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The Young Hegelians ( German : Junghegelianer ), or Left Hegelians ( Linkshegelianer ), or the Hegelian Left ( die Hegelsche Linke ), were a group of German intellectuals who, in the decade or so after the death of Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel in 1831, reacted to and wrote about his ambiguous legacy. The Young Hegelians drew on his idea that the purpose and promise of history was the total negation of everything conducive to restricting freedom and reason ; and they proceeded to mount radical critiques, first of religion and then of the Prussian political system. They rejected anti-utopian aspects of his thought that " Old Hegelians " have interpreted to mean that the world has already essentially reached perfection.

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182-399: The German philosophers who wrote immediately after the death of Hegel in 1831 can be roughly divided into the politically and religiously radical ' left ', or 'young' Hegelians and the more conservative ' right ', or 'old' Hegelians. The Right Hegelians followed the master in believing that the dialectic of history had come to an end—Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit reveals itself to be

364-547: A Popularphilosoph (a "man of letters") who serves to make the abstruse ideas of philosophers accessible to a wider public; his own felt need to engage critically with the central ideas of Kantianism would not come until 1800. Having received his theological certificate from the Tübingen Seminary, Hegel became Hofmeister (house tutor) to an aristocratic family in Berne (1793–1796). During this period, he composed

546-447: A "philosophical disputorium." In 1802, Schelling and Hegel founded the journal Kritische Journal der Philosophie ( Critical Journal of Philosophy ) to which they contributed until the collaboration ended when Schelling left for Würzburg in 1803. In 1805, the university promoted Hegel to the unsalaried position of extraordinary professor after he wrote a letter to the poet and minister of culture Johann Wolfgang von Goethe protesting

728-579: A Hegelian framework – against both the supernatural elements of the Gospel and the idea that the Christian church was the sole bearer of absolute truth. He believed the Gospel stories were mythical responses to the situation the Jewish community at the time found themselves in. The idea that 'infinite reason' or 'the absolute' (i.e. broadly Hegelian notions of God) could be incarnated within a finite human being

910-550: A collection of atomized individuals, instead taking a holistic view of human self-consciousness as requiring the recognition of others, and people's view of themselves as being shaped by the views of others. Hegel describes The Phenomenology as both the "introduction" to his philosophical system and also as the "first part" of that system as the "science of the experience of consciousness." Yet it has long been controversial in both respects; indeed, Hegel's own attitude changed throughout his life. Nevertheless, however complicated

1092-560: A crucial role in the development of European liberalism: By abandoning English constitutionalism and creating a new republic based on the rights of the individual, the North Americans introduced a new force in the world. Ideas spread most rapidly when they have found adequate concrete expression. Thus republicanism entered our Romanic/Germanic world.... Up to this point, the conviction had prevailed in Europe that monarchy best served

1274-598: A difference here to which one can "refer," only a dialectic that one can observe and describe. The final category of the Logic is "the idea." As with "the concept", the sense of this term for Hegel is not psychological. Rather, following Kant in The Critique of Pure Reason , Hegel's usage harks back to the Greek eidos , Plato 's concept of form that is fully existent and universal: "Hegel's Idee (like Plato's idea)

1456-480: A draft constitution for Paoli'se use. Similarly, Voltaire affirmed in his Précis du siècle de Louis XV (1769: chapter LX) that " Bravery may be found in many places, but such bravery only among free peoples ". But the influence of the Corsican Republic as an example of a sovereign people fighting for liberty and enshrining this constitutionally in the form of an Enlightened republic was even greater among

1638-492: A free and united Germany , Arnold Ruge shared Hegel's belief that history is a progressive advance towards the realization of freedom, and that freedom is attained in the State, the creation of the rational general will . At the same time he criticized Hegel for having given an interpretation of history which was closed to the future, in the sense that it left no room for novelty. Max Stirner would occasionally socialize with

1820-566: A friend that in England "almost sixteen thousand has gone off – and in Ireland above forty thousand". Paine may have been inclined to talk up sales of his works but what is striking in this context is that Paine believed that Irish sales were so far ahead of English ones before Part II had appeared. On 5 June 1792, Thomas Paine , author of the Rights of Man was proposed for honorary membership of

2002-635: A high official in Munich, pleading for Niethammer's help in securing a teaching position. With the help of Niethammer, Hegel was appointed headmaster of a gymnasium in Nuremberg in November 1808, a post he held until 1816. While in Nuremberg, Hegel adapted his recently published Phenomenology of Spirit for use in the classroom. Part of his remit was to teach a class called "Introduction to Knowledge of

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2184-592: A historian; and Immanuel  [ de ] , who followed a theological path – lived long and safeguarded their father's manuscripts and letters , and produced editions of his works. As H. S. Harris recounts, when Hegel entered the Tübingen seminary in 1788, "he was a typical product of the German Enlightenment – an enthusiastic reader of Rousseau and Lessing , acquainted with Kant (at least at second hand), but perhaps more deeply devoted to

2366-453: A kind of "unity-in-difference," this both in the ancient articulation provided by Plato and in the Christian religion's doctrine of agape , which Hegel at this time viewed as "already 'grounded on universal Reason. ' " This interest, as well as his theological training, would continue to mark his thought, even as it developed in a more theoretical or metaphysical direction. According to Glenn Alexander Magee, Hegel's thought (in particular,

2548-621: A laboratory for such political experiments, Corsica combined a number of factors that made it unique: a tradition of village democracy; varied cultural influences from the Italian city-states, Spanish empire and Kingdom of France which left it open to the ideas of the Italian Renaissance , Spanish humanism and French Enlightenment ; and a geo-political position between these three competing powers which led to frequent power vacuums in which new regimes could be set up, testing out

2730-430: A metaphysical logic of truth. There are two texts of Hegel's Logic . The first, The Science of Logic (1812, 1813, 1816; bk.I revised 1831), is sometimes also called the "Greater Logic." The second is the first volume of Hegel's Encyclopedia and is sometimes known as the "Lesser Logic." The Encyclopedia Logic is an abbreviated or condensed presentation of the same dialectic. Hegel composed it for use with students in

2912-681: A metaphysically necessary and coherent "identity of identity and non-identity". Hegel was born on 27 August 1770 in Stuttgart , capital of the Duchy of Württemberg in the Holy Roman Empire (now southwestern Germany). Christened Georg Wilhelm Friedrich, he was known as Wilhelm to his close family. His father, Georg Ludwig Hegel (1733–1799), was secretary to the revenue office at the court of Karl Eugen, Duke of Württemberg . Hegel's mother, Maria Magdalena Louisa Hegel, née Fromm (1741–1783),

3094-613: A permanent position replacing a professor of botany, he was unable to find a permanent position. In 1807, he had to move to Bamberg since his savings and the payment from the Phenomenology were exhausted and he needed money to support his illegitimate son Ludwig. There, he became the editor of the local newspaper, Bamberger Zeitung  [ de ] , a position he obtained with the help of Niethammer. Ludwig Fischer and his mother stayed behind in Jena. In Bamberg, as editor of

