Chapter 9 of 9 · 9561 words · ~48 min read

Part II

., Sect. IX.) [Tr.]

The Terminus of morals does not yield to Jupiter, the Terminus of force; for the latter remains beneath the sway of Fate. In other words, reason is not sufficiently enlightened to survey the series of predetermining causes which would make it possible for us to predict with certainty the good or bad results of human action, as they follow from the mechanical laws of nature; although we may hope that things will turn out as we should desire. But what we have to do, in order to remain in the path of duty guided by the rules of wisdom, reason makes everywhere perfectly clear, and does this for the purpose of furthering her ultimate ends.

The practical man, however, for whom morals is mere theory, even while admitting that what ought to be can be, bases his dreary verdict against our well-meant hopes really on this: he pretends that he can foresee from his observation of human nature, that men will never be willing to do what is required in order to bring about the wished-for results leading to perpetual peace. It is true that the will of all individual men to live under a legal constitution according to the principles of liberty—that is to say, the distributive unity of the wills of all—is not sufficient to attain this end. We must have the collective unity of their united will: all as a body must determine these new conditions. The solution of this difficult problem is required in order that civil society should be a whole. To all this diversity of individual wills there must come a uniting cause, in order to produce a common will which no distributive will is able to give. Hence, in the practical realisation of that idea, no other beginning of a law-governed society can be counted upon than one that is brought about by force: upon this force, too, public law afterwards rests. This state of things certainly prepares us to meet considerable deviation in actual experience from the theoretical idea of perpetual peace, since we cannot take into account the moral character and disposition of a law-giver in this connection, or expect that, after he has united a wild multitude into one people, he will leave it to them to bring about a legal constitution by their common will.

It amounts to this. Any ruler who has once got the power in his hands will not let the people dictate laws for him. A state which enjoys an independence of the control of external law will not submit to the judgment of the tribunals of other states, when it has to consider how to obtain its rights against them. And even a continent, when it feels its superiority to another, whether this be in its way or not, will not fail to take advantage of an opportunity offered of strengthening its power by the spoliation or even conquest of this territory. Hence all theoretical schemes, connected with constitutional, international or cosmopolitan law, crumble away into empty impracticable ideals. While, on the other hand, a practical science, based on the empirical principles of human nature, which does not disdain to model its maxims on an observation of actual life, can alone hope to find a sure foundation on which to build up a system of national policy.

Now certainly, if there is neither freedom nor a moral law founded upon it, and every actual or possible event happens in the mere mechanical course of nature, then politics, as the art of making use of this physical necessity in things for the government of men, is the whole of practical wisdom and the idea of right is an empty concept. If, on the other hand, we find that this idea of right is necessarily to be conjoined with politics and even to be raised to the position of a limiting condition of that science, then the possibility of reconciling them must be admitted. I can thus imagine a moral politician, that is to say, one who understands the principles of statesmanship to be such as do not conflict with morals; but I cannot conceive of a political moralist who fashions for himself such a system of ethics as may serve the interest of statesmen.

The moral politician will always act upon the following principle:—“If certain defects which could not have been avoided are found in the political constitution or foreign relations of a state, it is a duty for all, especially for the rulers of the state, to apply their whole energy to correcting them as soon as possible, and to bringing the constitution and political relations on these points into conformity with the Law of Nature, as it is held up as a model before us in the idea of reason; and this they should do even at a sacrifice of their own interest.” Now it is contrary to all politics—which is, in this particular, in agreement with morals—to dissever any of the links binding citizens together in the state or nations in cosmopolitan union, before a better constitution is there to take the place of what has been thus destroyed. And hence it would be absurd indeed to demand that every imperfection in political matters must be violently altered on the spot. But, at the same time, it may be required of a ruler at least that he should earnestly keep the maxim in mind which points to the necessity of such a change; so that he may go on constantly approaching the end to be realised, namely, the best possible constitution according to the laws of right. Even although it is still under despotic rule, in accordance with its constitution as then existing, a state may govern itself on republican lines, until the people gradually become capable of being influenced by the mere idea of the authority of law, just as if it had physical power. And they become accordingly capable of self-legislation, their faculty for which is founded on original right. But if, through the violence of revolution, the product of a bad government, a constitution more in accord with the spirit of law were attained even by unlawful means, it should no longer be held justifiable to bring the people back to the old constitution, although, while the revolution was going on, every one who took part in it by use of force or stratagem, may have been justly punished as a rebel. As regards the external relations of nations, a state cannot be asked to give up its constitution, even although that be a despotism (which is, at the same time, the strongest constitution where foreign enemies are concerned), so long as it runs the risk of being immediately swallowed up by other states. Hence, when such a proposal is made, the state whose constitution is in question must at least be allowed to defer acting upon it until a more convenient time.[148]

[148] These are _permissive_ laws of reason which allow us to leave a system of public law, when it is tainted by injustice, to remain just as it is, until everything is entirely revolutionised through an internal development, either spontaneous, or fostered and matured by peaceful influences. For any legal constitution whatsoever, even although it conforms only slightly with the spirit of law is better than none at all—that is to say, anarchy, which is the fate of a precipitate reform. Hence, as things now are, the wise politician will look upon it as his duty to make reforms on the lines marked out by the ideal of public law. He will not use revolutions, when these have been brought about by natural causes, to extenuate still greater oppression than caused them, but will regard them as the voice of nature, calling upon him to make such thorough reforms as will bring about the only lasting constitution, a lawful constitution based on the principles of freedom.

