Beyond Duty Kantian Ideals of Respect Beneficence and Appreciation Thomas E Hill JR Full Chapter PDF

Beyond Duty: Kantian Ideals of
Respect, Beneficence, and

Appreciation Thomas E. Hill Jr.
Visit to download the full and correct content document:
https://ebookmass.com/product/beyond-duty-kantian-ideals-of-respect-beneficence-a
nd-appreciation-thomas-e-hill-jr/
More products digital (pdf, epub, mobi) instant
download maybe you interests ...
Thomas' Calculus for the JEE 13th Edition George B.

Thomas Jr
https://ebookmass.com/product/thomas-calculus-for-the-jee-13th-
edition-george-b-thomas-jr/
Taming the Megabanks Arthur E. Wilmarth Jr
https://ebookmass.com/product/taming-the-megabanks-arthur-e-
wilmarth-jr/
Principles of Electronic Communication Systems 5th

Edition Louis E Frenzel Jr
https://ebookmass.com/product/principles-of-electronic-
communication-systems-5th-edition-louis-e-frenzel-jr/
Essentials of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation:

Musculoskeletal Disorders, Pain, and Rehabilitation
Thomas D. Rizzo Jr.
https://ebookmass.com/product/essentials-of-physical-medicine-
and-rehabilitation-musculoskeletal-disorders-pain-and-
rehabilitation-thomas-d-rizzo-jr/
Respect: Philosophical Essays Richard Dean And Oliver
Sensen
https://ebookmass.com/product/respect-philosophical-essays-
richard-dean-and-oliver-sensen/
Principles of Electronic Communication Systems 4 ed.

Edition Louis E. Frenzel Jr.
https://ebookmass.com/product/principles-of-electronic-
communication-systems-4-ed-edition-louis-e-frenzel-jr/
Medieval Monarchy in Action Boyd H. Hill Jr
https://ebookmass.com/product/medieval-monarchy-in-action-boyd-h-
hill-jr/
A Sense of Duty Sam Crescent
https://ebookmass.com/product/a-sense-of-duty-sam-crescent/
Shadow Hill Thomas Kies
https://ebookmass.com/product/shadow-hill-thomas-kies/
OUP CORRECTED AUTOPAGE PROOFS – FINAL, 17/9/2021, SPi
Beyond Duty
Beyond Duty
Kantian Ideals of Respect, Beneficence,
and Appreciation
THOMAS E. HILL, JR.
1
3
Great Clarendon Street, Oxford, OX2 6DP,
United Kingdom
Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford.
It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship,
and education by publishing worldwide. Oxford is a registered trade mark of
Oxford University Press in the UK and in certain other countries
© Thomas E. Hill, Jr. 2021
The moral rights of the author have been asserted
First Edition published in 2021
Impression: 1
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in
a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the
prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted
by law, by licence or under terms agreed with the appropriate reprographics
rights organization. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the
above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the
address above
You must not circulate this work in any other form
and you must impose this same condition on any acquirer
Published in the United States of America by Oxford University Press
198 Madison Avenue, New York, NY 10016, United States of America
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
Data available
Library of Congress Control Number: 2021946692
ISBN 978–0–19–284548–1
DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780192845481.001.0001
Printed and bound in the UK by
TJ Books Limited
Links to third party websites are provided by Oxford in good faith and
for information only. Oxford disclaims any responsibility for the materials
contained in any third party website referenced in this work.
Contents
Acknowledgments vii
Abbreviations for Kant’s Works xi
Aims, Abstracts, and Why ‘Beyond Duty’? 1
PART I: KANT AND KANTIAN PERSPECTIVES

1. The Groundwork 13
2. Imperfect Duties to Oneself 28
3. Kantian Autonomy and Contemporary Ideas of Autonomy 43
4. Rüdiger Bittner on Autonomy 59
5. Kantian Perspectives on the Rational Basis of Human Dignity 69
6. In Defense of Human Dignity: Comments on Kant and Rosen 77
7. The Kingdom of Ends as an Ideal and a Constraint on Moral
Legislation 90
8. Kantian Ethics and Utopian Thinking 106
9. Varieties of Constructivism 127
PART II: PRACTICAL ETHICS

10. Human Dignity and Tragic Choices 149
11. Duties and Choices in Philanthropic Giving: Kantian
Perspectives 172
12. Killing Ourselves 191
13. Conscientious Conviction and Conscience 207
14. Stability, A Sense of Justice, and Self-Respect 227
15. Two Conceptions of Virtue 247
vi 
16. Beyond Respect and Beneficence: An Ideal of Appreciation 270

17. Ideals of Appreciation and Expressions of Respect 284
References 305
Index 315
Acknowledgments
The essays listed below are reprinted here with permission of the publishers.
PART I: KANT AND KANTIAN PERSPECTIVES
(1) “The Groundwork,” in The Kantian Mind, edited by Mark Timmons

and Sorin Baiasu (Routledge Publishers, forthcoming), ch. 12.
(2) “Imperfect Duties to Oneself (TL 6: 444–447),” in Kant’s
“Tugendlehre”: A Comprehensive Commentary, (eds.) Andreas
Trampota, Oliver Sensen, and Jens Timmermann (Berlin and Boston:
Walter de Gruyter, GmbH, 2013), pp. 293–309.
(3) “Kantian Autonomy and Contemporary Ideas of Autonomy,” in Oliver
Sensen, ed., Kant on Moral Autonomy (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2013), ch. 1, pp. 15–31.
(4) “Rüdiger Bittner on Autonomy,” Erkenntnis 79, 2014, 1341–1350.
(5) “Kantian Perspectives on the Rational Basis of Human Dignity,” in The
Cambridge Handbook of Human Dignity, (eds.) Marcus Düewell, Jens
Braarvig, Roger Brownsword, and Dietmar Mieth (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 2014), ch. 22, pp. 215–222.
(6) “In Defense of Human Dignity: Comments on Kant and Rosen” in
Understanding Human Dignity, Christopher M. McCrudden, ed.,
Proceedings of the British Academy, 192, (Oxford University Press,
2014), ch. 17, pp. 313–325.
(7) “The Kingdom of Ends as an Ideal and Constraint on Legislation,” in
Kant’s Concept of Dignity, (eds.) Yasushi Kato and Gerhard Schönrich
(Berlin/Boston: Walter De Gruyter, 2020), pp. 177–194.
(8) “Kantian Ethics and Utopian Thinking,” Disputatio, 2019, pp. 505–526.
(9) “Varieties of Constructivism” in Reading Onora O’Neill (eds.) David
Archard, Monique Deveaux, Neil Manson, and Daniel Weinstock
(Oxford and New York: Routledge, 2013), ch. 3, pp. 37–54.
viii 
PART II: PRACTICAL ETHICS
(10) “Human Dignity and Tragic Choices,” Proceedings and Addresses of

the American Philosophical Association, vol. 89, Presidential Address
(Eastern Division), 2016, 74–94.
(11) “Duties and Choices in Philanthropic Giving: A Kantian Perspective”
in The Ethics of Giving: Philosophers’ Perspectives on Giving (ed.) Paul
Woodruff (New York: Oxford University Press, 2018), ch. 1,
pp. 13–39.
(12) “Killing Ourselves” in Cambridge Companion to Life and Death (ed.)
Steven Luper (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014), ch. 16,
pp. 265–281.
(13) “Conscientious Conviction and Conscience,” Criminal Law and
Philosophy, 10, 2016, pp. 677–692.
(14) “Stability, a Sense of Justice, and Self-Respect” in A Companion to
Rawls (eds.) Jon Mandle and David Reidy (Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell
Publishing, 2014), ch. 11, 200–215.
(15) “Two Conceptions of Virtue,” Theory and Research in Education, 11,
no. 2 (2013), 167–186.
(16) “Beyond Respect and Beneficence: An Ideal of Appreciation” in
Respect: Philosophical Essays (eds.) Richard Dean and Oliver Sensen
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2021), ch. 8.
(17) “Ideals of Appreciation and Expressions of Respect” in The Oxford
Handbook of Philosophy and Disability (eds.) Adam Cureton and
David Wasserman (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2020), ch. 21,
363–379.
As always I am indebted to the many moral philosophers and Kant scholars

from whom I have learned, especially to those whose invitations prompted my
thinking and writing on the topics of the essays collected here and those whose
insightful comments helped me to see more clearly and accurately what
I needed to say. I cannot thank everyone who has helped me individually,
but I especially appreciate conversations and correspondence with Adam
Cureton, Richard Dean, Oliver Sensen, and Jan-Willem van der Rijt. Even when
critical, I found it challenging and valuable to engage seriously with the work of the
contemporary philosophers directly addressed in these essays, including
Rüdiger Bittner, Kimberley Brownlee, Onora O’Neill, John Rawls, and Michael
Rosen. Former graduate students have been encouraging and helpful, and
 ix
I appreciate the editorial help of Ian Cruise as well as Jenny King, Gayathri.V and
other editors and staff at Oxford University Press. A special thanks is due to Adam
Cureton for friendly encouragement, helpful commentary, and his own excellent
development of Kantian ideas of mutual interest. Most of all, I am grateful for the
love and support of Robin Hill, without whom I could not have continued to enjoy
thinking and writing about philosophy for so long.
Abbreviations for Kant’s Works
A Anthropology from a Pragmatic Point of View, trans. Mary Gregor (The Hague:
Martinus Nijhoff, 1974). Translated from Anthropologie in pragmatischer
Hinsicht abgefasst (1798), in Kants gesammelte Schriften, ed. under the auspices
of the Konigliche Preussische Akademie der Wissenshaften (Berlin: Walter de
Gruyter, 1908–13), [7:117–333].
C₁ Critique of Pure Reason, trans. Norman Kemp Smith (New York: St. Martin’s
Press, 1965). Translated from Kritik der reinen Vernunft (1781, 1787) in Kants
gesammelte Schriften, [first edition, 4: 1–252; second edition, 3: 1–594].
References to the first and second editions are indicated by the standard A/B
abbreviation.
C₂ Critique of Practical Reason, trans. Mary Gregor (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1997). Translated from Kritik der praktischen Vernunft
(1788) in Kants gesammelte Schriften [5: 1–163].
C₃ Critique of the Power of Judgment, trans. Paul Guyer and Eric Matthews
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000). Translated from Kritik der
Urtheibkraft (Berlin und Libau: bey Lagarde und Friederich, 1790.) The
Cambridge edition includes Academy pagination correlating to Kants gesam-
melte Schriften [20: 195–484].
G Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals, trans. Arnulf Zweig, ed. Thomas
E. Hill, Jr. and Arnulf Zweig (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002).
Translated from Grundlegung zur Metaphysik der Sitten (1785), in Kants
gesammelte Schriften [4: 387–463].
LE Lectures on Ethics, trans. Louis Infield (New York: Harper and Row, 1963).
Translated from Eine Vorlesung Kants über Ethik, ed. Paul Menzer (Berlin: im
Auftrage der KantsgeseUschaft, 1924). A more recent and thorough translation
is Lectures on Ethics, trans. Peter Heath and J. B. Schneewind (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1997) [27: 3–732]. LE refers to the Infield edition;
references to the Heath and Schneewind edition will be indicated as in the
notes.
MM The Metaphysics of Morals, trans. Mary Gregor (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 1996). Translated from Die Metaphysik der Sitten
(1797–98), in Kants gesammelte Schriften [6: 203–491].
R Religion within the Boundaries of Mere Reason, trans. Allen Wood and George
di Giovanni (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998). Translated from
Die Religion innerhalb der Grenzen der blossen Vernunft (1793–94), in Kants
gesammelte Schriften [6: 1–202].
xii   ’ 
TL The Doctrine of Virtue (Tugendlehre), Part II of The Metaphysics of Morals