3276-698: A post from the Universities of Erlangen , Berlin and Heidelberg , Hegel chose Heidelberg, where he moved in 1816. Soon after, his illegitimate son Ludwig Fischer (now ten years old) joined the Hegel household in April 1817, having spent time in an orphanage after the death of his mother Christiana Burkhardt. In 1817, Hegel published The Encyclopedia of the Philosophical Sciences in Outline as

3458-473: A regeneration of their country". By 1795, Tone's republicanism and that of the society had openly crystallized when he tells us: "I remember particularly two days thae we passed on Cave Hill. On the first Russell, Neilson, Simms, McCracken and one or two more of us, on the summit of McArt's fort, took a solemn obligation...never to desist in our efforts until we had subverted the authority of England over our country and asserted her independence." The culmination

3640-668: A republic became a powerful force in Britain's North American colonies, where it contributed to the American Revolution . In Europe, it gained enormous influence through the French Revolution and through the First French Republic of 1792–1804. In Ancient Greece , several philosophers and historians analysed and described elements we now recognize as classical republicanism . Traditionally,

3822-464: A republic was any stable well-governed political community. Both Plato and Aristotle identified three forms of government: democracy , aristocracy , and monarchy . First Plato and Aristotle, and then Polybius and Cicero, held that the ideal republic is a mixture of these three forms of government. The writers of the Renaissance embraced this notion. Cicero expressed reservations concerning

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4004-657: A summary of his philosophy for students attending his lectures at Heidelberg. It is also while in Heidelberg that Hegel first lectured on the philosophy of art. In 1818, Hegel accepted the renewed offer of the chair of philosophy at the University of Berlin, which had remained vacant since Johann Gottlieb Fichte 's death in 1814. Here, Hegel published his Elements of the Philosophy of Right (1821). Hegel devoted himself primarily to delivering lectures; his lectures on

4186-515: Is Hegel's attempt to meet this foundational demand. As he puts it, " logic coincides with metaphysics ." In the words of scholar Glenn Alexander Magee, the logic provides "an account of pure categories or ideas which are timelessly true" and which make up "the formal structure of reality itself". It is important to see, however, that Hegel's metaphysical program is not a return to the Leibnizian - Wolffian rationalism critiqued by Kant, which

4368-521: Is a political ideology that encompasses a range of ideas from civic virtue , political participation , harms of corruption , positives of mixed constitution , rule of law , and others. Historically, it emphasizes the idea of self-governance and ranges from the rule of a representative minority or aristocracy to popular sovereignty . It has had different definitions and interpretations which vary significantly based on historical context and methodological approach. Republicanism may also refer to

4550-494: Is a criticism Hegel accepts. In particular, Hegel rejects any form of metaphysics as speculation about the transcendent. His procedure, an appropriation of Aristotle's concept of form , is fully immanent. More generally, Hegel agrees wholeheartedly with Kant's rejection of all forms of dogmatism and also agrees that any future metaphysics must pass the test of criticism. It is the assessment of scholar Stephen Houlgate that Hegel's method of immanent logical development and critique

4732-468: Is also sometimes called civic humanism . Beyond simply a non-monarchy, early modern thinkers conceived of an ideal republic, in which mixed government was an important element, and the notion that virtue and the common good were central to good government. Republicanism also developed its own distinct view of liberty . Renaissance authors who spoke highly of republics were rarely critical of monarchies. While Niccolò Machiavelli 's Discourses on Livy

4914-424: Is an ongoing project with respect to its historical content, which continues to change and develop. For instance, although Hegel regards "the basic structure" of the philosophy of nature as complete, he was "aware that science is not 'finished' and will continue to make new discoveries". Philosophy is, as Hegel puts it, " its own time comprehended in thoughts ." He expands upon this definition: A further word on

5096-518: Is appropriately applied to the creation of a rationally designed government. Rather than being ideological, this approach focuses on applying a scientific methodology to the problems of governance through the rigorous study and application of past experience and experimentation in governance. This is the approach that may best be described to apply to republican thinkers such as Niccolò Machiavelli (as evident in his Discourses on Livy ), John Adams, and James Madison . The word "republic" derives from

5278-422: Is embarking upon nothing less than a transcendental deduction of metaphysics." In the course of its dialectic, the Phenomenology purports to demonstrate that – because consciousness always includes self-consciousness – there are no 'given' objects of direct awareness not already mediated by thought. Further analysis of the structure of self-consciousness reveals that both the social and conceptual stability of

5460-526: Is engaged in a direct relationship with the state , removing the need for identity politics based on local, religious, or racial identification. Républicanisme , in theory, makes anti-discrimination laws unnecessary, though some critics may argue that in republics also, colour-blind laws serve to perpetuate discrimination. Inspired by the American and French Revolutions, the Society of United Irishmen

5642-593: Is historically unique. Philosopher Béatrice Longuenesse holds that this project may be understood, on analogy to Kant, as "inseparably a metaphysical and a transcendental deduction of the categories of metaphysics." This approach insists, and claims to demonstrate, that the insights of logic cannot be judged by standards external to thought itself, that is, that "thought... is not the mirror of nature." Yet, she argues, this does not imply that these standards are arbitrary or subjective. Hegel's translator and scholar of German idealism George di Giovanni likewise interprets

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5824-543: Is mostly likely that Hegel attended the Stift because it was state-funded, for he had "a profound distaste for the study of orthodox theology" and never wanted to become a minister. ) All three greatly admired Hellenic civilization, and Hegel additionally steeped himself in Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Lessing during this time. They watched the unfolding of the French Revolution with shared enthusiasm. Although

6006-408: Is neither a Platonist who believes in abstract logical entities, nor a nominalist according to whom the particular is first in the orders of explanation and being alike. Rather, Hegel is a holist . For Hegel, the universal is always first in the order of explanation even if what is naturally particular is first in the order of being. With respect to the system as a whole, that universal is supplied by

6188-664: Is not a psychological concept. When deployed with the definitive article ("the") and sometimes modified by the term "logical," Hegel is referring to the intelligible structure of reality as articulated in the Subjective Logic. (When used in the plural, however, Hegel's sense is much closer to the ordinary dictionary sense of the term. ) Hegel's inquiry into thought is concerned to systematize thought's own internal self-differentiation, that is, how pure concepts ( logical categories ) differ from one another in their various relations of implication and interdependence. For instance, in

6370-504: Is practicable or efficacious, or just which shall not include Irishmen of every religious persuasion. The declaration, then, urged constitutional reform, union among Irish people and the removal of all religious disqualifications. The movement was influenced, at least in part, by the French Revolution. Public interest, already strongly aroused, was brought to a pitch by the publication in 1790 of Edmund Burke 's Reflections on

