SCIENCE OF LOGIC
IN TWELVE WEBPAGE PARTS
(PAGE ELEVEN)
PART ELEVEN
Wissenschaft der Logik (1812-1816)
Translated by A. V. Miller George Allen &
Unwin, 1969
Born in Stuttgart and educated in Tübingen,
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel devoted his
life wholly to academic pursuits, teaching
at Jena, Nuremberg, Heidelberg, and Berlin.
His Wissenschaft der Logik (Science of Logic) (1812-1816) attributes the unfolding of
concepts of reality in terms of the pattern
of dialectical reasoning (thesis — antithesis
— synthesis) that Hegel believed to be the
only method of progress in human thought,
and Die Encyclopädie der philosophischen Wissenschaften
im Grundrisse (Encyclopedia of the Philosophical Sciences)
(1817) describes the application of this
dialectic to all areas of human knowledge.
Hegel's Naturrecht und Staatswissenschaft im Grundrisse
and Gundlinien der Philosophie des Rechts (Philosophy of Right) (1820) provide an
intellectual foundation for modern nationalism.
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The Doctrine of the Notion
The Idea of the Good
§ 1765
The Notion, which is its own subject matter,
being determined in and for itself, the subject
is determined for itself as an individual.
As subjective it again presupposes an implicit
otherness; it is the urge to realise itself,
the end that wills by means of itself to
give itself objectivity and to realise itself
in the objective world.
In the theoretical Idea the subjective Notion,
as the universal that lacks any determination
of its own, stands opposed to the objective
world from which it takes to itself a determinate
content and filling. But in the practical
Idea it is as actual that it confronts the
actual; but the certainty of itself which
the subject possesses in being determinate
in and for itself is a certainty of its own
actuality and the non-actuality of the world;
it is not only the world's otherness as an
abstract universality that is a nullity for
the subject, but the world's individuality
and the determination of its individuality.
The subject has here vindicated objectivity
for itself; its immanent determinateness
is the objective, for it is the universality
that is just as much absolutely determined;
the formerly objective world, on the contrary,
is now only something posited, something
immediately determined in various ways, but
because it is only immediately determined,
the unity of the Notion is lacking in it
and it is, by itself, a nullity.
§ 1766
This determinateness contained in the Notion
and in the likeness of the Notion, and including
within it the demand for an individual external
actuality, is the good. It comes upon the
scene with the worth of being absolute, because
it is within itself the totality of the Notion,
the objective that is at the same time in
the form of free unity and subjectivity.
This Idea is superior to the Idea of cognition
already considered, for it possesses not
only the worth of the universal but also
of the out-and-out actual. It is an urge
in so far as this actuality is still subjective,
positing its own self and not having at the
same time the form of immediate presupposition;
its urge to realise itself is, strictly speaking,
not to give itself objectivity this it possesses
within itself but merely this empty form
of immediacy. Hence the activity of the end
is not directed against itself in order to
adopt and appropriate a given determination
and by sublating the determinateness of the
external world to give itself reality in
the form of external actuality. The Idea
of the will as explicitly self-determining
possesses the content within itself. Now
it is true that this is a determinate content
and to that extent something finite and limited;
self-determination is essentially particularisation,
since the reflection of the will into itself
as a negative unity in general is also individuality
in the sense of the exclusion and presupposition
of an other. Nevertheless, the particularity
of the content is in the first instance infinite
through the form of the Notion, whose own
determinateness it is; and in this content
the Notion possesses its negative self-identity,
and therefore not merely a particular, but
its own infinite individuality. Consequently,
the above-mentioned finitude of the content
in the practical Idea is tantamount to the
latter being in the first instance the not
yet realised Idea; the Notion is, for the
content, something that is in and for itself;
it is here the Idea in the form of objectivity
that is for itself; on the one hand, the
subjective is for this reason no longer something
merely posited, arbitrary or contingent,
but an absolute; but on the other hand, this
form of concrete existence, being-for-self,
has not yet the form of the in-itself as
well. What thus appears in respect of form
as such, as opposition, appears in the form
of the Notion reflected into simple identity,
that is, appears in the content as its simple
determinateness; thus the good, although
valid in and for itself, is some particular
end, but an end that has not to wait to receive
its truth through its realisation, but is
already on its own account the true.