(MM), trans. Mary Gregor (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996).
Translated from Die Metaphysik der Sitten (1797–98) [6: 379–640].
PP Immanuel Kant, Practical Philosophy, translated and edited by Mary J. Gregor
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996). This volume contains several
of Kant’s shorter works.
Numbers in square brackets or in parentheses following an abbreviation refer to the

relevant volume and page number of Kants gesammelte Schriften. This edition of
Kant’s works is commonly called the Akademie (or Academy) edition. The abbrevi-
ations above will be followed by volume and page number in this standard edition, e.g.
(G 4: 438–439) for pages 438–439 in volume 4 of the Academy edition of Immanuel
Kant’s Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals.
When sources of Kant’s works other than those abbreviated above are cited, they
will be cited in a footnote and a full reference will be given in the References section.
Passages in these and other translations of Kant’s works can be located by the marginal
numbers, which indicate the Academy edition pages and are now included in virtually
all translations.
Numbers in parentheses between an abbreviation and bracketed Academy numbers
refer to the page numbers in the translations indicated above, for example, (MM
212–213 [6: 467–468]) refers to Immanuel Kant, The Metaphysics of Morals, translated
by Mary J. Gregor, pages 212–213 as well as its source in volume 6 of the Academy
edition, pages 467–468.
Note that TL is part of MM and so the marginal (AK) references to TL can also be
found in MM.
OUP CORRECTED AUTOPAGE PROOFS – REVISES, 24/9/2021, SPi
Aims, Abstracts, and Why ‘Beyond Duty’?
General Remarks
Since the publication of my last book, Virtue, Rules, and Justice: Kantian
Aspirations (OUP, 2012), I have continued to write essays and reviews on
fundamental issues in Kantian moral theory as well as practical ethics, but
in this recent work I focus on different problems and develop new themes in
these areas. For example, I explain some fundamental Kantian concepts, such
as autonomy and dignity, and also address potentially influential objections
from Rüdiger Bittner and Michael Rosen. Clarifying and revising earlier
work, I articulate an understanding of dignity as a status with its associated
rights, duties, and ideals defined by basic Kantian principles rather than an
independent value from which these rights, duties, and ideals derive. As the
title Beyond Duty suggests, the basic Kantian perspective is not only about
determining what is forbidden and what is strictly required but also about
ideals, for example, of beneficence, conscientious reflection, and expressions of
respect. Thinking about appreciation of beauty in nature has led me to try to
articulate a distinct but related ideal of appreciating the good in people and
their individual lives. In an essay on disabilities I propose that this is an aspect
of recognition of human dignity. Another theme “beyond duty” that runs
throughout my new essays is that sometimes the horrible circumstances of real
life call into question rigid adherence to unqualified Kantian principles.
Regrettably, reasonable exceptions are needed, but can we preserve what is
distinctively admirable in Kant’s commitment to human dignity while adding
qualifications to his principles? Does the duty of beneficence leave a reasonable
space for pursuit of one’s own interests? Is it a strict duty not to kill oneself,
or can other Kantian values justify exceptions (more than the few Kant
seemed to accept)? Does the duty to obey the law allow room for conscientious
objection, and if so, how must we understand “conscience” and “conscientious
conviction”?
These are some of the themes that are central in this collection of essays.
The essays were written for different audiences, often in response to specific
requests, but they are connected not only by the underlying common themes
Beyond Duty: Kantian Ideals of Respect, Beneficence, and Appreciation. Thomas E. Hill, Jr., Oxford University Press.
© Thomas E. Hill, Jr. 2021. DOI: 10.1093/oso/9780192845481.003.0001
2 , ,   ‘   ’ ?
but also by my understanding of Kantian ethics, my belief that theory is

important to practice, and my long-standing commitment to addressing
practical moral issues (as well as theories) with good common sense. Themes
and connections will be described more specifically in subsequent sections.
Why Beyond Duty?
The title of this volume—Beyond Duty—may seem puzzling at first, and so

some more explanation is in order. It is true, of course, that Kant writes about
duty and emphasizes its importance, but unfortunately a popular stereotype
takes Kantian ethics to be “all about duty” and sees duty as a set of strict
enforceable rules that determine precisely how one must behave. Contrary to
this stereotype, Kant acknowledges, as any reasonable person would, that
moral principles can contain built-in limits and exceptions and that one
principle can sometimes constrain or over-ride another principle. Equally
important, Kant classifies many duties as “imperfect duties,” implying that
they do not determine precisely how one is to act. For example, the imperfect
duty of beneficence, Kant says, does not determine specifically what, when, or
how much one is to do to promote the happiness of others. Basic duties of
virtue do not prescribe particular actions but tell us to adopt maxims to
promote certain general ends, such as others’ happiness and the development
of our own natural powers. In addition, Kant calls many moral requirements
“duties to oneself,” implying that appropriate sanction for non-compliance is
conscience, not the law or public opinion. These points, familiar to any serious
reader of Kant’s works, indicate at least that Kant’s ethics go beyond duty as
represented in the popular stereotype.
The title Beyond Duty is also meant to reflect the fact the essays on Kantian
moral theory here, like most of own Kant’s ethical writings, are not about
particular duties of any kind but rather about the source of all moral consid-
erations. In Kant’s moral theory the source of all ethical duties, virtues, and
ideals is, ultimately, autonomy of the will. A moral life is understood as a life of
rational self-governance based on respect for humanity in each person and
solidarity with all persons. Caring about morality is, in the language of the day,
partly a matter of respecting “who one is.” Human dignity is a universal and
inalienable moral status based on these ideas. Autonomy and dignity, rather
than duty, are a primary focus of essays here in Part I.
Finally, the title Beyond Duty is meant to reflect the fact that many of these
essays are about topics other than Kantian duty. For example, several essays
    3
review critically the views of contemporary philosophers, for example, John

Rawls, Onora O’Neill, and Kimberley Brownlee. Moral ideals, rather than
duties, are the focus of several papers. Perhaps most important, the last two
essays introduce an ethical ideal of appreciation of persons and their lives,
which is distinct not only from aesthetic appreciation but also from ethical
duties of gratitude, respect, and beneficence.
Summary of the Essays
Part I: Kant and Kantian Perspectives
The first two essays summarize and comment on particular texts that serve as
a background for later discussions.
1. “The Groundwork” calls attention to relevant presuppositions from Kant’s

Critique of Pure Reason¹ and then summarizes the aims, main lines of argu-
ment, and conclusions of Kant’s most influential work in ethics, Groundwork
for the Metaphysics of Morals.² Some controversies of interpretation are briefly
described. Written as an introductory over-view, this first essay foregoes the
usual concentration on Kant’s formulations of the Categorical Imperative in
order to focus on the thread of argument connecting the three sections.
2. “Imperfect Duties to Oneself ” concerns everyone’s moral responsibility
to try to develop one’s natural abilities and to become a better person morally.
Written as a part of a cooperative commentary on Kant’s Doctrine of Virtue
(Tugendlehre, TL),³ this essay examines a particular text on imperfect duties to
oneself regarding one’s natural perfection and moral perfection. The main
questions are: What are these duties, why are they duties, and what is meant by
calling them “imperfect duties” and “duties to oneself?” The concepts in the
relatively short but important passages discussed here provide a framework for
Kant’s ideas about beneficence, gratitude, and self-improvement. The passages
also help to explain why the duty to seek moral perfection is an “imperfect
duty” even though it does not allow the same kind of latitude as the duties to
develop one’s natural powers and to promote the happiness of others.
The next two essays attempt to explain Kant’s idea of autonomy, contrast it
with many current ideas with which it might be confused, and partially defend
it against a radical form of skepticism.
3. “Kantian Autonomy and Contemporary Ideas of Autonomy” concerns
Kant’s central claim that autonomy of the will is a necessary presupposition of
4 , ,   ‘   ’ ?
all morality. His idea of autonomy is abstract, foundational, normative, and a

key to his defense of the rationality of moral commitment. In contemporary
ethics philosophers often appeal to autonomy, more specifically, as a moral
right to make one’s own decisions or as a psychological ideal of independence
and rational self-control. The Kantian and contemporary ideas of autonomy
are not the same, but I ask, how are they related? Arguably, Kantian auton-
omy, when applied realistically to common human circumstances, tends to
support but also limit the particular claims often made in the name of
autonomy. Kantian autonomy is a crucial part of the moral point of view
from which specific principles can be assessed, not an ideal of living inde-
pendently of others.
4. “Rüdiger Bittner on Autonomy” attempts respectfully to defuse some of
Bittner’s radical objections to Kant on autonomy, especially his argument that
nothing could be both “a law” and “self-imposed.”⁴ By analogy with a legal
system, I suggest, Kant can view the supreme moral principle as the necessary
constitutional requirements on moral legislation, which are distinct from the
activities of deriving specific principles and imposing them on oneself. The
metaphors of law-giving and self-imposing must be interpreted differently
when referring to a rational person’s recognition of an unconditionally
rational principle and when referring to a rational person’s working out
more specifically what must be done and resolving to do it. Questions are
also raised about Bittner’s dismissal of various ideas of freedom that are
apparently embedded in ordinary language.
The following three essays concern human dignity, first a brief overview of
Kant’s basic position, then a partial defense against objections, and finally a
summary of many related points in my broadly Kantian interpretation of
dignity.
5. “Kantian Perspectives on the Rational Basis of Human Dignity” briefly
sketches Kantian responses to the questions: What is human dignity? By virtue
of what do human beings have dignity? Why believe in human dignity? What
are the practical implications? The Kantian view is that human dignity is an
innate worth or status that we did not earn and cannot forfeit, which we have
by virtue of our rational autonomy. A Kantian argument for this belief turns
on how we must understand ourselves from a practical standpoint. We must
strive to make our individual choices worthy of this moral standing, which
elevates us above animals and mere things, by never treating persons as mere
means and by honoring and promoting humanity positively.
6. “In Defense of Human Dignity: Comments on Kant and Rosen” briefly
addresses Michael Rosen’s objections to Kantian human dignity.⁵ These include
    5
the charges that the idea is indeterminate and so liable to abuse, consists of
disconnected strands, leads to absolutist practical positions, and derives
from an obscure metaphysical belief that there is in each person an awesome
“transcendental kernel” of a noumenal we-know-not-what. In response,
I propose that the Kantian idea may help to resolve the indeterminacy and
unify the apparently disconnected strands, and I challenge Rosen’s inter-
pretation of Kant’s defense of human dignity.
7. “The Kingdom of Ends as an Ideal and Constraint on Moral Legislation”
argues human dignity is not a metaphysical ground for the norms that we
associate with it, but rather a comprehensive status defined by the basic moral
principles and values, such as (for Kantians) the requirements of justifiability
to all and treating humanity as an end in itself. I comment on the sense in
which dignity is an elevated though inclusive status, in contrast to a conven-
tional status, and an inner worth, in contrast to a derivative value. Human
dignity has an important role in practical deliberations, but its specific require-
ments must be determined and justified by the theory in which it is embedded.
Many have discussed the constraints and limits required to respect the dignity
of every human person, but I emphasize that this also calls for certain positive
attitudes and ideals beyond these negative duties.
The last two essays in Part I turn to contemporary developments in moral
theory inspired by Kant. These are my reconstructed Kantian legislative
perspective for normative ethics and several forms of constructivism proposed
by John Rawls and Onora O’Neill.
8. “Kantian Ethics and Utopian Thinking,” written for non-specialists, first
distinguishes potentially good and bad uses of utopian ideals, then traces an
apparent path from Rousseau’s unworkable political ideal⁶ to Kant’s ethical
ideal. Three versions of Kant’s Categorical Imperative (and their counterparts
in common moral discourse) are examined briefly for the ways that they may
raise the suspicion that they manifest or encourage bad utopian thinking.
Special attention is directed to the third version, which says “Act on the
maxims of a universally law-giving member of a kingdom of ends.” The
essay gives a brief summary of the reconstruction and development of this
central idea in my previous work and then addresses briefly the objections that
we cannot count on everyone to follow ideal rules, that even conscientious
people disagree in their moral judgments, and that theories that allow excep-
tions to familiar moral rules create a “slippery slope” to moral chaos.
9. “Varieties of Constructivism” explores the contrasts, real and apparent,
between the broadly Kantian ethical constructivisms proposed by Onora
O’Neill in Constructions of Reason⁷ and John Rawls in Political Liberalism⁸
6 , ,   ‘   ’ ?
and his Dewey Lectures.⁹ The essay considers whether her constructivism at
the most fundamental level might be compatible with Rawls’ constructivist
thinking and reviews critically O’Neill’s several lines of objection to Rawls’
theory of justice.
Part II: Practical Ethics
This section starts with an overview of my approach to practical ethics,