6552-520: Is the final part of the Logic . It discusses the doctrine of "the Concept," which is concerned with reintegrating those categories of objectivity into a thoroughly idealistic account of reality. Simplifying greatly, Being describes its concepts just as they appear, Essence attempts to explain them with reference to other forces, and the Concept explains and unites them both in terms of an internal teleology. The categories of Being "pass over" from one to

6734-733: Is the period's key work on republics, he also wrote the treatise The Prince , which is better remembered and more widely read, on how best to run a monarchy. The early modern writers did not see the republican model as universally applicable; most thought that it could be successful only in very small and highly urbanized city-states. Jean Bodin in Six Books of the Commonwealth (1576) identified monarchy with republic. Classical writers like Tacitus , and Renaissance writers like Machiavelli tried to avoid an outspoken preference for one government system or another. Enlightenment philosophers, on

6916-446: Is the product of an attempt to fuse ontology, epistemology, evaluation, etc., into a single set of concepts." The Logic accommodates within itself the necessity of the realm of natural-spiritual contingency , that which cannot be determined in advance: "To go further, it must abandon thinking altogether and let itself go, opening itself to that which is other than thought in pure receptivity." Simply put, logic realizes itself only in

7098-448: Is the self-concept of consciousness itself that is tested in the domain of experience, and where that concept is not adequate, self-consciousness "suffers this violence at its own hands, and brings to ruin its own restricted satisfaction." For, as Hegel points out, one cannot learn how to swim without getting into the water. By progressively testing its concept of knowledge in this way, by "making experience his standard of knowledge, Hegel

7280-461: Is the weakness of Ireland..." They adopted three central positions: (i) to seek out a cordial union among all the people of Ireland, to maintain that balance essential to preserve liberties and extend commerce; (ii) that the sole constitutional mode by which English influence can be opposed, is by a complete and radical reform of the representation of the people in Parliament; (iii) that no reform

7462-414: Is to articulate what Hegel calls "the identity of identity and non-identity" of nature and spirit. Put another way, it aims to overcome subject-object dualism. This is to say that, among other things, Hegel's philosophical project endeavors to provide the metaphysical basis for an account of spirit that is continuous with, yet distinct from, the "merely" natural world – without thereby reducing either term to

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7644-640: The Bamberger Zeitung  [ de ] , which was a pro-French newspaper, Hegel extolled the virtues of Napoleon and often editorialized the Prussian accounts of the war. Being the editor of a local newspaper, Hegel also became an important person in Bamberg social life, often visiting with the local official Johann Heinrich Liebeskind  [ de ] , and becoming involved in local gossip and pursued his passions for cards, fine eating, and

7826-553: The Commonwealth of England in 1660 and the restoration of the monarchy under Charles II discredited republicanism among England's ruling circles. Nevertheless, they welcomed the liberalism , and emphasis on rights, of John Locke , which played a major role in the Glorious Revolution of 1688. Even so, republicanism flourished in the "country" party of the early 18th century ( commonwealthmen ), which denounced

8008-618: The Dutch Republic during and after the Eighty Years' War , which began in 1568. This anti-monarchism was more propaganda than a political philosophy; most of the anti-monarchist works appeared in the form of widely distributed pamphlets . This evolved into a systematic critique of monarchy, written by men such as the brothers Johan and Peter de la Court . They saw all monarchies as illegitimate tyrannies that were inherently corrupt. These authors were more concerned with preventing

8190-488: The Encyclopedia (second edition, 1827; third, 1830). In his political philosophy, he criticized Karl Ludwig von Haller 's reactionary work, which claimed that laws were not necessary. A number of other works on the philosophy of history , religion , aesthetics and the history of philosophy were compiled from the lecture notes of his students and published posthumously. Hegel was appointed University Rector of

8372-690: The Enlightenment , such as Christian Garve and Gotthold Ephraim Lessing . In 1844, Hegel's first biographer, Karl Rosenkranz described the young Hegel's education there by saying that it "belonged entirely to the Enlightenment with respect to principle, and entirely to classical antiquity with respect to curriculum." His studies at the Gymnasium concluded with his graduation speech, "The abortive state of art and scholarship in Turkey." At

8554-725: The Ferry Laws , which he intended to overturn the Falloux Laws by embracing the anti-clerical thinking of the Philosophes . These laws ended the Catholic Church's involvement in many government institutions in late 19th-century France, including schools. In recent years a debate has developed over the role of republicanism in the American Revolution and in the British radicalism of the 18th century. For many decades

8736-499: The Logic as (drawing upon, yet also in opposition to, Kant ) immanently transcendental ; its categories, according to Hegel, are built into life itself , and define what it is to be "an object in general." Books one and two of the Logic are the doctrines of "Being" and "Essence." Together they comprise the Objective Logic, which is largely occupied with overcoming the assumptions of traditional metaphysics. Book three

8918-434: The Phenomenology a Bildungsroman . It is not the consciousness under observation that learns from its experience. Only "we," the phenomenological observers, are in a position to profit from Hegel's logical reconstruction of the science of experience. The ensuing dialectic is long and hard. It is described by Hegel himself as a "path of despair," in which self-consciousness finds itself to be, over and again, in error. It

9100-438: The Phenomenology with respect to either of the systematic roles asserted by Hegel at the time of its publication. Hegel's philosophical system is divided into three parts: the science of logic , the philosophy of nature , and the philosophy of spirit (the latter two of which together constitute the real philosophy ). This structure is adopted from Proclus 's Neoplatonic triad of " 'remaining-procession-return' and from

9282-532: The University of Berlin , as they would certainly be poorly received due to their reputations. Dudley Knowles argues that the Young Hegelians secularised Hegel's idea of Geist (spirit), removing the religious link. The resulting philosophy ultimately replaces spirit as the subject of history with that of man. Hegel Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (27 August 1770 – 14 November 1831)

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9464-450: The essentialities of the things ." As Michael Wolff explains, Hegel's logic is a continuation of Kant's distinctive logical program. Its occasional engagement with the familiar Aristotelian conception of logic is only incidental to Hegel's project. Twentieth-century developments by such logicians as Frege and Russell likewise remain logics of formal validity and so are likewise irrelevant to Hegel's project, which aspires to provide

9646-504: The inaugural dissertation De Orbitis Planetarum , in which he briefly criticized mathematical arguments that assert that there must exist a planet between Mars and Jupiter . Later in the year, Hegel's essay The Difference Between Fichte's and Schelling's System of Philosophy was completed. He lectured on "Logic and Metaphysics" and gave lectures with Schelling on an "Introduction to the Idea and Limits of True Philosophy" and facilitated