It is always possible that moralists who rule despotically, and are at a loss in practical matters, will come into collision with the rules of political wisdom in many ways, by adopting measures without sufficient deliberation which show themselves afterwards to have been overestimated. When they thus offend against nature, experience must gradually lead them into a better track. But, instead of this being the case, politicians who are fond of moralising do all they can to make moral improvement impossible and to perpetuate violations of law, by extenuating political principles which are antagonistic to the idea of right, on the pretext that human nature is not capable of good, in the sense of the ideal which reason prescribes.

These politicians, instead of adopting an open, straightforward way of doing things (as they boast), mix themselves up in intrigue. They get at the authorities in power and say what will please them; their sole bent is to sacrifice the nation, or even, if they can, the whole world, with the one end in view that their own private interest may be forwarded. This is the manner of regular jurists (I mean the journeyman lawyer not the legislator), when they aspire to politics. For, as it is not their business to reason too nicely over legislation, but only to enforce the laws of the country, every legal constitution in its existing form and, when this is changed by the proper authorities, the one which takes its place, will always seem to them the best possible. And the consequence is that everything is purely mechanical. But this adroitness in suiting themselves to any circumstances may lead them to the delusion that they are also capable of giving an opinion about the principles of political constitutions in general, in so far as they conform to ideas of right, and are therefore not empirical, but _a priori_. And they may therefore brag about their knowledge of men,—which indeed one expects to find, since they have to deal with so many—without really knowing the nature of man and what can be made of it, to gain which knowledge a higher standpoint of anthropological observation than theirs is required. Filled with ideas of this kind, if they trespass outside their own sphere on the boundaries of political and international law, looked upon as ideals which reason holds before us, they can do so only in the spirit of chicanery. For they will follow their usual method of making everything conform mechanically to compulsory laws despotically made and enforced, even here, where the ideas of reason recognise the validity of a legal compulsory force, only when it is in accordance with the principles of freedom through which a permanently valid constitution becomes first of all possible. The would-be practical man, leaving out of account this idea of reason, thinks that he can solve this problem empirically by looking to the way in which those constitutions which have best survived the test of time were established, even although the spirit of these may have been generally contrary to the idea of right. The principles which he makes use of here, although indeed he does not make them public, amount pretty much to the following sophistical maxims.

1. =Fac et excusa.= Seize the most favourable opportunity for arbitrary usurpation—either of the authority of the state over its own people or over a neighbouring people; the justification of the act and extenuation of the use of force will come much more easily and gracefully, when the deed is done, than if one has to think out convincing reasons for taking this step and first hear through all the objections which can be made against it. This is especially true in the first case mentioned, where the supreme power in the state also controls the legislature which we must obey without any reasoning about it. Besides, this show of audacity in a statesman even lends him a certain semblance of inward conviction of the justice of his action; and once he has got so far the god of success (_bonus eventus_) is his best advocate.

2. =Si fecisti, nega.= As for any crime you have committed, such as has, for instance, brought your people to despair and thence to insurrection, deny that it has happened owing to any fault of yours. Say rather that it is all caused by the insubordination of your subjects, or, in the case of your having usurped a neighbouring state, that human nature is to blame; for, if a man is not ready to use force and steal a march upon his neighbour, he may certainly count on the latter forestalling him and taking him prisoner.

3. =Divide et impera.= That is to say, if there are certain privileged persons, holding authority among the people, who have merely chosen you for their sovereign as _primus inter pares_, bring about a quarrel among them, and make mischief between them and the people. Now back up the people with a dazzling promise of greater freedom; everything will now depend unconditionally on your will. Or again, if there is a difficulty with foreign states, then to stir up dissension among them is a pretty sure means of subjecting first one and then the other to your sway, under the pretext of aiding the weaker.

It is true that now-a-days no body is taken in by these political maxims, for they are all familiar to everyone. Moreover, there is no need of being ashamed of them, as if their injustice were too patent. For the great Powers never feel shame before the judgment of the common herd, but only before one another; so that as far as this matter goes, it is not the revelation of these guiding principles of policy that can make rulers ashamed, but only the unsuccessful use of them. For as to the morality of these maxims, politicians are all agreed. Hence there is always left political prestige on which they can safely count; and this means the glory of increasing their power by any means that offer.[149]

[149] It is still sometimes denied that we find, in members of a civilised community, a certain depravity rooted in the nature of man;[C] and it might, indeed, be alleged with some show of truth that not an innate corruptness in human nature, but the barbarism of men, the defect of a not yet sufficiently developed culture, is the cause of the evident antipathy to law which their attitude indicates. In the external relations of states, however, human wickedness shows itself incontestably, without any attempt at concealment. Within the state, it is covered over by the compelling authority of civil laws. For, working against the tendency every citizen has to commit acts of violence against his neighbour, there is the much stronger force of the government which not only gives an appearance of morality to the whole state (_causae non causae_), but, by checking the outbreak of lawless propensities, actually aids the moral qualities of men considerably, in their development of a direct respect for the law. For every individual thinks that he himself would hold the idea of right sacred and follow faithfully what it prescribes, if only he could expect that everyone else would do the same. This guarantee is in part given to him by the government; and a great advance is made by this step which is not deliberately moral, towards the ideal of fidelity to the concept of duty for its own sake without thought of return. As, however, every man’s good opinion of himself presupposes an evil disposition in everyone else, we have an expression of their mutual judgment of one another, namely, that when it comes to hard facts, none of them are worth much; but whence this judgment comes remains unexplained, as we cannot lay the blame on the nature of man, since he is a being in the possession of freedom. The respect for the idea of right, of which it is absolutely impossible for man to divest himself, sanctions in the most solemn manner the theory of our power to conform to its dictates. And hence every man sees himself obliged to act in accordance with what the idea of right prescribes, whether his neighbours fulfil their obligation or not.

