“There is therefore only one categorical imperative, and that is this: Act only according to that maxim whereby you can at the same time will that it should become a universal law.” This moral law, formulated by Kant in \Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals\ and then in * Critique of Practical Reason *, is vigorously rejected by Maurice Barrès in the first volume of *The Novel of National Energy*, \The Uprooted** \. For him, the teaching of German philosophy contributes to detaching French youth from their roots.**
Maurice Barrès's \The Uprooted** , published in 1897, describes the trials and tribulations of a group of young men from Lorraine. Influenced by Monsieur Bouteiller, a Kantian and Gambetta-inspired professor, they go to Paris to try to achieve a cosmopolitan destiny. The morality preached by the charismatic teacher profoundly affects them. In attempting to access the universal, the students detach themselves from their regional ties, their deep connection to the land, and a certain particularism. This "elevation" will, for many, turn into a fall, a perdition. Arriving in the capital, the poorest of the Lorrainers will find not glory, but only isolation and vice.
Bouteiller makes Kantian morality a rule of life. Convinced of the soundness of his teaching, he doesn't for a moment consider the corrupting nature of this law. "Mr. Bouteiller establishes his dominance by deforming the souls of Lorraine, and at the same time prepares him for a broader role for which they are eager and capable." In Barrès's eyes, Bouteiller's relationship with the moral law has a religious character. The intrinsic value of the categorical imperative cannot be questioned. "In short, it would be absurd to suppose that a Bouteiller, who has taken Kant as his starting point and who now no more verifies him than a believer verifies revealed truth [...] can linger to weigh the consequences of his teaching and the risks of leading astray a dozen young people."
A disembodied morality
For Barrès, the categorical imperative is a morality of abstraction, a disembodied morality. As Péguy says in Victor-Marie Comte Hugo: "Kantianism has clean hands, but it has no hands ." What disqualifies Kantian morality is that it does not take into account the existence of the flesh. The categorical imperative does not encompass the being in its totality. It is valid for a pure spirit but does not integrate bodily life, the specificity of the moment, or the urgency of the given context. It is an insurmountable horizon of morality. A law for gods, not for men.
But Kant is aware of this. “In fact, it is absolutely impossible to ascertain with complete certainty through experience a single instance where the maxim of an otherwise duty-bound action rested purely and simply on moral principles and on the representation of duty.” In Kant’s view, the moral character of an action does not reside in the action itself, but rather in the representation of duty that determines it. “[…] when it comes to moral value, what matters is not the actions that are seen, but the inner, unseen principles of those actions.”
Kantian morality is the opposite of pragmatism. An action is only in accordance with duty if it is motivated by a "good will." This will can only be assessed a priori, by having access to the motives. However, this invisible dimension of morality, subjective and sometimes unconscious, cannot be objectively identified. Kant thus establishes the foundations of a morality that is not applicable in reality. Absolute disinterestedness, the condition of possibility for the moral act, is inaccessible to human beings, precisely because humans are not pure spirits, because they possess a living body that is situated in time and place. Human existence is necessarily embodied. Kantian law never takes into account this inevitability of embodiment. In addition to being ill-suited, it is sterile.
The morality of rootedness
But let's return to Barrès. His critique of the categorical imperative involves denouncing the reign of subjectivity. For the mature Barrès (the one who succeeded the Barrès of *The Cult of the Self\* ), an incandescent nationalist, the morality of action is never fulfilled as well as when it is placed at the service of the nation. Individual morality is secondary to destiny and "national consciousness."
“After their ambitions were revealed to them under the guise of duties, none of these young people wanted to remain in their native land, and they greeted invitations to choose a corporate environment with almost equal disdain. […] They wanted to be individuals.” Barrès adopts a holistic perspective (the primacy of the whole over its parts). However, Kantian morality, while possessing universal views, finds its foundation in pure reason, that is, at the heart of human subjectivity. For Kant, what should guide my actions is the imperative revealed to me by my conscience. In Barrès’s view, morality does not stem from pure subjectivity but from the will to fulfill a shared destiny. The only valid morality is that of the land and the homeland. In this, Barrès clearly thematizes a morality of rootedness.
In \The Uprooted* , Barrès attacks the government in power. Through the voice of one of his characters, he asserts: “Always act in such a way that you can will that your action should serve as a universal rule. Act according to what is beneficial to society… I should have handed over Mouchefrin… I recognized that society, in its dealings with Racadot and Mouchefrin, had not behaved according to the Kantian principle… If the individual is to serve the community, the community must serve the individual.” True morality, therefore, only has meaning if it is all-encompassing and serves the national community. If Racadot and Mouchefrin committed a moral failing by murdering Madame Aravian, it is this logic of uprooting that led to their downfall. If the two characters had resisted their teacher's injunction and remained in Lorraine, their fate would have been entirely different. “Following all the ceremonies of this imposing funeral, I was led to think that if one wanted to transform humanity and, for example, make citizens of the universe, men of pure reason, out of little Lorrainers, out of children of tradition, such an operation involved risks. […] Racadot and Mouchefrin are our ransom, the price of our improvement. I hate their crime, but I still consider them, in relation to myself, as sacrifices.”*
Kant's critique is explicit in this passage. By yielding to the temptation of both the universal and the individual, the group from Lorraine lost several of its members. The purity of Kantian law caused the weakest among them to lose all sense of direction. Only the wealthy survived. The dwarf Mouchefrin and the bull Racadot were dependent on the land they left behind. For Barrès, moral life is inseparable from this immanent consciousness. The soul is truly itself only when rooted. To abandon one's land is to lose a part of oneself. Kant wanted them to forget. They remembered, but too late .
You can find the original article in french here.