9828-548: The 'Young Hegelians' aware of their existence as a distinct group, and it was their attitude to religion that distinguished the left and right from then onwards ( August Cieszkowski is a possible exception to this rule). Despite the lack of political freedom of speech in Prussia at the time, King Wilhelm III , under the influence of his relatively enlightened minister of religion, health and education Altenstein , allowed pretty much anything to be said about religion so long as there

10010-504: The Christian Trinity." Although evident in draft writings dating back as early as 1805, the system was not completed in published form until the 1817 Encyclopedia (1st ed.). Frederick C. Beiser argues that the position of the logic with respect to the real philosophy is best understood in terms of Hegel's appropriation of Aristotle's distinction between "the order of explanation" and "the order of being." To Beiser, Hegel

10192-744: The Dublin Society of the United Irishmen. The fall of the Bastille was to be celebrated in Belfast on 14 July 1791 by a Volunteer meeting. At the request of Thomas Russell , Tone drafted suitable resolutions for the occasion, including one favouring the inclusion of Catholics in any reforms. In a covering letter to Russell, Tone wrote, "I have not said one word that looks like a wish for separation, though I give it to you and your friends as my most decided opinion that such an event would be

10374-484: The Enlightenment ideal of a written constitutional monarchy . But the perception grew that the monarchy had colluded with the invading power, a more radical group of reformers led by the Pasquale Paoli pushed for political overhaul, in the form of a constitutional and parliamentary republic inspired by the popular ideas of the Enlightenment. Its governing philosophy was both inspired by the prominent thinkers of

10556-475: The French monarchy in the 1790s, began by setting up a republic; Napoleon converted it into an Empire with a new aristocracy. In the 1830s Belgium adopted some of the innovations of the progressive political philosophers of the Enlightenment. Républicanisme is a French version of modern republicanism. It is a form of social contract , deduced from Jean-Jacques Rousseau 's idea of a general will . Each citizen

10738-401: The Greek concept of " politeia " was rendered into Latin as res publica. Consequently, political theory until relatively recently often used republic in the general sense of "regime". There is no single written expression or definition from this era that exactly corresponds with a modern understanding of the term "republic" but most of the essential features of the modern definition are present in

10920-477: The Irish, French and American causes. During the Enlightenment, anti- monarchism extended beyond the civic humanism of the Renaissance. Classical republicanism, still supported by philosophers such as Rousseau and Montesquieu , was only one of several theories seeking to limit the power of monarchies rather than directly opposing them. Liberalism and socialism departed from classical republicanism and fueled

11102-606: The Latin noun-phrase res publica (public thing), which referred to the system of government that emerged in the 6th century BCE following the expulsion of the kings from Rome by Lucius Junius Brutus and Collatinus . This form of government in the Roman state collapsed in the latter part of the 1st century BCE, giving way to what was a monarchy in form, if not in name. Republics recurred subsequently, with, for example, Renaissance Florence or early modern Britain . The concept of

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11284-406: The Philosophical Sciences . Throughout his work, Hegel strove to address and correct the problematic dualisms of modern philosophy, Kantian and otherwise, typically by drawing upon the resources of ancient philosophy , particularly Aristotle . Hegel everywhere insists that reason and freedom are historical achievements, not natural givens. His dialectical -speculative procedure is grounded in

11466-562: The Radicals of Great Britain and North America , where it was popularised via An Account of Corsica , by the Scottish essayist James Boswell . The Corsican Republic went on to influence the American revolutionaries ten years later: the Sons of Liberty , initiators of the American Revolution , would declare Pascal Paoli to be a direct inspiration for their own struggle against the British;

11648-552: The Renaissance, Europe was divided, such that those states controlled by a landed elite were monarchies, and those controlled by a commercial elite were republics. The latter included the Italian city-states of Florence , Genoa , and Venice and members of the Hanseatic League . One notable exception was Dithmarschen , a group of largely autonomous villages, which confederated in a peasants' republic. Building upon concepts of medieval feudalism , Renaissance scholars used

11830-585: The Revolution in France , and Thomas Paine's response, Rights of Man , in February 1791. Theobald Wolfe Tone wrote later that, "This controversy, and the gigantic event which gave rise to it, changed in an instant the politics of Ireland." Paine himself was aware of this commenting on sales of Part I of Rights of Man in November 1791, only eight months after publication of the first edition, he informed

12012-522: The Roman Republic as an ideal system because it included features like a systematic separation of powers . Romans still called their state "Res Publica" in the era of the early emperors because, on the surface, the organization of the state had been preserved by the first emperors without significant alteration. Several offices from the Republican era, held by individuals, were combined under

12194-452: The Roman Republic constituted in such a manner that it applied the strengths of each system to offset the weaknesses of the others. In his view, the mixed system of the Roman Republic provided the Romans with a much greater level of domestic tranquillity than would have been experienced under another form of government. Furthermore, Polybius argued, the comparative level of domestic tranquillity

12376-519: The Romans enjoyed allowed them to conquer the Mediterranean. Polybius exerted a great influence on Cicero as he wrote his politico-philosophical works in the 1st century BCE. In one of these works, De re publica , Cicero linked the Roman concept of res publica to the Greek politeia . The modern term "republic", despite its derivation, is not synonymous with the Roman res publica . Among

12558-477: The Unique One's unique nature is derived from comparison, The Individual exists for itself, and is the existence of all ideas- it is nothing more than peculiarity and uniqueness itself. Karl Schmidt was the last notable Young Hegelian, and arguably the most obscure of the notable Young Hegelians. Edgar Bauer , 1820–1886, was the younger brother of Bruno Bauer. According to Lawrence S. Stepelevich, Edgar Bauer

12740-601: The Universal Coherence of the Sciences." In 1811, Hegel married Marie Helena Susanna von Tucher (1791–1855), the eldest daughter of a Senator. This period saw the publication of his second major work, the Science of Logic ( Wissenschaft der Logik ; 3 vols., 1812, 1813 and 1816), and the birth of two sons, Karl Friedrich Wilhelm (1813–1901) and Immanuel Thomas Christian (1814–1891). Having received offers of

12922-438: The University of Jena from much of the destruction of the surrounding city, few students returned after the battle and enrollment suffered, making Hegel's financial prospects even worse. Hegel traveled in the winter to Bamberg and stayed with Niethammer to oversee the proofs of the Phenomenology , which was being printed there. Although Hegel tried to obtain another professorship, even writing Goethe in an attempt to help secure

13104-808: The Young Hegelian movement was the Doctor's Club in Berlin (later known as 'the Free'), a society of intellectuals founded in 1837 and led by Bruno Bauer who, by 1838, was writing the most anti-Christian pamphlets in Germany at the time. The radicalization and politicization of the movement occurred when the new king, Frederick William IV , upon whom the Young Hegelians had pinned their hopes of political reform, came to power in 1840 and curtailed political freedom and religious tolerance more than before. In philosophy