[C] This depravity of human nature is denied by Rousseau, who held that the mind of man was naturally inclined to virtue, and that good civil and social institutions are all that is required. (_Discourse on the Sciences and Arts_, 1750.) Kant here takes sides with Hobbes against Rousseau. See Kant’s _Theory of Ethics_, Abbott’s trans. (4th ed., 1889), p. 339 _seq._—esp. p. 341 and _note_. Cf. also Hooker’s _Ecclesiastical Polity_, I. § 10:—“Laws politic, ordained for external order and regiment amongst men, are never framed as they should be, unless presuming the will of man to be inwardly obstinate, rebellious, and averse from all obedience to the sacred laws of his nature; in a word, unless presuming man to be, in regard of his depraved mind, little better than a wild beast, they do accordingly provide, notwithstanding, so to frame his outward actions, that they be no hindrance unto the common good, for which societies are instituted.” [Tr.]

* * * * *

In all these twistings and turnings of an immoral doctrine of expediency which aims at substituting a state of peace for the warlike conditions in which men are placed by nature, so much at least is clear;—that men cannot get away from the idea of right in their private any more than in their public relations; and that they do not dare (this is indeed most strikingly seen in the concept of an international law) to base politics merely on the manipulations of expediency and therefore to refuse all obedience to the idea of a public right. On the contrary, they pay all fitting honour to the idea of right in itself, even although they should, at the same time, devise a hundred subterfuges and excuses to avoid it in practice, and should regard force, backed up by cunning, as having the authority which comes from being the source and unifying principle of all right. It will be well to put an end to this sophistry, if not to the injustice it extenuates, and to bring the false advocates of the mighty of the earth to confess that it is not right but might in whose interest they speak, and that it is the worship of might from which they take their cue, as if in this matter they had a right to command. In order to do this, we must first expose the delusion by which they deceive themselves and others; then discover the ultimate principle from which their plans for a perpetual peace proceed; and thence show that all the evil which stands in the way of the realisation of that ideal springs from the fact that the political moralist begins where the moral politician rightly ends and that, by subordinating principles to an end or putting the cart before the horse, he defeats his intention of bringing politics into harmony with morals.

In order to make practical philosophy consistent with itself, we must first decide the following question:—In dealing with the problems of practical reason must we begin from its material principle—the end as the object of free choice—or from its formal principle which is based merely on freedom in its external relation?—from which comes the following law:—“Act so that thou canst will that thy maxim should be a universal law, be the end of thy action what it will.”[150]

[150] With regard to the meaning of the moral law and its significance in the Kantian system of ethics, see Abbott’s translation of the _Theory of Ethics_ (1889), pp. 38, 45, 54, 55, 119, 282. [Tr.]

Without doubt, the latter determining principle of action must stand first; for, as a principle of right, it carries unconditional necessity with it, whereas the former is obligatory only if we assume the empirical conditions of the end set before us,—that is to say, that it is an end capable of being practically realised. And if this end—as, for example, the end of perpetual peace—should be also a duty, this same duty must necessarily have been deduced from the formal principle governing the maxims which guide external action. Now the first principle is the principle of the political moralist; the problems of constitutional, international and cosmopolitan law are mere technical problems (_problema technicum_). The second or formal principle, on the other hand, as the principle of the moral politician who regards it as a moral problem (_problema morale_), differs widely from the other principle in its methods of bringing about perpetual peace, which we desire not only as a material good, but also as a state of things resulting from our recognition of the precepts of duty.[151]

[151] See Abbott’s trans., pp. 33, 34. [Tr.]

To solve the first problem—that, namely, of political expediency—much knowledge of nature is required, that her mechanical laws may be employed for the end in view. And yet the result of all knowledge of this kind is uncertain, as far as perpetual peace is concerned. This we find to be so, whichever of the three departments of public law we take. It is uncertain whether a people could be better kept in obedience and at the same time prosperity by severity or by baits held out to their vanity; whether they would be better governed under the sovereignty of a single individual or by the authority of several acting together; whether the combined authority might be better secured merely, say, by an official nobility or by the power of the people within the state; and, finally, whether such conditions could be long maintained. There are examples to the contrary in history in the case of all forms of government, with the exception of the only true republican constitution, the idea of which can occur only to a moral politician. Still more uncertain is a law of nations, ostensibly established upon statutes devised by ministers; for this amounts in fact to mere empty words, and rests on treaties which, in the very act of ratification, contain a secret reservation of the right to violate them. On the other hand, the solution of the second problem—the problem of political wisdom—forces itself, we may say, upon us; it is quite obvious to every one, and puts all crooked dealings to shame; it leads, too, straight to the desired end, while at the same time, discretion warns us not to drag in the conditions of perpetual peace by force, but to take time and approach this ideal gradually as favourable circumstances permit.

This may be expressed in the following maxim:—“Seek ye first the kingdom of pure practical reason and its righteousness, and the object of your endeavour, the blessing of perpetual peace, will be added unto you.” For the science of morals generally has this peculiarity,—and it has it also with regard to the moral principles of public law, and therefore with regard to a science of politics knowable _a priori_,—that the less it makes a man’s conduct depend on the end he has set before him, his purposed material or moral gain, so much the more, nevertheless, does it conform in general to this end. The reason for this is that it is just the universal will, given _a priori_, which exists in a people or in the relation of different peoples to one another, that alone determines what is lawful among men. This union of individual wills, however, if we proceed consistently in practice, in observance of the mechanical laws of nature, may be at the same time the cause of bringing about the result intended and practically realizing the idea of right. Hence it is, for example, a principle of moral politics that a people should unite into a state according to the only valid concepts of right, the ideas of freedom and equality; and this principle is not based on expediency, but upon duty. Political moralists, however, do not deserve a hearing, much and sophistically as they may reason about the existence, in a multitude of men forming a society, of certain natural tendencies which would weaken those principles and defeat their intention. They may endeavour to prove their assertion by giving instances of badly organised constitutions, chosen both from ancient and modern times, (as, for example, democracies without a representative system); but such arguments are to be treated with contempt, all the more, because a pernicious theory of this kind may perhaps even bring about the evil which it prophesies. For, in accordance with such reasoning, man is thrown into a class with all other living machines which only require the consciousness that they are not free creatures to make them in their own judgment the most miserable of all beings.

