THEOREM II.
All material practical principles as such are of one and the same
kind and come under the general principle of self-love or private
happiness.
Pleasure arising from the idea of the idea of the existence of a
thing, in so far as it is to determine the desire of this thing, is
founded on the susceptibility of the subject, since it depends on
the presence of an object; hence it belongs to sense (feeling), and
not to understanding, which expresses a relation of the idea to an
object according to concepts, not to the subject according to
feelings. It is, then, practical only in so far as the faculty of
desire is determined by the sensation of agreeableness which the
subject expects from the actual existence of the object. Now, a
rational being's consciousness of the pleasantness of life
uninterruptedly accompanying his whole existence is happiness; and the
principle which makes this the supreme ground of determination of
the will is the principle of self-love. All material principles, then,
which place the determining ground of the will in the pleasure or pain
to be received from the existence of any object are all of the same
kind, inasmuch as they all belong to the principle of self-love or
private happiness.
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