In short, there is for me, in general, no pure, naked existence, with
which I have no concern, and which I contemplate solely for the sake
of contemplation. Whatever exists for me, exists only by virtue of
its relation to me. But there is everywhere but one relation to
me possible, and all the rest are but varieties of this, i.e., my
destination as a moral agent. My world is the object and sphere of my
duties, and absolutely nothing else. There is no other world, no other
attributes of my world, for me. My collective capacity and all finite
capacity is insufficient to comprehend any other. Everything which
exists for me forces its existence and its reality upon me, solely by
means of this relation; and only by means of this relation do I grasp
it. There is utterly wanting in me an organ for any other existence.
To the question whether then in fact such a world exists as I
represent to myself, I can answer nothing certain, nothing which is
raised above all doubt, but this: I have assuredly and truly these
definite duties which represent themselves to me as duties toward such
and such persons, concerning such and such objects. These definite
duties I cannot represent to myself otherwise, nor can I execute
them otherwise, than as lying within the sphere of such a world as I
conceive. Even he who has never thought of his moral destination, if
any such there could be, or who, if he has thought about it at all,
has never entertained the slightest purpose of ever, in the indefinite
future, fulfilling it--even he derives his world of the senses and his
belief in the reality of such a world no otherwise than from his idea
of a moral world.
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