_Fiat justitia, pereat mundus._ This saying has become proverbial, and although it savours a little of boastfulness, is also true. We may translate it thus:—“Let justice rule on earth, although all the rogues in the world should go to the bottom.” It is a good, honest principle of right cutting off all the crooked ways made by knavery or violence. It must not, however, be misunderstood as allowing anyone to exercise his own rights with the utmost severity, a course in contradiction to our moral duty; but we must take it to signify an obligation, binding upon rulers, to refrain from refusing to yield anyone his rights or from curtailing them, out of personal feeling or sympathy for others. For this end, in particular, we require, firstly, that a state should have an internal political constitution, established according to the pure principles of right; secondly, that a union should be formed between this state and neighbouring or distant nations for a legal settlement of their differences, after the analogy of the universal state. This proposition means nothing more than this:—Political maxims must not start from the idea of a prosperity and happiness which are to be expected from observance of such precepts in every state; that is, not from the end which each nation makes the object of its will as the highest empirical principle of political wisdom; but they must set out from the pure concept of the duty of right, from the “_ought_” whose principle is given _a priori_ through pure reason. This is the law, whatever the material consequences may be. The world will certainly not perish by any means, because the number of wicked people in it is becoming fewer. The morally bad has one peculiarity, inseparable from its nature;—in its purposes, especially in relation to other evil influences, it is in contradiction with itself, and counteracts its own natural effect, and thus makes room for the moral principle of good, although advance in this direction may be slow.

Hence objectively, in theory, there is no quarrel between morals and politics. But subjectively, in the self-seeking tendencies of men (which we cannot actually call their morality, as we would a course of action based on maxims of reason,) this disagreement in principle exists and may always survive; for it serves as a whetstone to virtue. According to the principle, _Tu ne cede malis, sed contra audentior ito_, the true courage of virtue in the present case lies not so much in facing the evils and self-sacrifices which must be met here as in firmly confronting the evil principle in our own nature and conquering its wiles. For this is a principle far more dangerous, false, treacherous and sophistical which puts forward the weakness in human nature as a justification for every transgression.

In fact the political moralist may say that a ruler and people, or nation and nation do _one another_ no wrong, when they enter on a war with violence or cunning, although they do wrong, generally speaking, in refusing to respect the idea of right which alone could establish peace for all time. For, as both are equally wrongly disposed to one another, each transgressing the duty he owes to his neighbour, they are both quite rightly served, when they are thus destroyed in war. This mutual destruction stops short at the point of extermination, so that there are always enough of the race left to keep this game going on through all the ages, and a far-off posterity may take warning by them. The Providence that orders the course of the world is hereby justified. For the moral principle in mankind never becomes extinguished, and human reason, fitted for the practical realisation of ideas of right according to that principle, grows continually in fitness for that purpose with the ever advancing march of culture; while at the same time, it must be said, the guilt of transgression increases as well. But it seems that, by no theodicy or vindication of the justice of God, can we justify Creation in putting such a race of corrupt creatures into the world at all, if, that is, we assume that the human race neither will nor can ever be in a happier condition than it is now. This standpoint, however, is too high a one for us to judge from, or to theorise, with the limited concepts we have at our command, about the wisdom of that supreme Power which is unknowable by us. We are inevitably driven to such despairing conclusions as these, if we do not admit that the pure principles of right have objective reality—that is to say, are capable of being practically realised—and consequently that action must be taken on the part of the people of a state and, further, by states in relation to one another, whatever arguments empirical politics may bring forward against this course. Politics in the real sense cannot take a step forward without first paying homage to the principles of morals. And, although politics, _per se_, is a difficult art,[152] in its union with morals no art is required; for in the case of a conflict arising between the two sciences, the moralist can cut asunder the knot which politics is unable to untie. Right must be held sacred by man, however great the cost and sacrifice to the ruling power. Here is no half-and-half course. We cannot devise a happy medium between right and expediency, a right pragmatically conditioned. But all politics must bend the knee to the principle of right, and may, in that way, hope to reach, although slowly perhaps, a level whence it may shine upon men for all time.

[152] Matthew Arnold defines politics somewhere as the art of “making reason and the will of God prevail”—an art, one would say, difficult enough. [Tr.]

APPENDIX II

CONCERNING THE HARMONY OF POLITICS WITH MORALS ACCORDING TO THE TRANSCENDENTAL IDEA OF PUBLIC RIGHT

If I look at public right from the point of view of most professors of law, and abstract from its _matter_ or its empirical elements, varying according to the circumstances given in our experience of individuals in a state or of states among themselves, then there remains the _form_ of publicity. The possibility of this publicity, every legal title implies. For without it there could be no justice, which can only be thought as before the eyes of men; and, without justice, there would be no right, for, from justice only, right can come.

This characteristic of publicity must belong to every legal title. Hence, as, in any particular case that occurs, there is no difficulty in deciding whether this essential attribute is present or not, (whether, that is, it is reconcilable with the principles of the agent or not), it furnishes an easily applied criterion which is to be found _a priori_ in the reason, so that in the particular case we can at once recognise the falsity or illegality of a proposed claim (_praetensio juris_), as it were by an experiment of pure reason.