followed by three essays focused on moral issues regarding philanthropy,
suicide, and conscientious objection.
10. “Human Dignity and Tragic Choices,” my Presidential Address for the
American Philosophical Association, explains how I understand the aspir-
ations and limits of normative ethical theory, describes my reconstructed
Kantian perspective, and argues that this represents a distinctive kind of
normative ethical theory that has appealing features that become lost in the
persistent disputes about Kant’s moral rigorism. As I explain, the theory offers
a way to justify some exceptions to normally binding moral principles, but
exceptions are severely limited by the core Kantian values associated with
human dignity. Some objections are considered, examples of torture and lying
are reconsidered, and the value of both simplicity and complexity in ethics is
noted.
11. “Duties and Choices in Philanthropic Giving: Kantian Perspectives”
concerns our general duty to promote the happiness of others as well as our
more stringent duty to help those in distress when we easily can. In Kant’s
view these are duties of “practical love,” that is, duties to act, not to feel. The
general duty does not specify whose happiness to promote or the means and
extent of obligatory helping. Arguably the general duty also leaves ample room
for individuals to develop and pursue their own permissible ends. Several
objections from contemporary philosophers are addressed: (a) that Kant’s
principle of beneficence as I present it is too “anemic” (David Cummiskey),¹⁰
(b) that Kant requires us to devalue our own happiness (Michael Slote),¹¹ and (c)
that Kant fails to acknowledge that some acts are morally good to do but not
required (J. O. Urmson).¹² Other moral considerations may affect the applica-
tion of Kant’s principles to particular cases of philanthropic giving: justice,
respect, the kind of help needed, and the motives of the giver.
12. “Killing Ourselves” considers definitions of suicide and reviews several
different perspectives on when and how it might be justified, including a
modified Kantian perspective that emphasizes human dignity. I also propose
    7
an ideal of appreciation of life that goes beyond the Kantian value of func-
tioning as a rational agent and consider how this provides further relevant
reasons. Finally, I add a few comments on the special concerns relevant to
public policies permitting assisted suicide.
13. “Conscientious Conviction and Conscience” examines critically
Kimberley Brownlee’s claims about the conditions under which the law should
respect civil disobedients who act from conscience and conscientious con-
viction.¹³ For example, she offers four criteria for identifying a sincere
conscientious moral judgment: consistency, universality, non-evasion, and
communication and dialogue. I argue from examples that the criteria as
explained need revision in order to serve the purpose of identifying when
normative convictions are conscientious and moral. Then I contrast her
conception of conscience with those of Joseph Butler and Immanuel Kant,
considering their merits for the purposes of her arguments.
The penultimate two essays again focus on Rawls, but now not his political
constructivism but rather self-respect and a sense of justice.
14. “Stability, A Sense of Justice, and Self-Respect” reviews the role of
empirical psychology in A Theory of Justice,¹⁴ specifically how citizens in a
well-ordered just society would find their self-respect affirmed and would
naturally develop a sense of justice that would help to stabilize the constitu-
tional order. Rawls’ later doubts that a free society could maintain stability in
this way led to modifications of his theory in Political Liberalism,¹⁵ but
arguably aspects of the earlier argument for stability are still of value. Rawls’
idea of self-respect and the empirical conditions that foster it are distinguished
from the more Kantian idea of self-respect as a moral ideal that we must strive
to maintain.
15. “Two Conceptions of Virtue” contrasts a sense of justice in Rawls’
theory, which is a primary civic virtue, with moral virtue in Kant’s theory,
which is strength of will to do one’s duty. Rawls offers an empirical account of
how civic virtue might develop, and Kant offers some empirical advice on
preparing children for morality but in Kant’s view the resolve and strength-
ening of will to do what is right cannot be fully explained by reference to
empirical causes.
The final two essays introduce a new topic that is rarely mentioned in
discussions of practical ethics. What I call appreciation is an attitude of
readiness to recognize and respond to the worth or intrinsic value (in a
sense) of all sorts of things, not merely beauty in art and nature.
16. “Beyond Respect and Beneficence: An Ideal of Appreciation” first
explains briefly what the main questions are, why they matter, and how
8 , ,   ‘   ’ ?
moral theorists should investigate them. The discussion concentrates on ideal

moral attitudes in close personal relationships and how these relate to the
more common debates about what is right and what is wrong to do. To
illustrate, the essay first describes ideals of respect for persons, followed by
a brief account of beneficence or “caring.” An ideal of appreciation is distin-
guished from both respect and beneficent caring for another’s happiness and
well-being. In good friendships, for example, one not only respects the friend
but appreciates good things about the friend and in the friend’s life.
Appreciation requires some degree of understanding but is more than under-
standing, and appreciation is not the same as gratitude, though to be grateful is
in part to appreciate the evident good will of another person. Finally, the essay
calls attention to several merits of supplementing standard accounts by
including appreciation as an ideal.
17. “Ideals of Appreciation and Expressions of Respect” describes and
illustrates these ideals in personal relationships and then argues that they are
distinct from beneficence, that they are aspects of a full recognition of human
dignity, and that they have important general and special implications for
relationships involving persons with disabilities. Ideals of attitude and char-
acter are more than matters of wrongdoing and vice, and the ideal of appre-
ciation illustrated here is more than recognition of beauty in art and nature.
Respect for persons should constrain and limit our behavior and attitudes
toward others, but ideally it also calls for positive expressions that affirm one’s
recognition of a person’s humanity. With sketches of characters to illustrate,
the essay emphasizes that especially among family, friends, and care-givers,
the ideal of proper respect calls for positive affirmations of persons, not merely
dutiful constraint, and the ideal of appreciation calls for being open and
responsive to the good in life, in other persons, and in oneself. Appreciating
persons is more than respecting them and caring for their comfort and
happiness, and this has particular applications in relationships with persons
who have disabilities. Among other things, respect and appreciation for and by
us, as persons with disabilities, requires confronting and changing cultural
stigmas that undermine these morally important attitudes.
Notes
1. See C₁ in Abbreviations for Kant’s Works.

2. See G in Abbreviations for Kant’s Works.
3. Kant’s Doctrine of Virtue (Tugendlehre, here abbreviated TL), the second part of his late
work, The Metaphysics of Morals. See MM and TL in Abbreviations for Kant’s Works.
    9
4. Bittner (2002) and (2014).

5. Rosen (2012) and (2013).
6. Rousseau (1968).
7. O’Neill (1989).
8. Rawls (2005).
9. Rawls (1980).
10. Cummiskey (1996).
11. Slote (1992).
12. Urmson (1958).
13. Brownlee (2012).
14. Rawls (1999).
15. Rawls (2005).
PART I
K A N T A N D KA N T I A N
PERSPECTIVES
1
The Groundwork
Background: From the First Critique to the Groundwork
Immanuel Kant’s Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals has been one of
the most influential works in the history of moral philosophy.* It was also an
important step in the development of Kant’s critical philosophy. After noting
some background themes in Kant’s earlier work, this essay reviews its aims,
method, and main conclusions, highlighting some especially influential fea-
tures, and then calls attention to a few significant points of interpretation on
which scholars continue to disagree. The historical Kant has been blessed—or
cursed—with generations of commentators who have sought to absorb and
explain his monumental works. Different understandings are to be expected.
No definitive and comprehensive interpretation has been (or perhaps can even
be) given. This essay is no exception but aims to articulate my understanding
of some main ideas before mentioning a few of the many controversies.
Kant’s Groundwork followed shortly after his groundbreaking Critique of
Pure Reason, from which he drew ideas to develop for ethics in new and
radical ways. Among these were, first, his critical methodology that starts with
an examination of the powers of reason, second, the idea of a Copernican
Revolution in philosophy that calls for shifting our attention from the things
we know to our perspective as knowers, third, his defense of the possibility of
agent causation that is not entirely explicable by empirical causal laws, and,
fourth, his thesis that neither experience nor reason can prove or even allow us
to fully comprehend the existence of God, immortality, or freedom of the will.
To expand on these points briefly:
First, Kant’s methodology was to investigate the powers and limits of pure
reason, that is, reason insofar as it is not relying on empirical data. The
challenging question for mathematics, critical philosophy, and traditional
metaphysics was, “How are synthetic a priori propositions possible?” In
other words, how is it possible for there to be substantive propositions that
are knowable without reliance on empirical evidence and yet are not merely
self-contradictory to deny? The same question turns out to be a challenge for
ethics as well, though the challenge is hidden at first by Kant’s discussion of
14  
more familiar moral questions. The problem, to which Kant thought he had a
solution, is that common morality presupposes a guiding and constraining
supreme principle that purports to be necessarily rational but is not self-
contradictory to deny. Although many earlier philosophers emphasized the
importance of reason for ethics, Kant’s methodology deviates radically from
many of its rivals in the history of ethics. It rejects the Stoic attempt to ground
human norms in the nature of the universe, and it rejects theories of Aristotle,
Epicurus, and Hume insofar as they attempt in different ways to derive ethics
from human nature. It denies the Platonic idea that reason can perceive a
realm of independent moral truths, and it also rejects divine command
theories that base norms on an arbitrary divine will, though it leaves a place
for the Idea of a holy will or God that necessarily conforms to reason.
Second, Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason aims to bring about a revolution in
philosophy that is analogous to the Copernican Revolution in astronomy [C₁:
B xvi–xviii]. In brief, in the Critique of Pure Reason Kant argues that the world
as it appears to us, indeed the only world that we can know through science
and experience, is not entirely external to our powers of thought and under-
standing but is deeply dependent upon them. Moral judgments, however, do
not describe physical and psychological facts about the empirical world, and so
they are not beholden in the same way to what is “given” in spatiotemporally-
structured perception. For ethics, Kant develops an idea that is partly analogous
to his Copernican Revolution for theoretical philosophy, namely, the idea
that goodness is not to be found simply by observing nature but by applying
our rational action-guiding principles to the choices that natural phenomena
pose. Analogous to the pure categories of the understanding, which represent
necessary features of our take on how the world is, the idea of goodness,
and related moral ideas, represent how we must think that the world ought to
be. In the Groundwork what we judge good or bad to do depends ultimately on
what we will insofar as we are free and reason-governed. In Kant’s view, the
foundational principles of ethics do not stem from natural science, public
legislation, or individual choice but are principles that every person who has
practical reason cannot help but acknowledge, at least when clear-eyed and not
self-deceptive.
Third, a significant outcome of the Critique of Pure Reason for ethics is that,
according to Kant, every phenomenal event has a cause according to which
its effects must follow but nevertheless it is possible that there is another kind
of causality, a spontaneous initiation of a series of events, not explicable by
empirical laws of causation [C₁: A435/B463–A439/B467]. In the Critique of Pure
Reason, however, this non-empirical causation remains merely a possibility.
:    15
It is a task for the Groundwork (and the later Critique of Practical Reason) to
argue that we have compelling grounds to accept that we human beings, as
rational agents, have the capacity to be such free causes.
Fourth, the Critique of Pure Reason argues that the traditional metaphysical
ideas, such as God, a free will, and an immortal soul, cannot be comprehended
in empirical terms or grasped by intuition. What we can understand are things
that we can experience, or infer from experience, but these are things as they
appear to us (phenomena), not things in themselves (noumena). For example,
we can assess people’s empirical character by their patterns of behavior and
speech and by what we infer to be their thoughts and feelings, but a person’s
free will, as it is in itself, is ultimately inscrutable. We have Ideas of God,
freedom, and even immortality that can inform our thoughts and hopes, but
we can never perceive, intuit, or comprehend the objects of these thoughts.
Famously, Kant says that he has given a critique of reason in order to make
room for faith, but the Critique of Pure Reason does not provide his argument
for faith. The Groundwork, then, must work from the assumption that ethics
cannot be derived from religion, even though Kant later argues that elements
of religious faith can be supported by moral arguments.¹
These methodological and epistemological points are the important back-
ground for the Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals, but Kant’s explicit
argument in the Groundwork starts and proceeds from more familiar ideas
about what is most worthy of choice. The main themes are presented and
defended in a preface and three sections, some highlights of which are
sketched in the following sections.
Preface: Aims and Methods
Here Kant relates ethics as a rational discipline to other branches of know-

