Now it is clear enough that those determining principles of the will
which alone make maxims properly moral and give them a moral worth,
namely, the direct conception of the law and the objective necessity
of obeying it as our duty, must be regarded as the proper springs of
actions, since otherwise legality of actions might be produced, but
not morality of character. But it is not so clear; on the contrary, it
must at first sight seem to every one very improbable that even
subjectively that exhibition of pure virtue can have more power over
the human mind, and supply a far stronger spring even for effecting
that legality of actions, and can produce more powerful resolutions to
prefer the law, from pure respect for it, to every other
consideration, than all the deceptive allurements of pleasure or of
all that may be reckoned as happiness, or even than all threatenings
of pain and misfortune. Nevertheless, this is actually the case, and
if human nature were not so constituted, no mode of presenting the law
by roundabout ways and indirect recommendations would ever produce
morality of character.
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