Having thus, as it were, abstracted from all the empirical elements contained in the concept of a political and international law, such as, for instance, the evil tendency in human nature which makes compulsion necessary, we may give the following proposition as the _transcendental formula_ of public right:—“All actions relating to the rights of other men are wrong, if the maxims from which they follow are inconsistent with publicity.”

This principle must be regarded not merely as ethical, as belonging to the doctrine of virtue, but also as juridical, referring to the rights of men. For there is something wrong in a maxim of conduct which I cannot divulge without at once defeating my purpose, a maxim which must therefore be kept secret, if it is to succeed, and which I could not publicly acknowledge without infallibly stirring up the opposition of everyone. This necessary and universal resistance with which everyone meets me, a resistance therefore evident _a priori_, can be due to no other cause than the injustice with which such a maxim threatens everyone. Further, this testing principle is merely negative; that is, it serves only as a means by which we may know when an action is unjust to others. Like axioms, it has a certainty incapable of demonstration; it is besides easy of application as appears from the following examples of public right.

1.—=Constitutional Law.= Let us take in the first place the public law of the state (_jus civitatis_), particularly in its application to matters within the state. Here a question arises which many think difficult to answer, but which the transcendental principle of publicity solves quite readily:—“Is revolution a legitimate means for a people to adopt, for the purpose of throwing off the oppressive yoke of a so-called tyrant (_non titulo, sed exercitio talis_)?” The rights of a nation are violated in a government of this kind, and no wrong is done to the tyrant in dethroning him. Of this there is no doubt. None the less, it is in the highest degree wrong of the subjects to prosecute their rights in this way; and they would be just as little justified in complaining, if they happened to be defeated in their attempt and had to endure the severest punishment in consequence.

A great many reasons for and against both sides of this question may be given, if we seek to settle it by a dogmatic deduction of the principles of right. But the transcendental principle of the publicity of public right can spare itself this diffuse argumentation. For, according to that principle, the people would ask themselves, before the civil contract was made, whether they could venture to publish maxims, proposing insurrection when a favourable opportunity should present itself. It is quite clear that if, when a constitution is established, it were made a condition that force may be exercised against the sovereign under certain circumstances, the people would be obliged to claim a lawful authority higher than his. But in that case, the so-called sovereign would be no longer sovereign: or, if both powers, that of the sovereign and that of the people, were made a condition of the constitution of the state, then its establishment (which was the aim of the people) would be impossible. The wrongfulness of revolution is quite obvious from the fact that openly to acknowledge maxims which justify this step would make attainment of the end at which they aim impossible. We are obliged to keep them secret. But this secrecy would not be necessary on the part of the head of the state. He may say quite plainly that the ringleaders of every rebellion will be punished by death, even although they may hold that it was he who first transgressed the fundamental law. For, if a ruler is conscious of possessing irresistible sovereign power (and this must be assumed in every civil constitution, because a sovereign who has not power to protect any individual member of the nation against his neighbour has also not the right to exercise authority over him), then he need have no fear that making known the maxims which guide him will cause the defeat of his plans. And it is quite consistent with this view to hold that, if the people are successful in their insurrection, the sovereign must return to the rank of a subject, and refrain from inciting rebellion with a view to regaining his lost sovereignty. At the same time he need have no fear of being called to account for his former administration.[153]

[153] “When a king has dethroned himself,” says Locke, (_On Civil Government_, Ch. XIX. § 239) “and put himself in a state of war with his people, what shall hinder them from prosecuting him who is no king, as they would any other man, who has put himself into a state of war with them?” ... “The legislative being only a fiduciary power to act for certain ends, there remains still _in the people a supreme power to remove or alter the legislative_.” (_Op. cit._, Ch. XIII. § 149.) And again, (_op. cit._, Ch. XI. § 134.) we find the words, “... over whom [_i.e._ society] no body can have a power to make laws, but by their own consent, and by authority received from them.” Cf. also Ch. XIX. § 228 _seq._

Hobbes represents the opposite point of view. “How many kings,” he wrote, (Preface to the _Philosophical Rudiments concerning Government and Society_) “and those good men too, hath this one error, that a tyrant king might lawfully be put to death, been the slaughter of! How many throats hath this false position cut, that a prince for some causes may by some certain men be deposed! And what bloodshed hath not this erroneous doctrine caused, that kings are not superiors to, but administrators for the multitude!” This “erroneous doctrine” Kant received from Locke through Rousseau. He advocated, or at least practised as a citizen, a doctrine of passive obedience to the state. A free press, he held, offered the only lawful outlet for protest against tyranny. But, in theory, he was an enemy to absolute monarchy. [Tr.]

2.—=International Law.= There can be no question of an international law, except on the assumption of some kind of a law-governed state of things, the external condition under which any right can belong to man. For the very idea of international law, as public right, implies the publication of a universal will determining the rights and property of each individual nation; and this _status juridicus_ must spring out of a contract of some sort which may not, like the contract to which the state owes its origin, be founded upon compulsory laws, but may be, at the most, the agreement of a permanent free association such as the federation of the different states, to which we have alluded above. For, without the control of law to some extent, to serve as an active bond of union among different merely natural or moral individuals,—that is to say, in a state of nature,—there can only be private law. And here we find a disagreement between morals, regarded as the science of right, and politics. The criterion, obtained by observing the effect of publicity on maxims, is just as easily applied, but only when we understand that this agreement binds the contracting states solely with the object that peace may be preserved among them, and between them and other states; in no sense with a view to the acquisition of new territory or power. The following instances of antinomy occur between politics and morals, which are given here with the solution in each case.