ledge, explaining that although its prescriptions are substantive, ethics must be
based on principles of pure reason. Empirical studies of matters related to
ethics, labeled practical anthropology, are distinguished from moral philosophy
proper, which is concerned with a priori principles of a pure rational will.
Kant’s focus, a pure rational will, is contrasted with Christian Wolff ’s focus on
the will in general (which includes non-rational and conditionally rational
choices). The aim of the Groundwork, Kant explains, is to seek out and
establish the supreme principle of morality. Seeking out the supreme principle,
which is the task of the first two sections of the Groundwork, requires not only
finding apt expressions of it but also showing that the principle expressed is
16  
the only principle that could satisfy the presupposition of common morality
that moral duties are based on a Categorical Imperative. The task of establish-
ing the supreme moral principle requires defense of the claim that moral
duties are, as common morality presupposes, in fact based on a Categorical
Imperative, that is, they are unconditional requirements of reason even for
imperfectly rational beings, like us, who can follow rational principles but can
also fail to do so. In the Groundwork (1785) Kant aims to lay out only
foundations for a whole system of moral principles based on reason, but he
also planned to return to develop such a moral system, or metaphysics of
morals, in a later work, The Metaphysics of Morals (1797–8). This subsequent
work, he anticipates, would show the adequacy of his first principles in
application, thereby clarifying and confirming those principles though not
by itself securely proving them.
Section One: The Principle of a Good Will
Here Kant famously claims that only a good will is good without qualification,
that only acts from duty have moral worth, and that such acts are morally
worthy because of their underlying principle rather than what they achieve or
aim to achieve. The principle of a good will, expressed in morally worthy acts,
is to respect and conform to universal law, and this, Kant argues, implies
acting only on maxims that one can will as universal law. The primary aim of
this first section is to identify features of our common rational cognition of
morality and show, by an analytical method, that these entail a commitment to
the supreme moral principle and that this principle enables us to identify
maxims on which it is wrong or morally unworthy to act. Kant explains that,
even if they do not always use it well, ordinary people have the rational
capacity to determine whether or not what they propose to do is morally
permissible. Nevertheless, moral philosophy is still needed to combat sophis-
try and confusion, and to provide a deeper understanding of our moral
thought and practice.
To expand on these basic points briefly, the first section opens with the
ringing declaration that only a good will is good without qualification [G 4:
393]. This proposition is not just about what is worth having when considered
apart from further effects. Innocent pleasures and deserved happiness are
good in that way. A person’s happiness if consistent with moral principles is
both good to the agent and among the things that others have some reason to
promote. The point of saying that a good will is good without qualification is
 :       17
not simply to say that it is non-instrumentally good but to affirm that when
our various desires and values conflict, nothing should take precedence over
what one does or would will as a person who has a good will committed to
following the moral law. Other things that we may value—such as talent,
power, wealth, and even happiness—are good to have and pursue only so long
as they can be pursued and enjoyed without violating the principle(s) of a
good will.
Kant does not mean here to endorse the self-righteous attitude that all that
matters is “keeping one’s own hands clean” regardless of what others do or
suffer as a result. Rather, to give priority to our good will in deliberation is
simply to treat duty as trumping any other things that we may desire. This
does not yet specify what our duty is. A good will is “good without qualifica-
tion” and so we must never abandon our good will in any context regardless of
what others are doing and even if harmful consequences will predictably
follow. That is, we must regard our best informed judgment that, all things
considered, it is our duty to do something as decisive in our deliberations. This
is not to deny, however, that what others may do or suffer as a result of our
decisions is generally relevant, though not always decisive, when we try to
determine what it is our duty to do in a given situation.
A second major idea that Kant finds in common rational knowledge of
morality is that only acts from duty have moral worth [G 4: 397–399]. Here
Kant sets aside cases where a person acts contrary to duty. Many people think
that a person could be morally commendable even when acting contrary to
duty if the person was conscientiously trying to do right and acted wrongly
solely because of a mistaken belief about what is morally required. Kant,
however, does not focus on such cases here, presumably because these cases
are not necessary to consider for the project at hand, which is to identify and
analyze the basic principle on which a person with a good will acts. For this
Kant focuses on the paradigm case in which one acts from duty by doing what
is in fact morally required because it is morally required.
According to Kant, one cannot tell for certain whether anyone, including
oneself, has ever acted solely from duty as opposed to acting to impress others,
to avoid censure, to express personal preferences, etc. Nevertheless, the ideal of
doing what is right because it is right can inspire us as we deliberate about
what to do. In Kant’s view, acting this way would have a special moral worth as
manifesting a moral commitment that everyone should have. Moral worth,
however, is not like a gold star, a reward for virtue, or an earned right to be
praised by others. There is no way to measure or even identify it with certainty,
and although we should strive for the strength of will (or virtue) always to
18  
conform to duty and do so from duty (at least when inclinations tempt us to do
otherwise), this does not mean that we have a duty to accumulate a record of as
many exemplary acts of moral worth as possible. One person of good will may
face extraordinary moral challenges and temptations and so act with explicit
thoughts of duty more often than another, but the first is not necessarily a
better person than the second because, assuming that the second also has a
good will, presumably she too would act similarly if facing the same challenges
and temptations. The moral goodness of a person is not measured by the
number of a person’s morally worthy deeds but by the quality of that person’s
will. Kant’s point, seen in context, is that only acts from duty would fully
express a person’s morally good will in action. This proposition is not offered
as a comprehensive theory of comparative praiseworthiness but rather as a
step in Kant’s project in the first section of the Groundwork, which is to “seek
out” the fundamental principle of an unqualifiedly good will.
The search continues as Kant asks, what gives acts from duty their moral
worth? [G 4: 399] In other words, what about such acts identifies them as acts
of good will? It is not that they have desirable consequences, for even with
the best possible will a person may be unsuccessful in achieving his or her
ends and by chance even a bad will can bring about desirable outcomes.
Furthermore, the identifying mark of a good will is not even the intention to
produce certain results, for a person of good will is not concerned only with
consequences. Of course people of good will include the happiness of others,
self-improvement, etc., among their ends, but always with constraints on the
means that they will use to promote the ends. We cannot identify any type of
end (such as happiness) such that aiming to promote it shows that a person is
acting from a good will. Instead the essential mark of an act of good will is the
underlying principle on which the act is based independently of the agent’s
personal wishes and desires. Kant proceeds to identify the principle as respect
for law or to conform to universal law as such [G 4: 400–1]. Laws in this context
are by definition necessary and universal rational principles, and so we can
infer at least that a good will respects and conforms to universal law by
obeying necessary and universal rational principles, whatever these may be
(which is not yet specified).
Kant next describes the principle of a good will as “I ought never to act in
such a way that I could not also will that my maxim should become a universal
law” [G 4: 402]. This is essentially the same principle that Kant later declares to
be the only possible Categorical Imperative and a way of testing whether or
not one’s maxims are permissible to act on. Kant does not fill in the argument
to show how this action-guiding principle expresses or follows from the
 :      19
preceding “Conform to universal law as such.” Instead he proceeds to illustrate

how the principle, or a variant of it,² can show that it is morally wrong, even if
prudentially expedient, to make a lying promise to extricate oneself from a
distressful predicament. He expresses confidence that ordinary reason is
sufficient to know the difference between right and wrong, but explains that
philosophy may be needed to combat the confusions and self-serving quib-
bling that otherwise might lead us astray.
Section Two: Duty Presupposes the Categorical Imperative

and Autonomy of the Will
In the next section Kant makes a partly new attempt to seek out the supreme
principle of morality, now starting from the idea of duty rather than from the
idea of a good will. He first repeatedly insists that all moral philosophy must be
based on a priori principles [G 4: 406–413]. Contrasting his view with popular
philosophy, which mixes conceptual and empirical claims, he argues that only
one principle could be a purely rational moral principle [G 4: 413–421]. That
principle, which he calls the Categorical Imperative, ultimately turns out to be
more or less equivalent to the claim that we ought always to act as free and
rational beings with the capacity and disposition to govern ourselves by
rational principles independently of our sensuous impulses and inclinations
[G 4: 421–440].
The starting point of this section is the common distinction between what
we must do to promote our own desire-based interests and what we are
morally required to do whether or not it serves those interests [G 4:
413–417]. Rational requirements to promote desire-based interests are what
Kant calls hypothetical imperatives whereas moral requirements are (or are
based on) categorical imperatives. All imperatives are principles that a fully
rational person would follow in the relevant context and which therefore
imperfectly rational beings ought to follow [G 4: 413]. Hypothetical impera-
tives, however, are rational requirements that are doubly conditional: they are
binding only if they do not violate categorical (moral) requirements and only
insofar as they promote our personal ends or (more generally) the end of
attaining happiness that we have by natural necessity. Categorical imperatives
are principles that any fully rational person would follow regardless of whether
doing so promotes the person’s personal ends or happiness.
Famously Kant formulates several versions of the supreme moral principle
(the Categorical Imperative), arguing that these are at bottom the same and
20  
suggesting that they progressively reveal various aspects of the fundamental

requirements of morality [G 4: 421–440].³ In brief, the main formulations are:
(1) act only on maxims that you can will as universal laws, (2) act so that you
always treat humanity, in your own person or in the person of any other, never
simply as a means but always at the same time as an end in itself, and (3)
always act as if you were an autonomous law-maker in a possible kingdom of
ends in which the rational members make the laws to which they are subject
while abstracting from personal differences [G 4: 421–440]. Kant illustrates
the application of the first two of these principles by describing four cases. In
each situation a person considers doing something that Kant regards as
wrong: making a lying promise to get a loan, committing suicide to escape
discomfort and troubles, neglecting to cultivate one’s talents simply because
one prefers a life of ease, and refusing to give aid to the needy when one easily
could [G 4: 421–423, 429–430]. There is a vast literature concerning the
interpretation of these formulations and the relations among them, but
I respectfully pass over these controversies here in order to focus on the
outlines of the main argument of the Groundwork.⁴ Even the number of
formulations remains controversial, but from the list above drawn from
Kant’s review [G 4: 346], clearly (1) attempts to re-articulate formally the
basic idea of the Golden Rule, and (2) affirms human dignity as a barrier to
unrestrained consequentialist thinking, and (3) sketches abstractly the ideal
of a community in which all moral agents are authors of the moral laws to
which they are subject.
Kant argues progressively from formula to formula, ending with the striking
conclusion that autonomy of the will is the supreme principle of morality
[G 4: 440]. In effect, he argues, to act morally is to follow the Categorical
Imperative, which amounts to acting as a fully rational and free person.
Freedom here is not license to do as one pleases but autonomy of the will,
which (as indicated at the beginning of the next section) entails both freedom
negatively conceived, a rational capacity and disposition to act independently
of determination by alien causes, and freedom positively conceived, a rational
capacity and disposition to govern oneself in accordance with rational prin-
ciples that (in a sense) one gives to oneself [G 4: 446–447]. All previous moral
theories, Kant argues, have failed to appreciate the central role of this auton-
omy of the will. In various ways, insofar as they are substantive, the previous
theories—ethical egoism, moral sense theories, divine command theories, and
rationalist perfection theories—give us only reasons to act based on hypothet-
ical imperatives, which, as Kant has argued, cannot support the unconditional
demands of morality [G 4: 441–444].
 :     21
Kant ends section two with a surprising concession that for all he has shown
there may be no genuine categorical imperative and so morality may be an
illusion [G 4: 445]. His argument so far proceeded analytically from the
common idea of moral duty. It attempted to show that assuming we are
subject to moral duty, we must follow its supreme principle, the Categorical
Imperative, and that this is true if and only if as rational agents we have
autonomy of the will. The argument is conditional, leaving open the possibility
that we are mistaken in assuming that we have duties. Assuming, then, that we
are imperfect rational agents and, as Kant has argued, imperfect rational
agents have moral duties as specified by the Categorical Imperative if (but
only if) they have autonomy of the will, it remains for the third section to show
that we imperfectly rational agents have autonomy of the will or, what is
supposed to be the same from a practical standpoint, we must necessarily
conceive of ourselves as having autonomy of the will. This would “establish”
the supreme moral principle as a rational principle of choice.
Section Three: Practical Reason Presupposes

Autonomy of the Will
In the third section of the Groundwork Kant responds to the lingering worry
left in the preceding section that morality might be a mere phantom of the
brain. This may seem surprising because it is not a primary aim of Kant’s
moral theory to respond to those who doubt the judgments of ordinary
morality, and indeed he has already expressed in section one his confidence
that common reason is capable of discerning right from wrong. So what is his
aim? What would it mean for morality to be a mere illusion? Recall that Kant
has in effect analyzed the moral judgment that we have a duty as a prescription
or prohibition that is categorically imperative, implying that we have compel-
ling and overriding reasons to follow it. A moral duty is supposed to be an
unconditional rational requirement, which any fully rational person would
follow (in the specified conditions) and that imperfect rational beings ought to
follow if they can. That we have rational capacities of some kind but are not
fully rational is not in question here. What the preceding discussion has not
yet shown is that the moral requirements that we believe in are really, as they
purport to be, rational imperatives for us that we “ought” and even “must”
follow. If we were fully rational without inclinations, Kant argues, we would
necessarily conform to the moral requirements. And he argues that if we were
entirely natural beings whose behavior is determined by inclinations, then we
22  
would be incapable of governing ourselves by rational moral principles. But as

human beings we are in between: we are neither purely rational nor completely
governed by inclinations [G 4: 453–454]. What Kant needs to show is that we
have the capacity or freedom to follow rational requirements even when they
conflict with our inclinations. In section two Kant purports to have shown that
any fully rational person, acting rationally, would follow the principles
expressed in the formulations of the Categorical Imperative, and so any
imperfectly rational person who can follow them has a moral obligation to
do so. What he has argued, then, is that if free, that is, capable of governing
ourselves by moral principles, we imperfectly rational beings are under moral
obligation to follow them.
Another way of expressing the doubt that remains at the end of the
preceding section is to say that we do not yet know whether or not the
principle of a good will, which Kant has argued is the only principle that
could be a Categorical Imperative, is really a Categorical Imperative [G 4: 445].
That may seem puzzling because he has apparently articulated several formu-
lations of what he repeatedly calls “the Categorical Imperative,” arguing that
only this principle (or these formulations) could be a Categorical Imperative in
the strictest sense—a requirement that is unconditionally rational for anyone
to follow. What Kant has shown in the previous discussion is only that certain
shared ideas in ordinary morality presuppose that there is such a rational
principle and that it serves as the basis of common moral judgments about
what duties we have. So there would really be a Categorical Imperative, as
morality presupposes as its basis, if imperfectly rational beings such as us have
the freedom to act as we would if we were fully rational, even though we often
fail to do so.
Kant’s argument in response to these concerns is notoriously difficult to
follow, and interpretations remain controversial. Here I only sketch the main
steps as I understand them. Kant begins with the idea of a will, characterizing it
as an ability of living rational beings to cause events in accord with the idea of a
law [G 4: 446]. Then he defines a free will in a negative sense as a will that can
work independently of determination by alien causes. So a free will can make
things happen in the world without being deterministically caused or motiv-
ated by sensuous inclinations and desires. Then Kant argues that a will that is
free in a negative sense must also be free in a positive sense (autonomy). The
key idea here is that a free will cannot be lawless, and so rational beings with
free wills must be subject to laws, that is, universal rational principles that
they necessarily acknowledge as their own or “give to themselves.” Next Kant
re-affirms (from section two) that if a will is free in the positive sense
   23
(autonomy), then it is subject to the moral law as expressed by the Categorical

