to which Kant is led by his autonomy of the will; and it involves more serious consequences than the little innocent Kingdom of Ends, which is perfectly harmless and may be left in peace. I mean the conception of human dignity. Now this “dignity” is made to rest solely on man's autonomy, and to lie in the fact that the law which he ought to obey is his own work, his relation to it thus being the same as that of the subjects of a constitutional government to their statutes. As an ornamental finish to the Kantian system of morals such a theory might after all be passed over. Only this expression “Human Dignity,” once it was uttered by Kant, became the shibboleth of all perplexed and empty-headed moralists.

For behind that imposing formula they concealed their lack, not to say, of a real ethical