_a._ “When either of these states has promised something to another, (as, for instance, assistance, or a relinquishment of certain territory, or subsidies and such like), the question may arise whether, in a case where the safety of the state thus bound depends on its evading the fulfilment of this promise, it can do so by maintaining a right to be regarded as a double person:—firstly, as sovereign and accountable to no one in the state of which that sovereign power is head; and, secondly, merely as the highest official in the service of that state, who is obliged to answer to the state for every action. And the result of this is that the state is acquitted in its second capacity of any obligation to which it has committed itself in the first.” But, if a nation or its sovereign proclaimed these maxims, the natural consequence would be that every other would flee from it, or unite with other states to oppose such pretensions. And this is a proof that politics, with all its cunning, defeats its own ends, if the test of making principles of action public, which we have indicated, be applied. Hence the maxim we have quoted must be wrong.

_b._ “If a state which has increased its power to a formidable extent (_potentia tremenda_) excites anxiety in its neighbours, is it right to assume that, since it has the means, it will also have the will to oppress others; and does that give less powerful states a right to unite and attack the greater nation without any definite cause of offence?” A state which would here answer openly in the affirmative would only bring the evil about more surely and speedily. For the greater power would forestall those smaller nations, and their union would be but a weak reed of defence against a state which knew how to apply the maxim, _divide et impera_. This maxim of political expediency then, when openly acknowledged, necessarily defeats the end at which it aims, and is therefore wrong.

_c._ “If a smaller state by its geographical position breaks up the territory of a greater, so as to prevent a unity necessary to the preservation of that state, is the latter not justified in subjugating its less powerful neighbour and uniting the territory in question with its own?” We can easily see that the greater state dare not publish such a maxim beforehand; for either all smaller states would without loss of time unite against it, or other powers would contend for this booty. Hence the impracticability of such a maxim becomes evident under the light of publicity. And this is a sign that it is wrong, and that in a very great degree; for, although the victim of an act of injustice may be of small account, that does not prevent the injustice done from being very great.

3.—=Cosmopolitan Law.= We may pass over this department of right in silence, for, owing to its analogy with international law, its maxims are easily specified and estimated.

* * * * *

In this principle of the incompatibility of the maxims of international law with their publicity, we have a good indication of the non-agreement between politics and morals, regarded as a science of right. Now we require to know under what conditions these maxims do agree with the law of nations. For we cannot conclude that the converse holds, and that all maxims which can bear publicity are therefore just. For anyone who has a decided supremacy has no need to make any secret about his maxims. The condition of a law of nations being possible at all is that, in the first place, there should be a law-governed state of things. If this is not so, there can be no public right, and all right which we can think of outside the law-governed state,—that is to say, in the state of nature,—is mere private right. Now we have seen above that something of the nature of a federation between nations, for the sole purpose of doing away with war, is the only rightful condition of things reconcilable with their individual freedom. Hence the agreement of politics and morals is only possible in a federative union, a union which is necessarily given _a priori_, according to the principles of right. And the lawful basis of all politics can only be the establishment of this union in its widest possible extent. Apart from this end, all political sophistry is folly and veiled injustice. Now this sham politics has a casuistry, not to be excelled in the best Jesuit school. It has its mental reservation (_reservatio mentalis_): as in the drawing up of a public treaty in such terms as we can, if we will, interpret when occasion serves to our advantage; for example, the distinction between the _status quo_ in fact (_de fait_) and in right (_de droit_). Secondly, it has its probabilism; when it pretends to discover evil intentions in another, or makes, the probability of their possible future ascendency a lawful reason for bringing about the destruction of other peaceful states. Finally, it has its philosophical sin (_peccatum philosophicum_, _peccatillum_, _baggatelle_) which is that of holding it a trifle easily pardoned that a smaller state should be swallowed up, if this be to the gain of a nation much more powerful; for such an increase in power is supposed to tend to the greater prosperity of the whole world.[154]

[154] We can find the voucher for maxims such as these in Herr Hofrichter Garve’s essay, _On the Connection of Morals with Politics_, 1788. This worthy scholar confesses at the very beginning that he is unable to give a satisfactory answer to this question. But his sanction of such maxims, even when coupled with the admission that he cannot altogether clear away the arguments raised against them, seems to be a greater concession in favour of those who shew considerable inclination to abuse them, than it might perhaps be wise to admit.

Duplicity gives politics the advantage of using one branch or the other of morals, just as suits its own ends. The love of our fellowmen is a duty: so too is respect for their rights. But the former is only conditional: the latter, on the other hand, an unconditional, absolutely imperative duty; and anyone who would give himself up to the sweet consciousness of well-doing must be first perfectly assured that he has not transgressed its commands. Politics has no difficulty in agreeing with morals in the first sense of the term, as ethics, to secure that men should give to superiors their rights. But when it comes to morals, in its second aspect, as the science of right before which politics must bow the knee, the politician finds it prudent to have nothing to do with compacts and rather to deny all reality to morals in this sense, and reduce all duty to mere benevolence. Philosophy could easily frustrate the artifices of a politics like this, which shuns the light of criticism, by publishing its maxims, if only statesmen would have the courage to grant philosophers the right to ventilate their opinions.

With this end in view, I propose another principle of public right, which is at once transcendental and affirmative. Its formula would be as follows:—“All maxims which require publicity, in order that they may not fail to attain their end, are in agreement both with right and politics.”

For, if these maxims can only attain the end at which they aim by being published, they must be in harmony with the universal end of mankind, which is happiness; and to be in sympathy with this (to make the people contented with their lot) is the real business of politics. Now, if this end should be attainable only by publicity, or in other words, through the removal of all distrust of the maxims of politics, these must be in harmony with the right of the people; for a union of the ends of all is only possible in a harmony with this right.