Imperative. Any rational being, then, is subject to the moral law if that person
has a will that is free in the negative sense.
The next subsection [G 4: 447–448] attempts to remove the conditional
clause. That is, Kant argues that all rational beings necessarily have wills that
are free in the negative sense, or at least we must presume this from the
standpoint of practice (choice and action), which means it is a valid principle
for determining what we ought to do. The main argument is this: 1) we cannot
act except under the idea of freedom, taking ourselves to have free wills when
we choose and act, 2) anyone who cannot act except under the idea of
freedom, is free from a practical standpoint (i.e. the practical laws are binding
for such a person just as they would be if the person were free), 3) therefore, we
are free from a practical standpoint.
This basic argument is followed by a lengthy response to the imagined
objection that his reasoning is circular [G 4: 449–450]. Kant’s answer is No,
because we can and must see ourselves as members of not only a “sensible
world” in which all phenomenal events are caused but also an “intelligible
world” in which we can think and make choices free from determination by
such causes. As moral agents and even in theoretical thinking, we cannot help
but regard ourselves (with others) as having the capacity to reason without
being determined by sensuous causes and so as negatively and positively free.
Such freedom is an idea we must use from a practical standpoint but it cannot
be comprehended in empirical terms.
Questions of Interpretation
Serious scholars often disagree, and here are some of the persistent contro-
versies. For example, contemporary writers disagree about whether Kant is
committed to a strong version of the guise of the good thesis. Did Kant believe
that when we choose to act we necessarily see our act as objectively and
completely good?⁵ Kant no doubt thought that when one wills to do something
then one regards acting in that way to be good in some sense [C₂ 5: 63–64]. But
good in what sense? When we choose to do something then we generally
regard it as good to do at least in a subjective sense, for example, that doing it
pleases us or is likely to get us something that we want. Also Kant held that
when one wills fully in accord with reason then one wills only what is
objectively and completely good to do—that is, either unconditionally good
or good subject to some condition that is in fact satisfied. More controversial is
24  
whether in willing to do something one necessarily takes it to be good (or at

least permissible) for anyone to do. The relevant texts are complicated. Kant at
times seems to identify the will with practical reason [G 4: 413], and practical
reason determines both what is instrumentally good and what is good in itself.
And yet Kant seems to imply that we often do will to act contrary to reason
[G 4: 413, 454–455]. In later works Kant distinguishes between two senses of
will—practical reason (Wille) and choice (Willkür), but it is uncertain to what
extent the distinction is implicit in the Groundwork.⁶
Why does this controversy matter? The strongest versions of the guise of the
good thesis seem to have troubling implications. For example, if I always take
what I will to be objectively, universally, and unconditionally good, then
I cannot knowingly will to do something that I believe to be bad or wrong.
All wrongdoing would be due to moral errors or perhaps self-deception.
Weakness of will and willful wrongdoing, as commonly understood, would
be impossible. It is also not clear how Kant interprets weakness of will. In his
view, the will is not a physical power that could be literally strong or weak like
a muscle, but instead in all voluntary actions, including weak-willed wrong-
doing, what we will are maxims that “incorporate” our incentives (Allison
2011, Reath 2015). Would, then, a person doing wrong from weakness of will
have simultaneously two conflicting maxims, an ineffective good moral maxim
as well as the bad maxim on which he actually acts?⁷
Another controversy that persists concerns how to interpret the several
formulations of the Categorical Imperative and the relations among them. The
extent to which Kant meant for formulations of the Categorical Imperative to
serve as practical guides to moral decision making remains controversial
despite passages that strongly suggest that at least some of them can serve
this role. Scholars also differ about which formulation, if any, is the most
comprehensive and illuminating of the basic requirements of morality. Onora
O’Neill (1989), Oliver Sensen (2011), Barbara Herman (1993), and Jens
Timmermann (2011), for example, give priority to the formulas of universal
law, treating the later formulations as more or less the same or derivatives.
Allen Wood (1999) treats the later formulations as more illuminating and
grounded in moral realist metaphysics. John Rawls (2000), by contrast, devel-
ops a constructivist reading of the formulations that retains the priority of the
(appropriately reconstructed) universal law formula. My own work has
emphasized the kingdom of ends formula as combining aspects of the supreme
principle expressed in the earlier formulations.⁸ These controversies matter
not only because they are about how to understand Kant’s supreme moral
principle and its role in moral judgment but also because they concern crucial
   25
steps in Kant’s overall argument that all previous moral theories are mistaken
and morality is not based on an illusion.
Questions also remain unsettled about the content of the formulations as
well as their relative priority.⁹ For example, how specific are maxims meant to
be? Are they a person’s broad generic life-governing principles, or more
specific expressions of one’s intentions in particular contexts?¹⁰ Is the formula
of universal law that Kant introduces distinct from the often conflated formula
of autonomy?¹¹ We are to treat humanity in each person as an end in itself, but
what is humanity? For example, is it the same as a good will,¹² or the capacity
for having a good will, all aspects of our rational nature, or simply the capacity
to set ends for oneself?¹³ How are we to understand legislation in the kingdom
of ends? Are we to think of ideal rational law-makers jointly legislating moral
principles by which they will be governed (by analogy to state legislation) or
are we to imagine individuals willing that their personal maxims be adopted by
(or permissible for) everyone?¹⁴
Here, briefly, are three further questions that concern particular texts.
First, to what degree does the moral law leave room for the pursuit of our
personal projects? Kant says that to harmonize positively with humanity as an
end in itself everyone must endeavor “as far as he can to promote the ends of
others” and that “for this idea is to have its full effect in me” the ends of any
person who is an end in himself must “be also, so far as possible, my ends”
[G 4: 430]. Does this mean that we must always promote the happiness of
others instead of our own at every opportunity unless we are trying to fulfill
some other competing duty? Commentators disagree about this and whether
Kant acknowledges any sense in which an act can be morally good to do but
not required.¹⁵
Second, does Kant’s argument in the second paragraph of Groundwork III
[G 4: 446–447] imply that we act freely only when we act on the moral law? It
may seem so because Kant argues that negative freedom of will is also positive
freedom (autonomy), and the principle expressive of autonomy (“being a law
to itself”) is “acting on no other maxim than one that can also have being itself
a universal law for its object” [G 4: 447]. If this is a version of the Categorical
Imperative, the apparent implication is that only acts based on the moral law
are free and therefore all wrong acts are unfree and so we are not responsible
for them. Most scholars reject this interpretation, but the texts suggesting it
require explanation.
Third, what exactly was the circular reasoning that in Groundwork III Kant
dramatically pretends that he has fallen into? [G 4: 448–450] How did he think
that in the end he could avoid the charge? In both the Groundwork and the
26  
Critique of Practical Reason Kant defends what has been called the reciprocity
thesis: one is subject to the moral law if and only if one is free. Kant apparently
thought that he might be read as arguing both (1) we know that we are subject
to the moral law because we know that we are free and (2) we know we are free
because we know that we are subject to the moral law [C₂ 5: 5n]. This, of
course, would be circular reasoning. In the Critique of Practical Reason Kant
clearly adopts the second line of argument,¹⁶ but was this a reversal of the
argument in Groundwork III? [C₂ 5: 5n] It seems so because in the first two
paragraphs of Groundwork III Kant argues explicitly that if negatively free a
will must be free positively and so must be subject to the moral law (even if not
always following it). And in the fourth paragraph he argues that every rational
agent, from a practical standpoint, is negatively free. Thus so far, in the early
paragraphs, the argument is (1), that is, because we know (or have warranted
belief) that we are free, we know that are subject to the moral law. Why then
did he raise the suspicion that he also argued for (2), inferring freedom from
morality? Did he worry that his claim that we cannot act except under the idea
of freedom was based on our sense that we can always resist sensuous desires
to do our duty? In any case, he seems to respond by offering a non-moral
argument that we must think of ourselves as free. That is, even in theoretical
thinking one must take oneself to belong to the intelligible world, which is not
governed by empirical causal laws, and to do so is to think of oneself as free.
There are other ways to interpret the apparent circularity and the intended
escape, and we may wonder whether Kant’s ideas of freedom and the intelli-
gible world are sufficient for his purpose if these are, as he says, ultimately
inexplicable.
Notes
* This chapter is reproduced from “The Groundwork” in The Kantian Mind, edited by
Mark Timmons and Sorin Baiasu (Routledge Publishers, forthcoming), ch. 12.
1. C₁, especially 5: 122–148. See also R.
2. “Act as though the maxim of your action were to become by your will a universal law of
nature” G 4: 421.
3. G 4: 436. In order to distinguish Kant’s comprehensive moral principle from more
specific moral principles that he sometimes calls categorical imperatives, I capitalize the
term when it refers to versions of his comprehensive moral principle.
4. See, for example, Allison (2011), Baron (1995), Cummiskey (1996), Dean (2006), Guyer
(2007), Korsgaard (1996), Herman (1993), O’Neill (1989), Rawls (1999), Reath (2015),
Sedgwick (2008), Sensen (2011), Timmerman (2011), and Wood (1999 and 2008).
   27
5. For some discussion of this issue, see Hill (2002b, 2008, 2012a); Reath (2015); and
Engstrom (2009).
6. For example, MM 6: 213–14 and R 6: 25–26.
7. See Hill (2008c), 107–128.
8. See, for example, Hill (2003a).
9. For a review of various interpretations, see Hill (2006a).
10. See O’Neill (1989), 83–88.
11. See Wood (1999), 156–190.
12. See Dean (2006), 1–106.
13. See Korsgaard (1996), 106–132.
14. See Hill (2001).
15. See Baron and Seymour Fahmy (2009), Baron (2015), and Hill (1971), (2002a), and
(2015).
16. C₁ [5:5n].
2
Imperfect Duties to Oneself
All too often English-speaking students are familiar with Kant’s ethics only
from reading excerpts from his Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals, but
scholars in recent times have also focused attention on his later works, The
Metaphysics of Morals, Religion within the Bounds of Mere Reason, Lectures
on Ethics, and more.*,¹ Their detailed commentaries on Kant’s texts clarify
particular aspects of Kant’s thought, show how it developed over time, expose
and address apparent inconsistencies, and reveal the extraordinary depth and
scope of his philosophical ambition. This essay was written as a part of a
cooperative commentary on Kant’s late work The Metaphysics of Morals. The
section addressed here concerns what Kant called imperfect duties to oneself.
As will become evident the style of this essay is that of close textual examin-
ation, as the occasion required, but the ideas can be generally accessible and
they are presupposed in a Kantian perspective on topics in later essays in this
volume, such as virtue, conscience, self-respect, suicide, and (perhaps surpris-
ingly) even beneficence and appreciation.
Kant discusses imperfect duties to oneself in the second part of The
Metaphysics of Morals.² Kant’s discussion of ethical duties to oneself concludes
with Book II entitled “On a Human Being’s Imperfect Duties to Himself (with
Regard to His End)” (TL 6: 444.11f.). The discussion is divided into two
sections with descriptive titles: “On a Human Being’s Duty to Himself to
Develop and Increase His Natural Perfection, That Is, for a Pragmatic
Purpose” (TL 6: 444.14–16) and “On a Human Being’s Duty to Himself to
Increase His Moral Perfection, That Is, for a Moral Purpose Only” (TL 6:
446.10f.).
My comments will be divided as follows. First, as background I review some
general points about ethical duties, duties to oneself, and imperfect duties.
Second, I summarize and comment briefly on the text regarding the duty to
develop and increase one’s natural perfection, book II, section I, §19 and §20
(TL 6: 444.13–446.8). Here the main questions are: what is required, and why?
We need also to consider the significance of “for a Pragmatic Purpose” (TL 6:
444.15–16). Third, I review and comment briefly on the text regarding the
duty to increase one’s moral perfection, section II, §21 and §22 (TL 6:
    29
446.9–447.17). Again, the main questions are: what is required, and why? Here
we must consider the significance of “the frailty (fragilitas) of human nature”
(TL 6: 446.27) and the “unfathomable depths” (cf. TL 6: 447.1) of the human
heart. The answer should help to see why the duty to increase one’s moral
perfection is “imperfect” (TL 6: 446.26) even though it does not allow the same
kinds of latitude as the imperfect duties of beneficence and cultivation of one’s
natural powers.
Background and General Concepts
The main concepts employed in TL 6: 444–446 have been presented in