§ 1767
The syllogism of immediate realisation itself
requires no detailed exposition here; it
is altogether the same as the syllogism of
external purposiveness considered above;
it is only the content that constitutes the
difference. In external as in formal purposiveness,
it was an indeterminate finite content in
general; here, though it is finite too, it
is as such at the same time as absolutely
valid content. But in regard to the conclusion,
to the realised end, a further difference
comes in. The finite end in its realisation,
all the same, gets no further than a means;
since in its beginning it is not an end already
determined in and for itself, it remains
even when realised an end that is not in
and for itself. If the good again is also
fixed as something finite, if it is essentially
such, then notwithstanding its inner infinitude
it cannot escape the destiny of finitude
a destiny that manifests itself in a number
of forms. The realised good is good by virtue
of what it already is in the subjective end,
in its Idea; realisation gives it an external
existence; but since his existence is determined
merely as an intrinsically worthless externality,
in it the good has only attained a contingent,
destructible existence, not a realisation
corresponding to its Idea. Further, since
in respect of its content the good is restricted,
there are several kinds of good; good in
its concrete existence is not only subject
to destruction by external contingency and
by evil, but by the collision and conflict
of the good itself. From the side of the
objective world presupposed for it, in the
presupposition of which the subjectivity
and finitude of the good consists, and which
as a different world goes its own way, the
very realisation of the good is exposed to
obstacles, obstacles which may indeed even
be insurmountable.
§ 1768
In this way, the good remains an ought-to-be;
it is in and for itself, but being, as the
ultimate abstract immediacy, remains also
confronting is in the form of a not-being.
§ 1769
The Idea of the realised good is, it is true,
an absolute postulate, but it is no more
than a postulate, that is, the absolute afflicted
with the determinateness of subjectivity.
There are still two worlds in opposition,
one a realm of subjectivity in the pure regions
of transparent thought, the other a realm
of objectivity in the element of an externally
manifold actuality that is an undisclosed
realm of darkness. The complete elaboration
of the unresolved contradiction between that
absolute end and the limitation of this actuality
that insuperably opposes it, has been considered
in detail in the Phenomenology of Spirit.
§ 1770
As the Idea contains within itself the moment
of complete determinateness, the other Notion
with which the Notion enters into relation
in the Idea, possesses in its subjectivity
also the moment of an object; consequently
the Idea enter here into the shape of self-consciousness
and in this one aspect coincides with the
exposition of the same.
§ 1771
But what is still lacking in the practical
Idea is the moment of consciousness proper
itself; namely, that the moment of actuality
in the Notion should have attained on its
own account the determination of external
being.
§ 1772
Another way of regarding this defect is that
the practical Idea still lacks the moment
of the theoretical Idea. That is to say,
in the latter there stands on the side of
the subjective Notion - the Notion that is
in process of being intuited within itself
by the Notion only the determination of universality;
cognition knows itself only as apprehension,
as the identity on its own account indeterminate
of the Notion with itself; the filling, that
is, the objectivity that is determined in
and for itself, is for it a datum, and what
truly is is the actuality there before it
independently of subjective positing. For
the practical Idea, on the contrary, this
actuality, which at the same time confronts
it as an insuperable limitation, ranks as
something intrinsically worthless that must
first receive its true determination and
sole worth through the ends of the good.
Hence it is only the will itself that stands
in the way of attainment of its goal, for
it separates itself from cognition, and external
reality for the will does not receive the
form of a true being; the Idea of the good
can therefore find its integration only in
the Idea of the true.
§ 1773
But it makes this transition through itself.
In the syllogism of action, one premise is
the immediate relation of the good end to
actuality which it seizes on, and in the
second premise directs it as an external
means against the external actuality.
