a maniac of law

In a series of posts here, specially this one, I argued that the most important value that keeps a Protestant society together is lawfulness and that the greatest threat to it is unlawfulness. By contrast, the value that above all others keeps a Catholic society together is orthodoxy and the greatest threat to such a society is heresy.

With some exaggeration it can thus be said that Protestant people are maniacs of law, in the sense that what they hate most is the unlawful person. Catholics, by contrast, are maniacs of orthodoxy - what they hate most is the non-conformist. More recently I have also been arguing that Kant's works are in essence a theology of a secular Protestant society.

Indeed, when in his Fundamental Principles of the Metaphysic of Morals Kant elaborates on the principle of duty as the hallmark of moral behaviour, at a given moment he feels compelled to give some empirical content to the idea of duty. He writes:

"Duty is the necessity of acting from respect for law" (op. cit., p. 259).

This is Kant as a maniac of law. A philosopher from a Catholic culture would have put it differently:

"Duty is the necessity of acting from respect for authority" - a maniac of orthodoxy (or conformism or respeitinho).