13286-422: The Young Hegelians held the theory to be applicable to any state backed by any religion. All laws were ultimately based on religious tenets. As such, their plan to undermine what they felt was the corrupt and despotic state apparatus was to attack the philosophical basis of religion. David Strauss wrote Das Leben Jesu ( The Life of Jesus/The Life of Jesus, Critically Examined ) in 1835, in which he argued – in

13468-400: The Young Hegelians, attacking their views in works such as The German Ideology . Marx concluded that religion is not the basis of the establishment's power, but rather ownership of capital—processes that employ technologies, land, money and especially human labor-power to create surplus-value—lie at the heart of the establishment's power. Marx (and Engels) considered religion as a component of

13650-477: The Young Hegelians, but held views much to the contrary of these thinkers, all of whom he consequently satirized and mocked in his nominalist magnum-opus Der Einzige und Sein Eigentum ( The Unique and Its Property ). Another Young Hegelian, Karl Marx , was at first sympathetic with this strategy of attacking Christianity to undermine the Prussian establishment, but later formed divergent ideas and broke with

13832-533: The age of eighteen, Hegel entered the Tübinger Stift , a Protestant seminary attached to the University of Tübingen , where he had as roommates the poet and philosopher Friedrich Hölderlin and the future philosopher Friedrich Schelling . Sharing a dislike for what they regarded as the restrictive environment of the Seminary, the three became close friends and mutually influenced each other's ideas. (It

14014-540: The age of three, Hegel went to the German School. When he entered the Latin School two years later, he already knew the first declension , having been taught it by his mother. In 1776, he entered Stuttgart's Eberhard-Ludwigs-Gymnasium and during his adolescence read voraciously, copying lengthy extracts in his diary. Authors he read include the poet Friedrich Gottlieb Klopstock and writers associated with

14196-409: The antithesis of all human flaws and shortcomings. Such view later influenced Karl Marx 's thought, who coined the expression " opium of the people " to describe religion in his Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Right . Carl Nauwerck was a German orientalist, theologian and lecturer of Hegelian philosophy in Berlin who lost his teaching license along with Bruno Bauer in 1842. As an advocate of

14378-566: The argument that the American founding fathers were more influenced by republicanism than they were by liberalism. Cornell University professor Isaac Kramnick , on the other hand, argues that Americans have always been highly individualistic and therefore Lockean. Joyce Appleby has argued similarly for the Lockean influence on America. In the decades before the American Revolution (1776), the intellectual and political leaders of

14560-457: The city. On the day before the battle, Napoleon entered the city of Jena. Hegel recounted his impressions in a letter to his friend Friedrich Immanuel Niethammer : I saw the Emperor – this world-soul [ Weltseele ] – riding out of the city on reconnaissance. It is indeed a wonderful sensation to see such an individual, who, concentrated here at a single point, astride a horse, reaches out over

14742-517: The classics than to any thing modern." During this early period of his life "the Greeks – especially Plato – came first." Although he later elevated Aristotle above Plato, Hegel never abandoned his love of ancient philosophy, the imprint of which is everywhere in his thought. Hegel's concern with various forms of cultural unity (Judaic, Greek, medieval, and modern) during this early period would remain with him throughout his career. In this way, he

14924-467: The colonies studied history intently, looking for models of good government. They especially followed the development of republican ideas in England. Pocock explained the intellectual sources in America: The Whig canon and the neo-Harringtonians, John Milton , James Harrington and Sidney , Trenchard , Gordon and Bolingbroke , together with the Greek, Roman, and Renaissance masters of

15106-466: The conditions necessary for a functional popular sovereignty, that " There is still one European country capable of making its own laws: the island of Corsica. valour and persistency with which that brave people has regained and defended its liberty well deserves that some wise man should teach it how to preserve what it has won. I have a feeling that some day that little island will astonish Europe ."; indeed Rousseau volunteered to do precisely that, offering

15288-509: The consensus was that liberalism , especially that of John Locke , was paramount and that republicanism had a distinctly secondary role. The new interpretations were pioneered by J.G.A. Pocock , who argued in The Machiavellian Moment (1975) that, at least in the early 18th century, republican ideas were just as important as liberal ones. Pocock's view is now widely accepted. Bernard Bailyn and Gordon Wood pioneered

15470-509: The constraints of one nation. As Christopher N. Warren argues, Milton offers "a language to critique imperialism, to question the legitimacy of dictators, to defend free international discourse, to fight unjust property relations, and to forge new political bonds across national lines." This form of international Miltonic republicanism has been influential on later thinkers including 19th-century radicals Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels , according to Warren and other historians. The collapse of

15652-467: The control of a single person. These changes became permanent, and gradually conferred sovereignty on the Emperor. Cicero's description of the ideal state, in De re Publica , does not equate to a modern-day "republic"; it is more like enlightened absolutism . His philosophical works were influential when Enlightenment philosophers such as Voltaire developed their political concepts. In its classical meaning,

15834-532: The corruption of the "court" party, producing a political theory that heavily influenced the American colonists. In general, the English ruling classes of the 18th century vehemently opposed republicanism, typified by the attacks on John Wilkes , and especially on the American Revolution and the French Revolution . French and Swiss Enlightenment thinkers, such as Voltaire , Baron Charles de Montesquieu and later Jean-Jacques Rousseau , expanded upon and altered

16016-441: The culmination of history as the reader reaches its end. Here he meant that reason and freedom had reached their maximums as they were embodied by the existing Prussian state. And here the master’s claim was viewed as paradox, at best; the Prussian regime indeed provided extensive civil and social services , good universities, high employment and some industrialization , but it was ranked as rather backward politically compared with

16198-481: The day, notably the French philosophers Montesquieu and Voltaire and the Swiss theorist Jean-Jacques Rousseau. Not only did it include a permanent national parliament with fixed-term legislatures and regular elections, but, more radically for the time, it introduced universal male suffrage , and it is thought to be the first constitution in the world to grant women the right to vote, female suffrage did exist for heads of

16380-466: The defects that affected them. Both Livy , a Roman historian, and Plutarch , who is noted for his biographies and moral essays, described how Rome had developed its legislation, notably the transition from a kingdom to a republic , by following the example of the Greeks. Some of this history, composed more than 500 years after the events, with scant written sources to rely on, may be fictitious reconstruction. The Greek historian Polybius , writing in

16562-621: The definitive modern articulation of the divisions that must be overcome. This led to his engagement with the philosophical programs of Fichte and Schelling , as well as his attention to Spinoza and the Pantheism controversy . The influence of Johann Gottfried von Herder , however, would lead Hegel to a qualified rejection of the universality claimed by the Kantian program in favor of a more culturally, linguistically, and historically informed account of reason. The Phenomenology of Spirit

16744-490: The democratic ideals of the modern world. An important distinction is that, while republicanism stressed the importance of civic virtue and the common good , liberalism was based on economics and individualism . It is clearest in the matter of private property, which, according to some, can be maintained only under the protection of established positive law . Jules Ferry , Prime Minister of France from 1880 to 1885, followed both these schools of thought. He eventually enacted

