[168] See the _Grundlegung zur Metaphysik der Sitten_ (pp. 269-273, Hartenstein; Abbott’s transl. [1879] pp. 54-61). Here Kant first says, “There is therefore but one categorical imperative, namely, this: _Act only on that maxim whereby thou canst at the same time will that it should become a universal law_. Now, if all imperatives of duty can be deduced from this one imperative as from their principle ... we shall at least be able to show what we understand by [duty] and what this notion means.” He then demonstrates the application of the principle to four cases, selected as representative of “the many actual duties”; and continues: “if now we attend to ourselves on occasion of any transgression of duty, we shall find that we in fact do not will that our maxim should be a universal law, for that is impossible for us” ...: then, summing up the conclusion of this part of his argument, he says, “we have exhibited clearly and definitely for _every practical application_ the content of the categorical imperative which must contain the principle of all duty, if there is such a thing at all.” [169] I do not mean that I am prepared to accept Kant’s fundamental maxim, in the precise form in which he has stated it: but the qualifications which it seems to me to require will be more conveniently explained later. [170] See Book i. chap. iii. p. 32. [171] I cannot doubt that every one of our cognitive faculties,--in short the human mind as a whole,--has been derived and developed, through a gradual process of physical change, out of some lower life in which cognition, properly speaking, had no place. On this view, the distinction between ‘original’ and ‘derived’ reduces itself to that between ‘prior’ and ‘posterior’ in development: and the fact that the moral faculty appears somewhat later in the process of evolution than other faculties can hardly be regarded as an argument against the validity of moral intuition; especially since this process is commonly conceived to be homogeneous throughout. Indeed such a line of reasoning would be suicidal; as the cognition that the moral faculty is developed is certainly later in development than moral cognition, and would therefore, by this reasoning, be less trustworthy. CHAPTER II VIRTUE AND DUTY