Every transgression of a law only can and must be explained as
arising from a maxim of the transgressor making such wrong-doing his
rule of action; for were it not committed by him as a free being, it
could not be imputed to him. But it is absolutely impossible to
explain how any rational individual forms such a maxim against the
clear prohibition of the law-giving reason; for it is only events
which happen according to the mechanical laws of nature that are
capable of explanation. Now a transgressor or criminal may commit
his wrong-doing either according to the maxim of a rule supposed to be
valid objectively and universally, or only as an exception from the
rule by dispensing with its obligation for the occasion. In the latter
case, he only diverges from the law, although intentionally. He may,
at the same time, abhor his own transgression, and without formally
renouncing his obedience to the law only wish to avoid it. In the
former case, however, he rejects the authority of the law itself,
the validity of which, however, he cannot repudiate before his own
reason, even while he makes it his rule to act against it. His maxim
is, therefore, not merely defective as being negatively contrary to
the law, but it is even positively illegal, as being diametrically
contrary and in hostile opposition to it.
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