16926-462: The details, the basic strategy by which it attempts to make good on its introductory claim is not difficult to state. Beginning with only the most basic "certainties of consciousness itself," "the most immediate of which is the certainty that I am conscious of this object, here and now ," Hegel aims to show that these "certainties of natural consciousness" have as their consequence the standpoint of speculative logic. This does not, however, make

17108-525: The development of the more modern republicanism . Brazilian historiography generally identifies republican thought with the movement that was formally organized in the Empire of Brazil during the 1870s to 1880s, but republicanism was already present in the country since the First Reign (1822–1831) and the regency period (1831–1840). During Brazil's early years after its independence , the country saw

17290-536: The difference between civil society , which Hegel held to be the sphere where individual interest is pursued in conflict with the interests of others and the state, where such conflicts are transcended, was in fact misplaced, the goal of the proletariat being in fact to abolish such differences. Other Young Hegelians had other qualms about Hegel’s philosophy . David Strauss did not accept Hegel’s claims of Christian historicity renouncing any historical basis to Christianity in favour of its demythification, claiming that

17472-485: The domain of nature and spirit, in which it attains its "verification." Hence the conclusion of the Science of Logic with "the idea freely discharging [entläßt] itself" into "objectivity and external life" – and, so too, the systematic transition to the Realphilosophie . In contrast to the first, logical part of Hegel's system, the second, real-philosophical part – the philosophy of nature and of spirit –

17654-477: The emergence of a republican discourse among the writings of figures such as Cipriano Barata , Frei Caneca and João Soares Lisboa, but republican ideology better developed as a political current after the emergence of the so-called radical liberal faction in the crisis of the final years of the First Reign. During the First Reign, three groups emerged on the country's political scene: the moderate liberals,

17836-627: The entire story of Jesus was a myth . He found no record of anyone named "Yeshua of Nazareth" in any then-extant Roman records. Such citations actually exist, notably by the Roman historian Tacitus in his Annals and the Jewish historian Josephus in his Antiquities of the Jews . Bauer argued that almost all prominent historical figures in antiquity are referenced in other works (e.g., Aristophanes mocking Socrates in his plays), but as he could not find any such references to Jesus, he argued that it

18018-579: The episode resonated across Europe as an early example of Enlightened constitutional republicanism, with many of the most prominent political commentators of the day recognising it to be an experiment in a new type of popular and democratic government. Its influence was particularly notable among the French Enlightenment philosophers: Rousseau's famous work On the Social Contract (1762: chapter 10, book II) declared, in its discussion on

18200-418: The essay "Fragments on Religion and Love." In 1799, he wrote another essay titled "The Spirit of Christianity and Its Fate", unpublished during his lifetime. In 1801, Hegel came to Jena at the encouragement of Schelling, who held the position of Extraordinary Professor at the University of Jena . Hegel secured a position at the University of Jena as a Privatdozent (unsalaried lecturer) after submitting

18382-431: The essence of humankind – a conclusion from his 1806–07 Phenomenology that he claims is further verified by the systematic account of the interdependence of logic, nature , and spirit in his later Encyclopedia . He asserts that the Logic at once preserves and overcomes the dualisms of the material and the mental – that is, it accounts for both the continuity and difference marking the domains of nature and culture – as

18564-427: The exceptions being Moses Hess , who mixed Hegelianism with communism, and of course Marx and Engels. In all these areas a central change was the adoption of certain ideas of Johann Gottlieb Fichte , especially the notion that the self-transcendence of the world by man was a possibility and duty, but one that could never be conclusively fulfilled. Although they spread democratic ideas throughout Germany to some extent,

18746-485: The experiential world depend upon networks of reciprocal recognition. Failures of recognition, then, demand reflection upon the past as a way "to understand what is required of us at the present." For Hegel, this ultimately involves rethinking an interpretation of "religion as the collective reflection of the modern community on what ultimately counts for it." He contends, finally, that this "historically, socially construed philosophical account of that whole process" elucidates

18928-462: The family. It also extended Enlightened principles to other spheres, including administrative reform, the foundation of a national university at Corte , and the establishment of a popular standing army . The Corsican Republic lasted for fifteen years, from 1755 to 1769, eventually falling to a combination of Genoese and French forces and was incorporated as a province of the Kingdom of France. But

19110-467: The fashionable new ideas of the age. From the 1720s the island had been experiencing a series of short-lived but ongoing rebellions against its current sovereign, the Italian city-state of Genoa . During the initial period (1729–36) these merely sought to restore the control of the Spanish Empire; when this proved impossible, an independent Kingdom of Corsica (1736–40) was proclaimed, following

19292-418: The genesis of a distinctly "modern" standpoint. Another way of putting this is to say that the Phenomenology takes up Kant's philosophical project of investigating the capacities and limits of reason. Under the influence of Herder, however, Hegel proceeds historically, instead of altogether a priori. Yet, although proceeding historically, Hegel resists the relativistic consequences of Herder's own thought. In

19474-443: The group, although information only survives for Stirner's second wife, Marie Dähnhardt . Moreover, after the owner stopped lending them money to drink, they resorted to jokingly begging on the street. However, Mackay claims that they drank little and drunkenness was uncommon. Marx would not accept that the state was the seat of universality and rationality , i.e. that it was inherently rational; and made it his goal to prove that

19656-589: The group. Attendees included Max Stirner , Bruno Bauer , Arnold Ruge and Friedrich Engels , among others. Although not much is known about the group, with John Henry Mackay 's biography of Max Stirner appearing to be the most authoritative source, involvement appears to have been a formative period for Engels (who wrote with Karl Marx The Manifesto of the Communist Party , Wage-Labour and Capital and The German Ideology shortly after involvement) and Stirner (who wrote The Ego and Its Own around

19838-436: The human reality they reflect." In other words, it is not enough to consider propositions, or even the content of consciousness; "it is worthwhile to ask in every instance what kind of spirit would entertain such propositions, hold such views, and have such a consciousness. Every outlook in other words, is to be studied not merely as an academic possibility but as an existential reality." The Phenomenology of Spirit shows that

20020-471: The idea emerged that power should come from below.... These two principles are like two opposite poles, and it is the conflict between them that determines the course of the modern world. In Europe the conflict between them had not yet taken on concrete form; with the French Revolution it did. Republicanism, especially that of Rousseau , played a central role in the French Revolution and foreshadowed modern republicanism. The revolutionaries, after overthrowing

20202-416: The ideal appears opposite the real and reconstructs this real world, which it has grasped in its substance, in the shape of an intellectual realm. When philosophy paints its gray in gray, a shape of life has grown old, and it cannot be rejuvenated, but only recognized, by the gray in gray of philosophy; the owl of Minerva begins its flight only with the onset of dusk. Republicanism Republicanism