§ 1774
For the subjective Notion the good is the
objective; actuality in its existence confronts
is as an insuperable limitation only in so
far as it still has the character of immediate
existence, not of something objective in
the sense of a being that is in and for itself;
on the contrary, it is either the evil or
the indifferent, the merely determinable,
whose worth does not reside within it. This
abstract being that confronts the good in
the second premise has, however, already
been sublated by the practical Idea itself;
the first premise of the latter's action
is the immediate objectivity of the Notion,
according to which the end communicates itself
to actuality without meeting any resistance
and is in simple identical relation with
it. Thus all that remains to be done is to
bring together the thoughts of its two premises.
To what has been already immediately accomplished
by the objective Notion in the first premise,
the only addition made in the second premise
is that it is posited through mediation,
and hence posited for the objective Notion.
Now just as in the end relation in general,
the realised end is also again merely a means,
while conversely the means is also the realised
end, so similarly in the syllogism of the
good, the second premise is immediately already
present implicitly in the first; but this
immediacy is not sufficient, and the second
premise is already postulated for the first
- the realisation of the good in the face
of another actuality confronting it is the
mediation which is essentially necessary
for the immediate relation and the accomplished
actualisation of the good.
§ 1775
For it is only the first negation or the
otherness of the Notion, an objectivity that
would be a submergence of the Notion in the
externality; the second negation is the sublating
of this otherness, whereby the immediate
realisation of the end first becomes the
actuality the Notion is posited as identical
with itself, not with an other, and thus
alone is posited as the free Notion.
§ 1776
Now if it is supposed that the end of the
good is after all not realised through this
mediation, this signifies a relapse of the
Notion to the standpoint occupied by it before
its activity - the standpoint of an actuality
determined as worthless and yet presupposed
as real. This relapse, which becomes the
progress to the spurious infinity, has its
sole ground in the fact that in the sublating
of that abstract reality this sublating is
no less immediately forgotten, or it is forgotten
that this reality is in fact already presupposed
as an actuality that is intrinsically worthless
and not objective.
§ 1777
This repetition of the presupposition of
the end consequently assumes this character,
that the subjective bearing of the objective
Notion is reproduced and made perpetual,
with the result that the finitude of the
good in respect of its content as well as
its form appears as the abiding truth, and
its actualisation appears as a merely individual
act, and not as a universal one. As a matter
of fact this determinateness has sublated
itself in the actualisation of the good;
what still limits the objective Notion is
its own view of itself, which vanishes by
reflection on what its actualisation is in
itself. Through this view it is only standing
in its own way, and thus what it has to do
is to turn, not against an outer actuality,
but against itself.
§ 1778
In other words, the activity in the second
premise produces only a one-sided being-for-self,
and its product therefore appears as something
subjective and individual, and consequently
the first presupposition is repeated in it.
But this activity is in truth no less the
positing of the implicit identity of the
objective Notion and the immediate actuality.
This latter is determined by the presupposition
as having a phenomenal reality only, as being
intrinsically worthless and simply and solely
determinable by the objective Notion. When
external actuality is altered by the activity
of the objective Notion and its determination
therewith sublated, by that very fact the
merely phenomenal reality, the external determinability
and worthlessness, are removed from that
actuality and it is posited as being in and
for itself.
§ 1779
In this process the general presupposition
is sublated, namely the determination of
the good as a merely subjective end limited
in respect of content, the necessity of realising
it by subjective activity, and this activity
itself. In the result the mediation sublates
itself; the result is an immediacy that is
not the restoration of the presupposition,
but rather its accomplished sublation. With
this, the Idea of the Notion that is determined
in and for itself is posited as being no
longer merely in the active subject but as
equally an immediate actuality; and conversely,
this actuality is posited, as it is in cognition,
as an objectivity possessing a true being.
§ 1780
The individuality of the subject with which
the subject was burdened by its presupposition,
has vanished along with the presupposition;
hence the subject now exists as free, universal
self-identity, for which the objectivity
of the Notion is a given objectivity immediately
to hand, no less truly than the subject knows
itself as the Notion that is determined in
and for itself. Accordingly in this result
cognition is restored and united with the
practical Idea; the actuality found as given
is at the same time determined as the realised
absolute end; but whereas in questing cognition
this subjectivity appeared merely as an objective
world without the subjectivity of the Notion,
here it appears as an objective world whose
inner ground and actual subsistence is the
Notion. This is the absolute Idea.
The Absolute Idea - (next section)
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