previous sections of TL. A brief review of some points, however, may be useful
for subsequent discussion.
Ethical duties
The imperfect duties to oneself are ethical duties, belonging to the Doctrine of
Virtue, as opposed to juridical duties as discussed in the Doctrine of Right.
Among other things, this implies that they are not duties that can be externally
legislated (e.g. by Parliament or Congress) or enforced (e.g. by police) in a legal
system. Further, rather than prescribing specific actions, ethics (in the narrow
sense relevant here) basically prescribes ends. Kant’s explanation of the
supreme principle of the Doctrine of Virtue has elements of the universal
law formula and the humanity formula of the categorical imperative. Most
generally, it says “act in accordance with a maxim of ends that it can be a
universal law for everyone to have” (TL 6: 395.15f.). Kant explains: “In
accordance with this principle a human being is an end for himself as well
as for others” (TL 6: 395.17). Thus, beyond merely avoiding using himself (or
his humanity) as a mere means, it is “his duty to make man as such his end”
(TL 6: 395.20f.). On this basis presumably, Kant proposes that the two main
“ends that are duties” are the perfection of oneself and the happiness of others
(cf. TL 6: 385.30–388.30, 391.26–394.12).
It should be noted that Kant seems to use two different ideas of an end.
Perfection and happiness are ends of a kind that can be developed and
promoted to various degrees, but at least in the Groundwork humanity as an
end in itself seems to be a status or value, ascribed by reason, to be respected
and honored in various ways rather than itself an end literally to be promoted
30    
(like the happiness of others) or increased (like the degree of perfection of our
natural and moral powers).³ There need be no inconsistency here. “Treating
humanity in each person as an end in itself” in the Groundwork may not mean
quite the same as “making man as such one’s end” in the Doctrine of Virtue. In
the Doctrine of Virtue, for example, Kant primarily focuses on how a proper
regard for humanity requires more than refraining from specific acts that treat
persons as mere means.⁴ If so, then the Groundwork principle that we must
treat humanity as an end-in-itself rather than a mere means can be consistently
regarded as a ground for making perfection and happiness ends (in a narrower
sense) to pursue and promote (cf. G 4: 430.10–27). Whether or not there is a
shift in the sense in which humanity is an “end” from the Groundwork to the
Doctrine of Virtue, the crucial question is how one’s own perfection and the
happiness of others are the two fundamental ends required by proper regard for
humanity as an end. And here we are concerned with the Doctrine of Virtue.
If we were to treat the requirement to make man as such our end as different
from the humanity formula of the Groundwork, the former would be a more
specific principle suitable for the Doctrine of Virtue whereas another aspect of
the humanity formula (i.e. do not treat persons as mere means) would remain
especially appropriate to the Doctrine of Right.⁵ On this view, one might
suppose that man as such is an end in the same way that perfection and
happiness are ends. The expression “man as such” (TL 6: 395.20) would refer
to an abstract ideal of a person who realized as fully as possible the distinctive
human capacities for morality and the cultivation and use of theoretical and
practical reason. It is an obligatory end in the sense that we should strive to make
ourselves more like the ideal. As others have noted, there is textual support for
this use of the idea of humanity—or man as such—as an ideal to strive for.
Duties to oneself
Kant’s classification of imperfect duties of self-perfection as duties to oneself

has implications regarding their object, source, and appropriate sanctions.
Their object—what they are about—is how we treat ourselves especially
regarding important natural and moral capacities, dispositions, and powers,
such as survival, sex, food and drink, speech, socially useful talents, memory,
imagination, conscience, and ability to do what is right from duty despite
temptations. Perfect duties to oneself are typically about whether we abuse,
damage, or disrespect our basic human powers and capacities, whereas the
imperfect duties to oneself are about developing these and improving them.
    31
Lying is contrary to a duty to oneself because it is an abuse of the power of

