Kant is the first philosopher of self-sacrifice to advance this ethics as a
matter of philosophic principle, explicit, self-conscious,
uncompromised—essentially uncontradicted by any remnants of the Greek,
pro-self viewpoint.
Thus, although he believed that the dutiful man would be rewarded with
happiness after death (and that this is proper), Kant holds that the man who is
motivated by such a consideration is nonmoral (since he is still acting from
inclination, albeit a supernaturally oriented one). Nor will Kant permit the
dutiful man to be motivated even by the desire to feel a sense of moral
self-approval.
The main line of pre-Kantian moralists had urged man to perform certain actions
in order to reach a goal of some kind. They had urged man to love the object
which is the good (however it was conceived) and strive to gain it, even if
most transferred the quest to the next life. They had asked man to practice a
code of virtues as a means to the attainment of values. Kant dissociates
virtue from the pursuit of any goal. He dissociates it from man’s love of or
even interest in any object. Which means: he dissociates morality from values,
any values, values as such.