“Yes; there is sense,” I hear it said. “Just as it may be that the target is not the thing to be hit at all, either by aiming directly or indirectly at it, but that some other thing is to be hit; so it may be that the thing to be achieved immediately or remotely is not happiness at all, but some other thing: the other thing being duty.” In answer to this the admonished man may reasonably say:—“What then is meant by Kant’s statement that the man who pursues happiness ‘fails of true satisfaction’? All happiness is made up of satisfactions. The ‘true satisfaction’ which Kant offers as an alternative, must be some kind of happiness; and if a truer satisfaction, must be a better happiness; and better must mean on the average, and in the long run, greater. If this ‘true satisfaction’ does not mean greater happiness of self,—distant if not proximate, in another life if not in this life—and if it does not mean greater happiness by achieving the happiness of others; then you propose to me as an end a smaller happiness instead of a greater, and I decline it.” So that in this professed repudiation of happiness as an end, there lies the inavoidable implication that it _is_ the end. * * * * * The last consideration introduces us naturally to another of Kant’s cardinal doctrines. That there may be no mistake in my representation of it, I must make a long quotation. “I omit here all actions which are already recognized as inconsistent with duty, although they may be useful for this or that purpose, for with these the question whether they are done _from duty_ cannot arise at all, since they even conflict with it. I also set aside those actions which really conform to {210} duty, but to which men have _no_ direct _inclination_, performing them because they are impelled thereto by some other inclination. For in this case we can readily distinguish whether the action which agrees with duty is done _from duty_, or from a selfish view. It is much harder to make this distinction when the action accords with duty, and the subject has besides a _direct_ inclination to it. For example, it is always a matter of duty that a dealer should not overcharge an inexperienced purchaser, and wherever there is much commerce the prudent tradesman does not overcharge, but keeps a fixed price for every one, so that a child buys of him as well as any other. Men are thus _honestly_ served; but this is not enough to make us believe that the tradesman has so acted from duty and from principles of honesty: his own advantage required it; it is out of the question in this case to suppose that he might besides have a direct inclination in favour of the buyers, so that, as it were, from love he should give no advantage to one over another [!]. Accordingly the action was done neither from duty nor from direct inclination, but merely with a selfish view. On the other hand, it is a duty to maintain one’s life; and, in addition,