speech. Servility violates a duty to oneself because it fails to respect one’s own
value or status as a human being.
The source of all ethical duties, in a sense, is that humanity in each person is
an end in itself, but we can think of the source of duties to oneself in particular
as that value or status of humanity in one’s own person. We must preserve,
develop, and respect ourselves as human beings and not simply to enable us to
fulfill our responsibilities to others. Kant does not develop in detail the
arguments from one’s humanity as an end to particular duties to oneself, but
to say that the former is the source of the latter (as I understand it) is just to say
that there are good arguments of this sort, not that there is a metaphysical
brute fact from which normative conclusions flow.
With regard to appropriate sanctions for non-compliance, the expression
“a duty to (someone)” is commonly used to identify the person who has the
primary claim and right to complain if the duty is not fulfilled. Accordingly if
I have a duty to myself, I would be the person who has the primary respon-
sibility to fulfill the duty and the right to complain and pass judgment (on
myself) for failures.⁶ This seems to be Kant’s position. Not only are these
duties to oneself unenforceable by law, they are generally not the business of
others.⁷ The only basic end obligatory to promote regarding others is their
happiness, not their perfection. Conscience serves as an inner court in which
we accuse and pass judgment on ourselves but not, of course, on others. Even
our duty not to lead others into temptation, Kant argues, depends on concern
not for their moral well-being, but for the happiness they might lose because of
pangs of conscience (cf. TL 6: 394.1–12).
Imperfect duties
Kant’s distinctions between perfect and imperfect and between wide and
narrow are controversial, but some points are clear enough. The principles
that express imperfect duties in the Doctrine of Virtue are fundamentally
requirements to adopt the obligatory ends whole-heartedly and so have
these ends shape one’s plans and pursuits in an appropriate way. To adopt
the ends is a strict duty, a categorical imperative, but the principles do not
specify completely what one must do, when, and how much.⁸ As ethical duties
the principles of imperfect duty “leave[.] a playroom (latitudo) for free choice
in following (complying with) the law, that is, [ . . . ] the law cannot specify
precisely in what way one is to act and how much one is to do by the action for
32    
an end that is also a duty” (TL 6: 390.6–9). We must make it our maxim to
pursue the obligatory ends, but the principles do not specify particular acts
that must be done or exactly how much latitude we have promoting the ends.
Judgment is required, and the kind and amount of latitude varies with the end
in question. Our duty to ourselves to promote our natural perfection, Kant
says, is “wide and imperfect” (TL 6: 446.5) because “it determines nothing
about the kind and extent of actions themselves but allows latitude for free
choice” (TL 6: 446.6–8). The classification of the duty to promote one’s moral
perfection is more complex and harder to understand. Kant says, “[t]his duty
to oneself is a narrow and perfect one in terms of [ . . . ] quality [ . . . ] and
imperfect in terms of [ . . . ] degree, because of the frailty (fragilitas) of human
nature” (TL 6: 446.25–27). We need to consider what this means after review-
ing the content of the duty.
One’s Duty to Oneself to Develop One’s Natural Powers
The general topic is in the heading “On a Human Being’s Imperfect Duties to
Himself (with Regard to His End)” (TL 6: 444:11f.). The ideas of imperfect
duties and duties to oneself have been reviewed briefly above, and “with
Regard to His End” indicates that the duties in question are about the end
referred to in the supreme principle of the Doctrine of Virtue. This is an end
that “can be a universal law for everyone to have” (TL 6: 395.16)—humanity or
“man as such” (TL 6: 395.20). At least regarding the imperfect duties, this
seems to be an abstract ideal of a human being that has fully realized certain
distinctive natural and moral capacities. And the duty, beyond not treating
these as a mere means, is to strive to approximate more closely to this ideal and
to do so on principle. The duty, like all duties of virtue, can be fulfilled only if
one adopts the end from duty or respect for the moral law rather than, for
example, to promote one’s happiness. Moreover, because it is a duty to oneself
the requirement cannot be met if one’s motive is simply to acquire the means
to satisfy one’s duties to others. Self-improvement is a requirement of self-
respect, not just prudence or service to others.
The content and latitude of the duty to develop natural powers
The first derivative imperfect duty to oneself regarding one’s end is described
in the heading to section I: “On a Human Being’s Duty to Himself to Develop
Another random document with
no related content on Scribd:
About 5 p.m. on the 15th the enemy started a heavy barrage and
were seen to be massing on our right, but our guns were at once
turned on these and dispersed the assembly. The Buffs were
relieved the same night by the 2nd Leinsters, and three days later
moved to Burgomaster’s Farm at Dickebusch under Major Vaughan,
the commanding officer, Lt.-Colonel F. C. R. Studd, D.S.O., having
been wounded the previous day. The casualties from the 7th to the
10th inclusive were Captain A. F. Gulland, who died on the 16th, 2nd
Lieuts. Sherwill, H. C. Arnold (died on the 12th), Hilary and Curtis
and 28 men wounded and 4 killed; but during the 14th, 15th and 16th
the loss was more considerable, 2nd Lieuts. Paige, Carlos and
Edwards, with 14 men, were killed; Captain Hall and 2nd Lieuts.
Darling, Wilkinson, Young, Lilley, Greig and Lt.-Colonel Studd, with
89 other ranks, were wounded, though the commanding officer
remained at duty for some time. There were also 4 men missing.
Times in this neighbourhood and at this period were, however, too
strenuous to allow of much rest to anyone, and when the 23rd June
came round again it found the Buffs once more in the trenches and,
forty-eight hours afterwards, under an abnormally heavy fire, which
did little damage to the front line, but found several victims amongst
working parties in rear. 2nd Lieut. J. B. Millard was killed and Major
Vaughan and Lieut. Hancock narrowly escaped from the same shell,
and it is curious that both these officers were slightly hurt by another
one only a few minutes later. 2nd Lieut. A. H. Webb was also killed.
It was decided to push forward certain posts during the night of the
26th/27th, and B Company on the left actually did so and got to the
edge of a wood which was on its front and there consolidated, but A
Company, on the right, found that any advance would be impossible
without heavy artillery assistance. The 23rd of the month brought a
Military Cross for 2nd Lieut. Sherwill. On the 28th relief came in the
shape of the 8th Battalion York and Lancaster Regiment, but the
change over was a nasty job. The enemy appeared to have got wind
of what was going forward and opened a heavy fire, wounding Lieut.
Newcomb and three other men. The 29th took the battalion away. It
travelled by train to Reninghelst for the training area round Lumbres,
and on the last day of the month it marched fourteen kilometres to
Escocuilles.
THE LOOS CRASSIERS
SPOIL (OR THE BUFFS’) BANK
CHAPTER XI
THE WESTERN FRONT
(Continuation till March, 1918)
I. 1st Battalion
A
t the commencement of the last chapter the readers were
reminded that the Russians made a separate peace with the
enemy towards the end of 1917, and that the Americans having
declared war against Germany in April the vanguard of her troops
began to come into action on the 27th October, so that the defection
of the one nation was in the end counteracted by the determination
of the other. As has been said, America at first possessed but a tiny
army, and though a few troops were fighting in Europe at the end of
1917, still her real force could not make itself felt for months
afterwards. Consequently there was an interval between the collapse
of Russia and Rumania and the arrival of a capable American army.
During this space the French and English must bear the whole brunt
of the struggle, and the Germans, whose railways were planned
strategically, with the idea of being able to rapidly transfer armies
from her eastern to her western frontier or vice versa, were not the
people to fail to take full advantage of such an opportunity.
These facts must be borne in mind in studying what follows. As a
matter of fact, our enemies started on the 21st March, 1918, a
mighty effort to sweep us into the sea and overwhelm the French.
This chapter will therefore continue the story of the doings of the
Buffs on the Western front up to this date. Like the previous chapter,
it is a record of trench warfare varied by fighting and the necessary
rest and reorganization which followed each battle.
The most important action was perhaps that of Cambrai, in which
both the 1st and 6th Battalions took part, and it may therefore be as
well first to continue the narrative of these two units: the village of
Mazingarbe is, roughly speaking, four miles from Loos in the
direction of comparative safety, and this place may be considered as
the chief station of the 1st Battalion up to the 15th November—that is
to say, that it was the resting-place when trenches were not occupied
somewhere near Loos or Hulluch. Of course, there were certain
alterations, for troops took turn to go into the reserve of the division
or some higher formation, and the more important that portion of the
army was, the further back from the front line were stationed its
reserves; for instance, on the 13th July the Buffs went into divisional
reserve for a week at Fouquieres, near Bethune, and for a time in
October they were in G.H.Q. reserve at Flechin.
The most important and the pleasantest change of programme,
however, was a long period of rest at Monchy Breton (about twelve
miles west of Mazingarbe), which is an area set apart for giving a
change of scene to tired troops. The battalion was allowed a month
here which, in addition to training, was devoted to sport and health-
giving recreation; a composite company, under the command of
Captain Strauss, it secured the highest number of marks in the
brigade sports and won the divisional challenge cup for the smartest
turn-out and work in an attack scheme.
During the period between the 1st July and the 15th November
officers and men of the 1st Battalion received a considerable number
of decorations and honours: on the 3rd July the Corps Commander
inspected C and D Companies, which had furnished the raiding party
on the 23rd June; after offering his congratulations he presented
Military Medals to Sgts. Cross, Goodall and Poole, Corpl. Sindon
and L.-Corpl. Spenceley, and to Privates Halliday and Searle, all of C
Company. In D Company Military Medals were given to Sgts. Barker,
Buss, Evans and Moorcock, Corpl. Duff, and to L.-Corpls. Curd,
Green and Page. During this period Lieuts. Marshall, Moss and
Wyatt were awarded the M.C., and Captain Jacobs and Lieut.
Worster the clasp to the M.C.; C.S.M.’s McDonough and Randall
received the D.C.M., the latter also being given a commission and
posted to C Company; Pte. Sage received the M.M., and Corpl. Duff
the Decoration Militaire (Belgian).
On the 30th August B Company, having gone to relieve one of the
K.S.L.I., A and D Companies being already in front-line trenches with
C in support, the enemy at 8 p.m. ventured an attack on our three-
company front, which was quickly dealt with by the Canadian
gunners and our Lewis guns. Notwithstanding this repulse another
hostile attack was launched at 2 o’clock next morning, but this again
was stayed by our Lewis guns and we did not suffer much.
Another incident worthy of note was the departure from France of
Captain Birrell, the adjutant, who left the battalion on the 10th
October after no less than two years and ten months’ service on the
Western front and was succeeded by Lieut. Davies. This length of
war service, other than at the base or on the staff, was very
exceptional indeed. On the 1st November the 1st Battalion marched
to meet their comrades of the 6th at Grand Bouret. Early in the
month the question of combined infantry and tank work in the field
became an extra tactical study that all must learn.
As to casualties, they of course continued. There is a horrible
regularity in recording these. Men were always being killed or
wounded. A battle removed a lot of good fellows in a few hours,
trench warfare corroded the battalion strength little by little, and this
had to be patched up either by raw hands from England or men who
had already done their share but, after being invalided, had to come
out again. Ten men were wounded on the 26th August, one killed
and five wounded on the 30th. 2nd Lieut. G. E. Sewell died of
wounds on the 2nd September and two men were killed and two
wounded on the same day, five more getting hit on the morrow.
Eighteen men of the pioneer company were gassed on the 5th
September. A little bit of joyful news reached the regiment in the
middle of September, namely, that the gallant Harrington, who had
done so well on the 24th June and who had been missing since that
date, was still alive, though a prisoner in Germany. A Company on
the 16th October lost eight men killed and three wounded, the
enemy opening a barrage on our front line at 8 p.m. On the 15th
November, Sir Douglas Haig having planned a further attack on the
German lines, the 16th Brigade, in which the 1st Battalion still
served, was attached to the Third Corps to take part in the same,
and the battalion entrained for Peronne and moved to the forward
area on the 17th.
II. 6th Battalion
There is a great high road running dead straight from Arras east-
south-east for four-and-twenty miles to Cambrai. Two miles and a
half from Arras along this road lies the village of Tilloy, and three
miles further on Monchy is to the north and Wancourt to the south of
it. Two miles south-east of the latter place and about two miles to the
south of the great road is the scene of the 7th Battalion’s fight on the
3rd May, 1917—the village of Cherisy. It was round these places that
the 6th Battalion fought and endured up till the 23rd October, when it
retired away west to a more peaceful region for a few days and there
saw a good deal of the 1st Battalion.
On the 1st July the 6th moved from Arras to the Wancourt line,
and on that date it mustered 33 officers, but only 483 other ranks.
While in this sector it was sometimes in front, sometimes in support
and sometimes further back.
Amongst the various excavations of this region is what is known
as “The Long Trench,” which, commencing about 1,200 yards south
of Keeling Copse, runs southward and is continued in that direction
by Tool Trench. In this long work was the 6th Battalion on the 10th
July, when it received orders to raid the enemy’s shell holes east of
Tool Trench at 7.30 a.m. the next day. The enemy, however, had
made his own plans and, taking the initiative himself, attacked at 5
a.m. after an exceptionally heavy bombardment of guns of all sorts
and sizes, smoke and liquid fire being also used. This heavy rain of
projectiles was directed not only on Long and Tool Trenches, but on
the supports. The infantry attack was directed chiefly on Long
Trench, and the Germans managed to penetrate at one point after
feinting or making a holding attack along the whole front of it. Having
effected his penetration he rapidly deployed and occupied shell
holes in rear or on our side. 2nd Lieut. Stevens, who was holding a
post near by, at once realized the situation and organized and
carried out a counter-attack along Long Trench, and almost at the
same time L.-Corpl. Edgington and two men, who were all on duty
with the 37th Brigade Sniping Company, seeing that the attack was
serious, at once dashed up to ascertain the true situation. These
three went up Long Trench for three or four hundred yards till they
reached the point where the break through had occurred. Here, of
course, they came across a lot of Germans who hurled bombs at
them. The corporal, however, was a good and resolute Buff soldier,
and he, posting one of his men in an advantageous position in the
trench, with the other commenced to erect a block or stop in the
work. He was soon joined by 2nd Lieut. Stevens and another man,
and between them they consolidated the block and opened fire at
close range on a number of the enemy. About two hours and a half
later on the Buffs tried a counter-attack which was duly preceded by
artillery preparation, but it failed owing to the heavy machine-gun fire
it was subjected to. The enemy’s aeroplanes were very noticeable
during this affair, flying low over our lines all day, particularly during
the attack. 2nd Lieut. Gunther was killed, as were 9 men; another
officer and 26 men were wounded, and there were 30 missing. Long
Trench was recovered a week later by the 35th Brigade and the
Royal West Kent Regiment.
On the 3rd August, at 6 p.m., the Buffs being then in rear in what
was called the Brown Line, the enemy opened a heavy barrage and
later attacked Hook Trench. Two officers and one hundred men of
the Buffs were sent up about 8.30 to aid the Queen’s and West Kent
in the front line. The attack was beaten off and heavy casualties
were inflicted on the enemy, who withdrew, leaving several
prisoners. On the 6th August the whole brigade was relieved and
went into Beaurains Camp, near Arras. 2nd Lieuts. Hunt, Mason-
Springgay, Russell and Sowter, with eighty-six men, who had been
training for a raid, proceeded from here to take their part in an
organized minor adventure which took place on the 9th of the month
and which was most successful: the moral of the enemy had every
appearance of being severely shaken and he suffered heavy
casualties; his trenches were entered, many dug-outs destroyed and
eighty prisoners brought back, and it was just a regimental
misfortune that the men of Kent were in the flank which became
subject to the enfilade fire and consequently suffered the following
casualties and failed to get on as far as was hoped.
2nd Lieuts. J. Russell and F. I. Sowter missing, Mason-Springgay
wounded and thirty-five men either killed, wounded or missing. It was
afterwards ascertained that both Russell and Sowter had been killed.
The raid party returned to camp about 3 a.m., played in by the
Drums.
On the 24th August, while in the Levis Barracks at Arras, Corpl.
Horton, L.-Corpl. Parker and Ptes. Hoare, Lane and Scott heard they
had been awarded the M.M., and about the same time, while in the
trenches again, news came of a M.C. for 2nd Lieut. Mason-
Springgay.
On the 1st September the Royal Fusiliers, aided by the Buffs’
covering fire, made a neat little raid, sustaining only one casualty
and bringing in twenty-six prisoners; and the next day a telegram
came saying that 2nd Lieut. Stevens had the M.C. and Pte. Barham
the M.M. An attempt was made by the enemy on the 24th to raid the
brigade front, but it was repulsed with loss.
The 3rd October brought the battalion thirty-three casualties,
including 2nd Lieut. Needman killed. This was because the Sussex
Regiment, on the Buffs’ left, made a raid and the German heavily
barraged the latter corps’ lines. Two days afterwards 2nd Lieut. N. E.
FitzRoy Cole and one man were killed in the front line. The 24th of
October took the 6th Battalion off westward, and the 29th found it
billeted at Vacquerie le Bourg.
November opened with more than one pleasant meeting with the
1st Battalion. The 6th marched to Frevent with this object on the 1st
November, and two drawn matches at football were played between
the units, first at Beaudricourt and afterwards at Vacquerie, but the
real business of life at this time was training and preparation for a
coming attack. On the 16th the battalion entrained for Peronne, and
by the 19th it was in position of assembly behind the village of
Gonnelieu, which is about four miles south of Ribecourt, in the
vicinity of which the 1st Battalion stood. Before describing the parts
taken by the Buffs in the action before Cambrai it may be well to
explain shortly why the battle came to be fought.
It was now past the middle of November and the collapse of the
Russians had already become so apparent that large bodies of
Germans had been withdrawn from their Eastern front to swell the
armies in France, and it was quite clear that more and more would
be arriving shortly. Under these adverse circumstances Haig
determined on a surprise attack on a considerable scale before more
reinforcements could arrive, and so he directed General Byng to
attack in front of Cambrai, reckoning that that portion of the German
line was not quite so strongly held as some others and that it would
take the enemy forty-eight hours to draw troops from other portions
of his front to the rescue. Secrecy and despatch, therefore, were the
main points to be considered, and it was for these reasons that the
fight under notice differed from almost all others in so far that no
artillery preparation was to take place, but the overcoming of wire
and other obstacles was to be entrusted to the action of tanks, and
careful arrangements were made for their initial employment and
close co-operation with the infantry. It would occupy too much space
to describe this battle in detail, but it must be understood that,
though the British attack achieved considerable success at first, the
enemy was able ultimately to increase his force about Cambrai,
particularly in guns, and so he managed at last such a mighty
counter-attack that about the last day of the month our original
offensive was perforce changed into a somewhat anxious defensive
operation.
Imperial War Museum Crown Copyright
A NEW TRENCH
III. Cambrai
Now, on the 20th November and following days the Third Army
Corps consisted of the 6th Division, which included the 1st Battalion
of the Buffs, the 12th Division, with the 6th Battalion, and the 20th
Division. This Corps attacked with the 12th Division on the right, the
20th in the centre and the 6th on the left, and the zero hour was 6.20
a.m. Thus it came about that the 1st Battalion moved out preceded
by B Battalion of tanks and in artillery formation from the vicinity of
Villers Plouich.
The first objective, the village of Ribecourt and the spur to the
south-east of it, was soon taken, D Company, which formed the first
wave, securing that portion which was entrusted to the 1st Battalion.
The ground won was known as the Blue Line and was part of the
main Hindenburg entrenchment.
The rest of the 1st Battalion co-operated with the divisional
sniping section and then passed through and secured the second
objective, the Brown or Hindenburg support line, one thousand yards
further on.
These positions were taken with small loss, the Buffs only having
eight men killed and thirty-three wounded. This was satisfactory
enough, as the two points which had caused anxiety to the divisional
commander were Couillet Wood and Ribecourt, whereas the first fell
to the Buffs and the latter to the 71st Brigade. The formations
adopted were suitable; the hostile artillery was weak; the enemy was
late in opening fire and it was scattered and inaccurate when
opened; the tanks had no difficulty in crossing the trenches; the
enemy appeared to be surprised and demoralized; the positions
were quickly consolidated because there was no hostile fire, and in
fact all was very well. The 6th Division had a most successful day:
the bridge at Marcoing had fallen, and everything had gone like
clockwork; the artillery pushed forward to advanced positions, as did
the machine guns which were brought up by pack animals. The next
morning the Buffs, with the assistance of the tanks, completed the
clearing of Noyelles. This was a creditable bit of initiative on the part
of Captain Moss, who, finding the place but lightly held, collected a
few men and with two tanks captured the village there and then.
Meanwhile a little further south the 12th Division was equally
successful. During the whole of the 19th, battalion after battalion of
tanks, R.E. equipment, ambulances and so on had been coming up
to the front and, in accordance with Operation Orders, had been
doing so in absolute silence. The scheme for the 20th had included
five objectives. The 37th Brigade was assembled on the right of the
36th and it was to go forward on a two-company frontage only. The
two companies of the 7th East Surrey were given the task of seizing
the first objective, and the remainder of this battalion was to take the
second. The third and fourth objectives were allotted to two
companies each of the 6th Buffs and the Royal West Kents had the
fifth.
The Surreys were quite successful; then the Buffs moved forward
in artillery formation and, crossing the first lines of defence, moved
on with marked success, sending back numerous prisoners and
attacking the Hindenburg Line. There took place some fierce hand-
to-hand fighting and a systematic “mopping up” of dug-outs, but
everything went like clockwork and by the afternoon the battalion
headquarters was in Pam-Pam Farm with three companies holding
Lateau Wood and B Company at Bonavis, though the progress had
been delayed somewhat by machine-gun fire from the two named
farms, and the enemy had been difficult to drive from Lateau Wood.
At 3.45 p.m. the West Kent reported to brigade headquarters that
they were in touch with the Buffs and that no enemy was in sight.
The battalion casualties for the 20th were 5 officers wounded and
105 other ranks killed, wounded or missing, mostly only wounded.
On the 21st the positions occupied were consolidated. Much
movement of lorries was noticed on this day behind the enemy’s
lines. Strong patrols, however, from the regiment covered the
bridges over the canal. It became apparent on the 23rd that the
German artillery had been considerably reinforced, as the hostile
shelling very perceptibly increased in volume. On this date Captain
A. F. Worster of the 1st Battalion died of wounds. He had been
twelve months with the battalion and was greatly respected and
universally loved. He had twice won the M.C.
On the 26th both battalions were relieved and withdrawn, the 1st
into the Hindenburg Line as divisional reserve, and the 6th into
support, though it sent up strong working parties to labour on the
communication and front trenches for the West Kent Regiment, as a
counter-attack on the part of the enemy now seemed imminent, he
having evidently been greatly reinforced. On this date Lt.-Colonel
Green left the 1st Battalion to assume command of a brigade.
On the 30th November a great German counter-attack was
launched. Being in divisional reserve, the 1st Battalion did not on the
first day suffer much from the shock, though six men were wounded;
but the following morning it reinforced the troops who were now
holding the line round Gonnelieu and La Vacquerie, where the
enemy had broken through the previous day. Here Major B. L.
Strauss, who was commanding, was killed, as were seven of his
men, another dying of his wounds. Captain Allen, the adjutant, was
wounded but continued for a while to command the battalion which
duty had devolved on him. Captain Tibbles, R.A.M.C., Lieut. Blake,
2nd Lieuts. Clark, Fisher and Owen, C.S.M. Vincer and forty-five
others were also injured.
In the evening Captain Pill, R.A.M.C., attached to the Bedfords,
took over medical charge, Allen retired to the dressing station, Major
Hardy, of the York and Lancasters, assumed temporary command
and the Buffs were withdrawn again into divisional reserve to go up
once more in the night of the 3rd to take up a defensive flank on
Highland Ridge, as the enemy had broken through near Marcoing
that morning. One company of R.E. and the Brigade Pioneer
Company were attached for aid on Highland Ridge.
On the 5th December five men were killed and sixteen wounded,
one of whom died the following day, on which date a new doctor,
Lieut. McVey, relieved Captain Pill. Three were killed on the 7th and
Lieut. L. F. Clark died of his hurts; two of the men were lost in the
same way on the 8th. On this latter date the Buffs were relieved from
the Ridge and moved back into trenches in rear of the main
Hindenburg system. On the night of the 9th they moved further back
still and on the 11th were taken twenty miles westward to Courcelles
to refit, and Lt.-Colonel Power, who had commanded the 2nd
Battalion at Ypres when Colonel Geddes was killed, was appointed
commanding officer.
CAMBRAI
The 6th Battalion suffered severely on the 30th November, but
showed that the men were made of magnificent fighting material.
The enemy’s offensive was most successful on the sector which was
on the right flank of the battalion. Here he penetrated right through to
the rear, and the first news the men in the line had of this success
was that their own brigade headquarters was being attacked behind
them. This attempt, however, was beaten off by the staff, the
orderlies and the signallers, though the transport, which was bringing
up water and supplies, was captured. This hostile movement of
course exposed the Buffs’ flank. Dense German masses were
successful on the other flank also, but a ray of light in the gloom was
occasioned by a very successful counter-attack made by the Buffs
on Pam-Pam Farm, which had fallen. This place was recaptured and
the enemy’s advance in this region held up for three hours.
Overwhelming masses, however, at last proved impossible to
withstand and the small garrison withdrew fighting from shell hole to
shell hole. The enemy was now on front, flanks and even in rear, and
the struggle was hand-to-hand, obstinate and desperate. It was a
case of the remnants of a fighting unit cutting its way back through
all obstacles to regain a line that was forming in rear. This was finally
effected and the line straightened out, but, as may be supposed, it
was a bloody affair and our casualties numbered 14 officers and 317
other ranks, Major C. F. Cattley, M.C., being amongst the killed. The
new position taken up was successfully held against all attacks,
though it formed a very acute angle, as the divisions on the right and
left had fallen back, leaving, of course, a greatly exposed salient.
The line was held, however, until relief came next day, when the
battalion moved back to the old British front, which was heavily
gassed by means of shells.
On the 2nd December this battalion moved back into billets in
Heudicourt, thence, on the 5th, to Dernancourt and on to Albert,
where train was taken to Thiennes, in the peaceful country some
seven or eight miles south by west of Hazebrouck, for the necessary
rest and refit and to receive and train fresh men from England to fill
the terrible gaps.
IV. 1st Battalion

