Page:Popular Works of Johann Gottlieb Fichte (1889) Vol 2.djvu/46

 from thence the law of its own conduct;—and in this way constructs its political existence out of a confused patchwork gathered from many different Ages long since dead, thereby openly displaying a clear consciousness of its own utter nothingness. With respect to Morality, it proclaims this as the only Virtue,—that we should pursue our own individual interests, at furthest adding thereto those of others (either as bound in honour so to do, or else from mere inconsequence) so far as they are not inconsistent with our own; and this as the only Vice,—to fail in the pursuit of our own advantage. It maintains, and—since it can have no difficulty in discovering an ignoble motive for every action, inasmuch as it is quite unacquainted with aught that partakes of nobleness,—it even pretends to prove, that all men who live or have ever lived have actually thought and acted in this way, and that there is absolutely no other motive of action in man than Self-Interest;—compassionating those who assume the existence of any other as silly fools who are as yet ignorant of the world and of men. Lastly, with respect to Religion, it also is changed into a mere Doctrine of Happiness, designed to remind us that man must be temperate in enjoyment in order that his enjoyments may be lasting and varied; a God is deemed necessary only in order that he may care for our welfare, and it is our wants alone which have called him into existence and determined him to be. Whatever it may chance to retain of the super-sensual elements of any already existing system of Religion owes this forbearance only to the need there may be of a curb for the unbridled populace, which however the cultivated classes do not require; and to the want of a more efficient means of supplementing the deficiencies of the Police or of judicial Evidence. In short,—and to express the matter in one word,—such an Age has reached its highest point of development when it has attained a clear conviction that Reason, and with Reason all that lies beyond mere sensuous personal Existence, is