Literary and Philosophical Essays: French, German and Italian — Kant — John Shaqi
Literary and Philosophical Essays: French, German and Italian
Kant · en
The sensuous impulsion excludes from its subject all autonomy and
freedom; the formal impulsion excludes all dependence and passivity.
But the exclusion of freedom is physical necessity; the exclusion of
passivity is moral necessity. Thus the two impulsions subdue the
mind: the former to the laws of nature, the latter to the laws of
reason. It results from this that the instinct of play, which unites
the double action of the two other instincts, will content the mind
at once morally and physically. Hence, as it suppresses all that is
contingent, it will also suppress all coercion, and will set man
free physically and morally. When we welcome with effusion some one
who deserves our contempt, we feel painfully that nature is
constrained. When we have a hostile feeling against a person who
commands our esteem, we feel painfully the constraint of reason. But
if this person inspires us with interest, and also wins our esteem,
the constraint of feeling vanishes together with the constraint of
reason, and we begin to love him, that is to say, to play, to take
recreation, at once with our inclination and our esteem.
Moreover, as the sensuous impulsion controls us physically, and the
formal impulsion morally, the former makes our formal constitution
contingent, and the latter makes our material constitution
contingent, that is to say, there is contingence in the agreement of
our happiness with our perfection, and reciprocally. The instinct of
play, in which both act in concert, will render both our formal and
our material constitution contingent; accordingly, our perfection
and our happiness in like manner. And on the other hand, exactly
because it makes both of them contingent, and because the contingent
disappears with necessity, it will suppress this contingence in
both, and will thus give form to matter and reality to form. In
proportion that it will lessen the dynamic influence of feeling and
passion, it will place them in harmony with rational ideas, and by
taking from the laws of reason their moral constraint, it will
reconcile them with the interest of the senses.
LETTER XV.
I approach continually nearer to the end to which I lead you, by a
path offering few attractions. Be pleased to follow me a few steps
further, and a large horizon will open up to you and a delightful
prospect will reward you for the labour of the way.