“ To set before children, as a pattern, actions that are called noble, magnanimous, meritorious, with the notion of captivating them by infusing enthusiasm for such actions, is to defeat our end. ”
Immanuel Kant, Critique of Practical Reason (1788). copy citation
| Author | Immanuel Kant |
|---|---|
| Source | Critique of Practical Reason |
| Topic | action enthusiasm |
| Date | 1788 |
| Language | English |
| Reference | |
| Note | Translated by Thomas Kingsmill Abbott |
| Weblink | http://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/5683/pg5683-images.html |
Context
“It is more necessary than ever to direct attention to this method in our times, when men hope to produce more effect on the mind with soft, tender feelings, or high-flown, puffing-up pretensions, which rather wither the heart than strengthen it, than by a plain and earnest representation of duty, which is more suited to human imperfection and to progress in goodness. To set before children, as a pattern, actions that are called noble, magnanimous, meritorious, with the notion of captivating them by infusing enthusiasm for such actions, is to defeat our end. For as they are still so backward in the observance of the commonest duty, and even in the correct estimation of it, this means simply to make them fantastical romancers betimes. But, even with the instructed and experienced part of mankind, this supposed spring has, if not an injurious, at least no genuine, moral effect on the heart, which, however, is what it was desired to produce.
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