{INTRODUCTION ^paragraph 175}
Virtue signifies a moral strength of will. But this does not exhaust
the notion; for such strength might also belong to a holy (superhuman)
being, in whom no opposing impulse counteracts the law of his rational
will; who therefore willingly does everything in accordance with the
law. Virtue then is the moral strength of a man's will in his
obedience to duty; and this is a moral necessitation by his own law
giving reason, inasmuch as this constitutes itself a power executing
the law. It is not itself a duty, nor is it a duty to possess it
(otherwise we should be in duty bound to have a duty), but it
commands, and accompanies its command with a moral constraint (one
possible by laws of internal freedom). But since this should be
irresistible, strength is requisite, and the degree of this strength
can be estimated only by the magnitude of the hindrances which man
creates for himself, by his inclinations. Vices, the brood of unlawful
dispositions, are the monsters that he has to combat; wherefore this
moral strength as fortitude (fortitudo moralis) constitutes the
greatest and only true martial glory of man; it is also called the
true wisdom, namely, the practical, because it makes the ultimate
end of the existence of man on earth its own end. Its possession alone
makes man free, healthy, rich, a king, etc., nor either chance or fate
deprive him of this, since he possesses himself, and the virtuous
cannot lose his virtue.
All the encomiums bestowed on the ideal of humanity in its moral
perfection can lose nothing of their practical reality by the examples
of what men now are, have been, or will probably be hereafter;
anthropology which proceeds from mere empirical knowledge cannot
impair anthroponomy which is erected by the unconditionally
legislating reason; and although virtue may now and then be called
meritorious (in relation to men, not to the law), and be worthy of
reward, yet in itself, as it is its own end, so also it must be
regarded as its own reward.
Virtue considered in its complete perfection is, therefore, regarded
not as if man possessed virtue, but as if virtue possessed the man,
since in the former case it would appear as though he had still had
the choice (for which he would then require another virtue, in order
to select virtue from all other wares offered to him). To conceive a
plurality of virtues (as we unavoidably must) is nothing else but to
conceive various moral objects to which the (rational) will is led
by the single principle of virtue; and it is the same with the
opposite vices. The expression which personifies both is a contrivance
for affecting the sensibility, pointing, however, to a moral sense.
Hence it follows that an aesthetic of morals is not a part, but a
subjective exposition of the Metaphysic of Morals; in which the
emotions that accompany the force of the moral law make the that force
to be felt; for example: disgust, horror, etc., which gives a sensible
moral aversion in order to gain the precedence from the merely
sensible incitement.
{INTRODUCTION ^paragraph 180}