20384-484: The ideal of the militia), established churches (opposed to the Puritan and deist modes of American religion) and the promotion of a monied interest – though the formulation of this last concept was somewhat hindered by the keen desire for readily available paper credit common in colonies of settlement. A neoclassical politics provided both the ethos of the elites and the rhetoric of the upwardly mobile, and accounts for

20566-489: The ideas of the ancient world to advance their view of an ideal government. Thus the republicanism developed during the Renaissance is known as 'classical republicanism' because it relied on classical models. This terminology was developed by Zera Fink in the 1940s, but some modern scholars, such as Brugger, consider it confuses the "classical republic" with the system of government used in the ancient world. 'Early modern republicanism' has been proposed as an alternative term. It

20748-574: The ideas of what an ideal republic should be: some of their new ideas were scarcely traceable to antiquity or the Renaissance thinkers. Concepts they contributed, or heavily elaborated, were social contract , positive law , and mixed government . They also borrowed from, and distinguished republicanism from, the ideas of liberalism that were developing at the same time. Liberalism and republicanism were frequently conflated during this period, because they both opposed absolute monarchy. Modern scholars see them as two distinct streams that both contributed to

20930-615: The ideological superstructure of societies, and a pre-rational mode of thought, which nonetheless was wielded by ruling elites to obscure social relationships including the true basis of political power. In this latter sense, he described religion as "the opium of the people ." August Cieszkowski focused on Hegel's view of world history and reformed it to better accommodate Hegelian Philosophy itself by dividing it into Past, Present, and Future. In his Prolegomena to Historiosophy , Cieszkowski argues that we have gone from Art (the Past), which

21112-470: The influence of early Romanticism, he underwent a sort of reversal, exploring, in particular, the mystical experience of love as the true essence of religion. Also in 1797, the unpublished and unsigned manuscript of " The Oldest Systematic Program of German Idealism " was written. It was written in Hegel's hand, but may have been authored by Hegel, Schelling, or Hölderlin. While in Frankfurt, Hegel composed

21294-495: The intellectual exertions of the Young Hegelians failed to connect with or stir any wider social movement, and when the Deutsche Jahrbücher was suppressed in 1843 the movement started to disintegrate. The Young Hegelians interpreted the entire state apparatus as ultimately claiming legitimacy based upon religious tenets. While this thought was clearly inspired by the function of Lutheranism in contemporary Prussia ,

21476-441: The interests of the nation. Now the idea spread that the nation should govern itself. But only after a state had actually been formed on the basis of the theory of representation did the full significance of this idea become clear. All later revolutionary movements have this same goal... This was the complete reversal of a principle. Until then, a king who ruled by the grace of God had been the center around which everything turned. Now

21658-463: The islands becoming republics, particularly Bermuda . Julien Fédon and Joachim Philip led the republican Fédon's rebellion between 2 March 1795 and 19 June 1796, an uprising against British rule in Grenada . The first of the Enlightenment republics established in Europe during the 18th century occurred in the small Mediterranean island of Corsica . Although perhaps an unlikely place to act as

21840-632: The labels 'right' and 'left' make them appear. The term 'Right Hegelian', for example, was never actually used by those to whom it was later ascribed, namely, Hegel's direct successors at the Fredrick William University (now the Humboldt University of Berlin ). The term was first used by David Strauss to describe Bruno Bauer —who actually was a typically 'Left', or Young, Hegelian. It was the outcry caused by David Strauss' The Life of Jesus in 1835 which first made

22022-483: The lecture hall, not as a substitute for its proper, book-length exposition. Hegel presents logic as a presuppositionless science that investigates the most fundamental thought-determinations [ Denkbestimmungen ], or categories , and so constitutes the basis of philosophy. In putting something into question, one already presupposes logic; in this regard, it is the only field of inquiry that must constantly reflect upon its own mode of functioning. The Science of Logic

22204-469: The length of the text itself. The fourth chapter of the Phenomenology includes Hegel's first presentation of the lord-bondsman dialectic , the section of the book that has been most influential in general culture. What is at stake in the conflict Hegel presents is the practical (not theoretical) recognition or acknowledgement [ Anerkennung , anerkennen ] of the universality – i.e., personhood, humanity – of each of two opposed self-consciousnesses. What

22386-518: The local Bamberg beer. However, Hegel bore contempt for what he saw as "old Bavaria", frequently referring to it as "Barbaria" and dreaded that "hometowns" like Bamberg would lose their autonomy under new the Bavarian state. After being investigated in September 1808 by the Bavarian state for potentially violating security measures by publishing French troop movements, Hegel wrote to Niethammer, now

22568-416: The logic. Michael J. Inwood states, "The logical idea is non-temporal and therefore does not exist at any time apart from its manifestations." To ask "when" it divides into nature and spirit is analogous to asking "when" 12 divides into 5 and 7. The question does not have an answer because it is predicated upon a fundamental misunderstanding of its terms. The task of the logic (at this high systemic level)

22750-526: The mid-2nd century BCE, emphasized (in Book 6) the role played by the Roman Republic as an institutional form in the dramatic rise of Rome's hegemony over the Mediterranean. In his writing on the constitution of the Roman Republic, Polybius described the system as being a "mixed" form of government. Specifically, Polybius described the Roman system as a mixture of monarchy, aristocracy, and democracy with

22932-448: The more liberal constitutional monarchies of France and Britain. The Young Hegelians drew on both Hegel's veneration of Reason and Freedom (as the guiding forces of history) and his idea that the 'Spirit' overcame all that opposed reason and freedom. They wanted to overcome the religious dogma and political authoritarianism in Germany at that time. It is important to note that the groups were not as unified or as self-conscious as

23114-457: The new semester began in October, Hegel returned to Berlin in the mistaken belief that the epidemic had largely subsided. By 14 November, Hegel was dead. The physicians pronounced the cause of death as cholera, but it is likely he died from another gastrointestinal disease. His last words are said to have been, "There was only one man who ever understood me, and even he didn't understand me." He

23296-473: The next as denoting thought-determinations only extrinsically connected to one another. The categories of Essence reciprocally "shine" into one another. Finally, in the Concept, thought has shown itself to be fully self-referential, and so its categories organically "develop" from one to the next. It is clear then, that in Hegel's technical sense of the term, the concept ( Begriff , sometimes also rendered "notion," capitalized by some translators but not others )

23478-617: The non-ideological scientific approach to politics and governance. As the republican thinker and second president of the United States John Adams stated in the introduction to his famous A Defense of the Constitutions of Government of the United States of America , the "science of politics is the science of social happiness" and a republic is the form of government arrived at when the science of politics

23660-399: The opening dialectic of the Logic , Hegel claims to display that the thought of " being, pure being – without further determination" is indistinguishable from the concept of nothing , and that, in this "passing back and forth" of being and nothing, " each immediately vanishes in its opposite. " This movement is neither one concept nor the other, but the category of becoming . There is not

