral act requires liberty, and therefore agrees
here in the most perfect manner with the interest of imagination. But as
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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