I must postpone the further development and discussion of this principle till another opportunity. That it is a transcendental formula is quite evident from the fact that all the empirical conditions of a doctrine of happiness, or the _matter_ of law, are absent, and that it has regard only to the _form_ of universal conformity to law.

* * * * *

If it is our duty to realise a state of public right, if at the same time there are good grounds for hope that this ideal may be realised, although only by an approximation advancing _ad infinitum_, then perpetual peace, following hitherto falsely so-called conclusions of peace, which have been in reality mere cessations of hostilities, is no mere empty idea. But rather we have here a problem which gradually works out its own solution and, as the periods in which a given advance takes place towards the realisation of the ideal of perpetual peace will, we hope, become with the passing of time shorter and shorter, we must approach ever nearer to this goal.

INDEX

Absolutism; of Hobbes, 43, 44; of Schopenhauer, 43; according to Kant, 43, 44, 125-128; to Locke, 44.

Alexander I. of Russia; 80.

Alexander the Great; 31, 103.

Alsace-Lorraine; annexation of, 90, 92, 95.

Ambrose, Saint; 15.

Amphictyonic League; 16, 22.

Aquinas, Thomas; on fighting clergy, 18; on war, 18, 19.

Arbitration; as a substitute for war, 79, 81, 87; difficulties settled by, 80; where it is useless, 82, 83, 86.

Aristotle; on war, 7, 8; and rights of an enemy, _ib._; 31; on the relation between politics and ethics, 162.

Assyrians; war among the, 9.

Augustine, Saint; 16.

Balance of power; 26, 95.

Bentham, Jeremy; 26, 79, 92.

Bluntschli, J. K.; 41, 73, 74, 80.

Caird, Edward; 3, 51.

Calvin, John; 19.

Carnegie, Andrew; 100.

China; a danger to Europe, 92, 93, 140, 141.

Cicero; on the conduct of war, 22, 41.

Clement of Alexandria; 15.

Clergy, fighting; Origen on, 14, 15; Wycliffe, 18; Erasmus, _ib._; Aquinas, _ib._

Cobden, Richard; 64.

Corvinus, Matthias; 109.

Cowper, William; 5, 38, 123.

Crusades, wars of the; 16, 103.

Dante, Alighieri; on mediation, 46; on universal monarchy, 68, 69.

Disarmament; 88-93; Czar’s proposal of, 90; practicability of, 90-93.

Dubois, Cardinal; 36.

Empire; of Rome, 9, 20, 68; world-, spiritual, 23, 32, 69; of Alexander the Great, 31, 68; Frankish, 69; Holy Roman 69; of Napoleon I., 69.

Erasmus, Desiderius; and European peace, 17; on war, 18, 19; on fighting clergy, 18, 32.

Farrar, J. A.; 18.

Federation; Kant’s idea of, 60, 68, 69, 128-137; 88, 92, 93, 95, 97; probable results of, 98, 99, 100, 134.

Fichte, J. G.; 69, 99.

Finland; 92, 95.

Fischer, Kuno; 62, 67.

Fleury, Cardinal; 55.

Frederick the Great; 66, 126.

Gentilis, Albericus; 21, 32.

Golden Age; 3, 41.

Government; origin of, according to Plato, 5; according to Hume, 5, 52; to Cowper, 5, 6; to Hobbes, 40-42, 118, 119; to Kant, 51-54, 152-154; to Rousseau, 52; to Locke, 53; representative, 65-68, 120, 121, 124-128.

Greeks; their attitude to other nations, 7; to an enemy, _ib._; their Sacred Wars, 16; the Amphictyonic League, 16.

Grotius, Hugo; his _De Jure Belli et Pacis_, 24-27; and the _Jus Gentium_, 24, 25; and the Law of Nature, 25; on peace, 27, 32, 40, 131.

Hague Conference (1899); 86, 90.

Hegel, G. W. F.; 57; on war, 71, 72, 75.

Henry IV. of France; 30, 32, 33, 36.

Hobbes, Thomas; his theory of the state of nature and origin of government, 4, 40-42, 51, 118, 119, 133; 6, 26, 27, 28, 37; his influence on Kant, 40, 46; his views on revolution, 41, 188; of the relations between states, 43-46, 128, 131; on the conduct of war, 45, 89, 120, 124, 159.

Holls, Fred. W.; 86.

Hooker, Richard; 52; on the depravity of man, 173.

Hume, David; on the origin of government, 5, 52; on the state of nature, 40, 41; on the original contract, 52, 108, 109, 162.

International Law; the development of, 20-24; its connection with the Reformation, 21, 24; in Greece and Rome, 22, 23.

Intervention; 64, 93, 94, 112, 113.

Jews; war among the, 9-11; their dream of peace, 32.

Justin; 15.

Kant, Immanuel; 26, 37; his indebtedness to earlier political writers, 40, 46; his theory of human development, 47-49; and how this is possible, 49-51, 54; on the foundation of the state, 51-54, 152-154; the relations between states and individuals, 54, 55, 117-120, 128, 173, 174; the necessity for reform within the state, 55, 56, 168; the political and social conditions of his time, 57-59; his attitude to war, 58, 133, 135, 136, 137, 149-151; on the growing power of commerce, 59, 65, 142, 157; his idea of federation, 60, 68, 69, 128-137, 192; and ideal of perpetual peace, 61, 129, 196; the conditions of its realization, 62-69; on representative and other constitutions, 65-68, 120-128, 152, 153, 167; his opinion of the English constitution, 66; his disapproval of universal monarchy, 68, 69, 155, 156; 79, 83, 89, 100, 105; on the right of way, 137-142; on nature’s guarantee of a perpetual peace, 143-157; on the relation between politics and morals, 161-196; on revolution, 167, 168, 186-188.

