Whoever then holds
morality to be anything real, and not a chimerical idea without any
truth, must likewise admit the principle of it that is here
assigned. This section then, like the first, was merely analytical.
Now to prove that morality is no creation of the brain, which it
cannot be if the categorical imperative and with it the autonomy of
the will is true, and as an a priori principle absolutely necessary,
this supposes the possibility of a synthetic use of pure practical
reason, which however we cannot venture on without first giving a
critical examination of this faculty of reason. In the concluding
section we shall give the principal outlines of this critical
examination as far as is sufficient for our purpose.
THIRD SECTION
TRANSITION FROM THE METAPHYSIC OF MORALS TO THE
CRITIQUE OF PURE PRACTICAL REASON
The Concept of Freedom is the Key that explains the Autonomy of
the Will
The will is a kind of causality belonging to living beings in so far
as they are rational, and freedom would be this property of such
causality that it can be efficient, independently of foreign causes
determining it; just as physical necessity is the property that the
causality of all irrational beings has of being determined to activity
by the influence of foreign causes.
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