After Cambrai the 1st Battalion, except for a short time near
Moreuil, was kept out of the trenches till the 25th January, 1918, on
which date it relieved the 9th Battalion of the Norfolks at Demicourt,
about half-way between Bapaume and Cambrai. During this interval
it had been lent to the 3rd Division and posted at Ervillers, Noreuil
and Courcelles, all of which places are fairly close together.
Christmas was spent at Courcelles in a quiet and restful manner, and
a slight change of scene occurred soon afterwards by a move to
Bellacourt, near Riviere, which is somewhat nearer Arras. The arrival
in this place was marked by the rejoining of Captain Jones, D.S.O.,
of the R.A.M.C., who, an old, much respected and greatly beloved
medical officer to the battalion, had been over fifteen months absent
from his friends.
The New Year brought some honours with it. The late Major
Strauss was gazetted to a M.C.; Sgt. Pass got the D.C.M.; and the
M.M. came to Ptes. Alexander, Elliott, Wilson and Wright; and Lt.-
Colonels Green, D.S.O., and Power, Major Blackall, Lieut. Whitlock,
Corpl. Troy and Pte. May were all mentioned in despatches. The
21st January took this unit to Fremicourt, near Bapaume, and into
divisional reserve, and the 25th, as has been said, back into the
dreary trench work again. Captain Marshall on this date, who had
already the M.C., was awarded the D.S.O. The trench tour was quiet
enough, for the enemy was nearly a mile away, and the battalion
was back at Fremicourt on the 3rd February.
Here, or rather at Le Bucquiere close by, on the 8th, a somewhat
startling and apparently an unexpected change of organization took
place which affected nearly everybody in the army. It had been
decided that infantry brigades would be of more use, or at any rate
that certain saving of power would be effected, if, instead of four,
they should consist in future of only three battalions. This resulted in
the disbanding of many brave and tried units which had repeatedly
proved their value. Thus the 16th Brigade lost the 8th Battalion of the
Bedfordshire Regiment which had been comrades of the Buffs, York
and Lancaster and Shropshire Light Infantry since March, 1915,
when they came into the brigade in place of the Leicester Regiment.
Of course, the disbanding of these units did not mean that the
soldiers composing them went home to their mothers. They merely
were transferred to other battalions in the form of huge drafts. Thus
our own 8th Battalion of the Buffs, which had so nobly upheld the
ancient honour of the regiment on many a stricken field, now ceased
to exist in the same way as did the 8th Bedfords, and in
consequence the 1st and 6th Buffs became the richer for strong
reinforcements of fighting men. Five officers and 250 other ranks
arrived at Le Bucquiere from the 8th for the 1st Buffs.
On the 12th February the battalion went into trenches at
Lagnicourt, near Queant, and it was at this place when it received
the shock of the German great offensive in March. It was in February
a quiet and fairly comfortable place, though on the 14th an unlucky
shell killed three N.C.O.’s of D Company in a dug-out and blew a
fourth clean through the roof. Beugnatre was the rearmost resting-
place for Lagnicourt, and each battalion of the brigade of course took
its turn there.
Now that the Russians had finally collapsed and so set free the
enormous hostile armies which, up till now, they had, at any rate in
part, kept occupied, the whole of Central Europe had for some time
been crowded with troop trains bringing division after division from
east to west; these divisions had been specially trained for open as
opposed to trench fighting, and the Kaiser and his staff fondly hoped
they would suffice to drive the French to Paris and the English into
the sea, more particularly as thousands of Russian guns were now
available for German gunners to use on their western foes. It was
clear to everybody, from the Commander-in-Chief to the last recruit
from England, that a great offensive might commence on any day
and we were busily engaged in preparations. Battlefields were made
ready for defence, strong points heavily wired and mine fields laid as
protection against tanks. This attack was expected in the early
morning of the 13th March and the whole British front was covered
with a series of listening patrols, special precautions were taken and
all ranks exhorted to quit themselves like men. On the 19th the
rainless spring weather, which had lasted a fortnight, gave place to
mist, with cold showers. On the 20th before midnight orders came to
withdraw all working parties, to man all battle and alarm posts before
dawn, and to be in readiness for the enemy’s onslaught.
V. 6th Battalion
The 6th Battalion did not come into the front line again till the
22nd January, 1918, on which date it was at Fleurbaix, in the
direction of Armentieres. The interval had been passed round
Merville and Estaires. Some well-deserved decorations came to the
unit in January and some medal ribbons were presented by the Army
Commander. Captain Ferrie and 2nd Lieut. Gray got the M.C., L.-
Corpl. Parker a bar to his M.M., and the decoration itself came to L.-
Corpl. Clements and Pte. Woodcock. A little later 2nd Lieuts. Kidd,
Stevens and Turk were gladdened with the news that each had the
M.C.; Lt.-Colonel Smeltzer, M.C., was given the D.S.O., and R.S.M.
Jeffrey the M.C.
Though Fleurbaix itself was reached on the 13th January, the
battalion did not move into the front line in that region till the 22nd,
and then it was quiet enough till relief came and a move back some
five miles or so to Sailly, except that there was a certain amount of
bombardment on the 28th, and just before relief was due the next
day an enemy’s party of about twenty attempted a raid on a post
known as “Richard.” They worked round behind this point with a view
to cutting off the retreat of its little garrison, but at the exact moment
the relieving party of Fusiliers arrived on the scene and the raiders,
caught between two fires, were surprised and dispersed.
There was a good deal of work to be done in February in the way
of preparation for the coming assault, and the 6th of the month saw
the battalion in the front-line trenches, after C.S.M. Woodhams had
heard on the 4th that he had got his D.C.M. The 9th of the month
brought the big draft from the now defunct 8th Battalion of the Buffs.
This consisted of 5 officers and 200 men.
Remaining in the same vicinity for many days, now in brigade
reserve at Rouge-de-Bout, then in divisional at Nouveau Monde, and
again in the trenches, all the men’s energies were directed to work at
defensive positions; for the British army and its allies were now for a

Beyond Duty Kantian Ideals of Respect Beneficence and Appreciation Thomas E Hill JR Full Chapter PDF

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

You might also like

Beyond Duty Kantian Ideals of Respect Beneficence and Appreciation Thomas E Hill JR Full Chapter PDF

Uploaded by

Document Information

Original Title

Copyright

Available Formats

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

Available Formats

Beyond Duty Kantian Ideals of Respect Beneficence and Appreciation Thomas E Hill JR Full Chapter PDF

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

Beyond Duty: Kantian Ideals of

Respect, Beneficence, and

Thomas' Calculus for the JEE 13th Edition George B.

Taming the Megabanks Arthur E. Wilmarth Jr

Principles of Electronic Communication Systems 5th

Essentials of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation:

Principles of Electronic Communication Systems 4 ed.

Medieval Monarchy in Action Boyd H. Hill Jr

A Sense of Duty Sam Crescent

Shadow Hill Thomas Kies

THOMAS E. HILL, JR.

PART I: KANT AND KANTIAN PERSPECTIVES

PART II: PRACTICAL ETHICS

16. Beyond Respect and Beneﬁcence: An Ideal of Appreciation 270

PART I: KANT AND KANTIAN PERSPECTIVES

(1) “The Groundwork,” in The Kantian Mind, edited by Mark Timmons

PART II: PRACTICAL ETHICS

(10) “Human Dignity and Tragic Choices,” Proceedings and Addresses of

As always I am indebted to the many moral philosophers and Kant scholars

Abbreviations for Kant’s Works

xii   ’ 

TL The Doctrine of Virtue (Tugendlehre), Part II of The Metaphysics of Morals

Numbers in square brackets or in parentheses following an abbreviation refer to the

Aims, Abstracts, and Why ‘Beyond Duty’?

2 , ,   ‘   ’ ?

but also by my understanding of Kantian ethics, my belief that theory is

Why Beyond Duty?

The title of this volume—Beyond Duty—may seem puzzling at ﬁrst, and so

    3

review critically the views of contemporary philosophers, for example, John

Summary of the Essays

Part I: Kant and Kantian Perspectives

1. “The Groundwork” calls attention to relevant presuppositions from Kant’s

4 , ,   ‘   ’ ?

all morality. His idea of autonomy is abstract, foundational, normative, and a

    5

6 , ,   ‘   ’ ?

Part II: Practical Ethics

This section starts with an overview of my approach to practical ethics,

    7

8 , ,   ‘   ’ ?

moral theorists should investigate them. The discussion concentrates on ideal

1. See C₁ in Abbreviations for Kant’s Works.

    9

4. Bittner (2002) and (2014).

Background: From the First Critique to the Groundwork

:    15

Preface: Aims and Methods

Here Kant relates ethics as a rational discipline to other branches of know-

Section One: The Principle of a Good Will

 :       17

 :      19

preceding “Conform to universal law as such.” Instead he proceeds to illustrate

Section Two: Duty Presupposes the Categorical Imperative

suggesting that they progressively reveal various aspects of the fundamental

 :     21

Section Three: Practical Reason Presupposes

would be incapable of governing ourselves by rational moral principles. But as