ABSTRACT
The Crocean theory distinguishes between the act of valuing and the historical knowledge of this act. Benedetto Croce points out that as long as a sharp distinction is maintained between theoretical and practical reason, the danger of confusion is diminished, because then the terms may come close to meaning simply knowledge and moral will. The epistemological fulcrum of Croce's "historicism" is his interest in a kind of knowledge that is neglected by other philosophers: the autobiographical knowledge of what we have just been doing. Self-knowledge, as an awareness of our own acts as we go along, is historical knowledge in the sense of autobiography cut down to what is in the immediate past. Irving Babbitt and Croce agree that Immanuel Kant's concept of "practical reason" should be discarded and replaced by "ethical will". According to Croce, and Babbitt is obviously in agreement, there are two distinct modes of willing or valuing—ethical and non-ethical.