Laveleye, Émile de; 81.

Lawrence, T. J.; 9, 78, 81.

Leibniz, Gottfried W.; 36; his criticism of St. Pierre, 37, 38, 58, 106.

Locke, John; and the golden age, 3, 4; on the original contract, 53; on revolution, 53, 188; 67, 133.

Lorimer, James; 34, 80.

Louis Philippe; 76.

Luther, Martin; on war, 19.

Machiavelli, Nicolo; 162.

Maine, Henry; on Grotius and the _Jus Gentium_, 24, 25.

Maistre, Joseph de; 71.

Martineau, James; 102.

Mennonites; and war, 14.

Military service; of Christians, 14, 16, 18, 19; compulsory, 89; voluntary, 111.

Mill, John Stuart; 80.

Moltke, Graf von; 71, 73-75.

Monarchy, universal; the ideal of Dante, 68, 69; disapproved by Kant, 68, 69, 155, 156; and Fichte, 69.

Montesquieu, Baron de; on self-preservation, 83; on armed peace, 88, 159.

More, Thomas; 32.

Morley, John; 3.

Napoleon Bonaparte; Empire of, 69, 71, 72, 76, 77.

Napoleon, Louis; 80.

National Debt; 63, 64, 111, 112.

Origen; on military service, 14, 15.

Original Contract; 40; as understood by Rousseau, 52; by Hobbes, 52, 53; by Hooker, 52; by Hume, _ib._; by Kant, _ib._; by Locke, 53.

Paris Congress (1856); 86.

Paulsen, Friedrich; 43, 52, 53, 66, 78.

Peace, perpetual; the dream of, 29-33; projects of, by Penn, 30; by Henry IV., 30, 33, 34; by St. Pierre, 30, 32, 34-37; Rousseau’s attitude to, 38-40, 106; for Kant an ideal, 61, 129; the articles of, 62-69, 107-142, 158-160; the guarantee of, 143-157.

Peace Societies; 70, 75, 78, 79, 80, 86, 87; and disarmament, 88, 96, 97, 100, 101, 102.

Penn, William; 30.

Plato; on the origin of the state, 5; on war, 8, 41; on the relation between ethics and politics, 162.

Poland; 92, 93, 95.

Politics; and morals, according to Kant, 161-196; to Plato, 162; to Aristotle, _ib._; to Hume, _ib._; sophistical maxims of, 170-172.

Pope, Alexander; 4, 127.

Puffendorf, Samuel; 27; on intervention, 64, 131.

Quakers; and war, 14.

Reformation; and military service, 18; and international law, 21, 24.

Religion; Roman, and war, 9; Jewish, 9-11; Mohammedan, 10; Buddhist, and conversion, 12; Christian, and war, 12-20.

Revolution, right of; according to Hobbes, 41, 53; and Spinoza, 41; according to Locke, 53; to Rousseau, _ib._; to Kant, 167, 186-188.

Right of way; Vattel on, 65, 138; Kant on, 65, 137-142.

Ritchie, D. G.; on Rousseau, 3; on Locke and the golden age, _ib._, 52, 85, 98.

Robertson, William; 6, 17, 18, 19.

Romans; and war, 7, 8, 9, 22, 23; and international law, 22, 23.

Rousseau, J. J.; and the state of nature, 2, 3, 52; 26, 28; his criticism of St. Pierre, 38-40; his views on militarism, 39; on the original contract, 52; on revolution, 53, 188; 61, 67, 100, 132, 134; on democratic and republican governments, 153; on the depravity of man, 173.

Russia; Alexander I. of, 80; the Czar of, 90; the backward civilization of, 92, 93, 94, 95.

Schiller, Friedrich von; on war and peace, 71, 72, 73, 75.

Schopenhauer, Arthur; 43.

Spencer, Herbert; 76.

Spinoza, Benedict; on the state of nature, 41; and revolution, _ib._

Standing armies; 63, 64, 89, 110.

State of nature; according to Rousseau, 2, 3; and the golden age, 3; Hobbes’ theory of, 4, 40, 41, 118; according to Hume a philosophical fiction, 41; according to Kant, 117-120.

States; transference of, 63, 108, 109; marriage between, 109.

St. Pierre, Castel de; 30, 32, 33; his _Projet_, 34-37; and Leibniz, 37, 38; and Rousseau, 38-40; 61, 67, 79, 92, 106.

Sully, Duke of; 30, 32, 33.

Tennyson, Lord; 73, 74.

Tertullian; 14, 15.

Treaties of peace; in Greece, 7, 63, 64, 107, 108.

Treitschke, H. von; 75.

Trendelenburg, F. A.; 75.

Vattel, Emerich; his _Droit des Gens_, 28, 29; on intervention, 64, 113, 114; on the right of way, 65; of self-preservation, 83, 89, 103; on treaties, 108; 131.

Voltaire, François de; 33, 37, 38.

War; religious, 16; private, 17, 20, 29; dynastic, 38, 57, 123; Kant’s attitude to, 58, 133, 135, 136, 137, 149-151; its influence on progress, 70, 96, 103; views of Hegel on, 71, 72, 75; of Schiller, 71, 72, 73, 75; of Moltke, 71, 73, 74, 75; under altered conditions, 76, 77, 78; when just, 84, 85; future probable causes of, 94, 95; honorable conduct of, 114, 115.

Wycliffe, John; and fighting clergy, 18.

Zwingli, Huldreich, 19.

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