23842-448: The other Young Hegelians (and, in its infancy, Old Hegelians). It attacked Catholicism and orthodox Protestantism but was initially politically moderate, taking the line that Prussia was the embodiment of historical reason, which required that it evolve by peaceful reform towards a bourgeois egalitarian state with a constitutional monarchy, Protestant religion (though without a dominating state church) and freedom of speech. Another nucleus of

24024-540: The other hand, expressed a clear opinion. Thomas More , writing before the Age of Enlightenment, was too outspoken for the reigning king's taste, even though he coded his political preferences in a utopian allegory. In England a type of republicanism evolved that was not wholly opposed to monarchy; thinkers such as Thomas More, John Fisher and Sir Thomas Smith saw a monarchy, firmly constrained by law, as compatible with republicanism. Anti- monarchism became more strident in

24206-533: The other. Furthermore, the final sections of Hegel's Encyclopedia suggest that to give priority to any one of its three parts is to have an interpretation that is "one-sided," incomplete or otherwise inaccurate. As Hegel famously declares, "The true is the whole." Hegel's concept of logic differs greatly from that of the ordinary English sense of the term. This can be seen, for instance, in such metaphysical definitions of logic as "the science of things grasped in [the] thoughts that used to be taken to express

24388-416: The philosophy of fine art, the philosophy of religion, the philosophy of history, and the history of philosophy were published posthumously from students' notes. In spite of his notoriously terrible delivery, his fame spread and his lectures attracted students from all over Germany and beyond. Meanwhile, Hegel and his pupils, such as Leopold von Henning , Friedrich Wilhelm Carové , were harassed and put under

24570-519: The political spectrum, along Jacobin lines, and defended broad reforms such as the abolition of the monarchy and the establishment of a republic, federalism, the extinction of the Moderating Power , the end of life tenure in the Senate , the separation between Church and State, relative social equality, the extension of political and civil rights to all free segments of society, including women,

24752-556: The position of Stadholder from evolving into a monarchy, than with attacking their former rulers. Dutch republicanism also influenced French Huguenots during the Wars of Religion . In the other states of early modern Europe republicanism was more moderate. In the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth , republicanism was the influential ideology. After the establishment of the Commonwealth of Two Nations, republicans supported

24934-538: The principle of immanence , that is, in assessing claims always according to their own internal criteria. Taking skepticism seriously, he contends that people cannot presume any truths that have not passed the test of experience; even the a priori categories of the Logic must attain their "verification" in the natural world and the historical accomplishments of humankind. Guided by the Delphic imperative to " know thyself ", Hegel presents free self-determination as

25116-442: The promotion of his philosophical adversary Jakob Friedrich Fries ahead of him. Hegel attempted to enlist the help of the poet and translator Johann Heinrich Voß to obtain a post at the renascent University of Heidelberg , but he failed. To his chagrin, Fries was, in the same year, made ordinary professor (salaried). The following February marked the birth of Hegel's illegitimate son, Georg Ludwig Friedrich Fischer (1807–1831), as

25298-461: The radical liberals and the caramurus . The moderates defended political-institutional reforms such as decentralization, without, however, giving up the monarchical system. Their main doctrinal references were Locke, Montesquieu, Guizot and Benjamin Constant . The radicals, in turn, formed a heterogeneous group with almost no representation within the imperial bureaucracy. They were on the left of

25480-400: The radicalization took the form of a breach with Hegel’s doctrine of the Prussian state as the fulfillment of history. In religion it manifested as a rejection of Christianity even in its most diluted pantheistic form and an adoption of atheism (led by Bauer and Feuerbach ). In politics the Young Hegelians dropped much of Hegel's political theory and for the most part turned to republicanism –

25662-408: The readers learn, but what the self-consciousnesses described do not yet realize, is that recognition can only be successful and actual as reciprocal or mutual. This is the case for the simple reason that the recognition of someone you do not recognize as properly human cannot count as genuine recognition. Hegel can also be seen here as criticizing the individualist worldview of people and society as

25844-426: The republican form of government. While in his theoretical works he defended monarchy, or at least a mixed monarchy/oligarchy, in his own political life, he generally opposed men, like Julius Caesar , Mark Antony , and Octavian , who were trying to realise such ideals. Eventually, that opposition led to his death and Cicero can be seen as a victim of his own Republican ideals. Tacitus , a contemporary of Plutarch,

26026-462: The result of an affair with Hegel's landlady Christiana Burkhardt née Fischer. With his finances drying up quickly, Hegel was under great pressure to deliver his book, the long-promised introduction to his philosophical system. Hegel was putting the finishing touches to it, The Phenomenology of Spirit , as Napoleon engaged Prussian troops on 14 October 1806 in the Battle of Jena on a plateau outside

26208-449: The rulers, there can be no civic peace or happiness. A number of Ancient Greek city-states such as Athens and Sparta have been classified as " classical republics ", because they featured extensive participation by the citizens in legislation and political decision-making. Aristotle considered Carthage to have been a republic as it had a political system similar to that of some of the Greek cities, notably Sparta, but avoided some of

26390-849: The same time). Consequently, the overall influence of the group to modern political thought can be considered monumental. As a cartoon by Engels shows, their small meetings were also attended by a "secret policeman", reporting on their activities to the authorities. The members of Die Freien held widely diverging views and met for the purpose of debate. They did not represent a unified political or ideological outlook, though most of them have subsequently been seen as "Young Hegelians." They usually met at Hippel's Wine Bar in central Berlin . According to John Henry Mackay 's biography of Max Stirner, they were well known for using foul language, at one point resulting in Arnold Ruge chastising them before storming out. Reportedly, there were many women involved with

26572-479: The search for an externally objective criterion of truth is a fool's errand. The constraints on knowledge are necessarily internal to spirit itself. Yet, although theories and self-conceptions may always be reevaluated, renegotiated, and revised, this is not a merely imaginative exercise. Claims to knowledge must always prove their own adequacy in real historical experience. Although Hegel seemed during his Berlin years to have abandoned The Phenomenology of Spirit , at

26754-509: The several meanings of the term res publica , it is most often translated "republic" where the Latin expression refers to the Roman state, and its form of government, between the era of the Kings and the era of the Emperors. This Roman Republic would, by a modern understanding of the word, still be defined as a true republic, even if not coinciding entirely. Thus, Enlightenment philosophers saw

26936-537: The singular cultural and intellectual homogeneity of the Founding Fathers and their generation. The commitment of most Americans to these republican values made the American Revolution inevitable. Britain was increasingly seen as corrupt and hostile to republicanism, and as a threat to the established liberties the Americans enjoyed. Leopold von Ranke in 1848 claimed that American republicanism played

27118-703: The son of Ebenezer Mackintosh was named Pascal Paoli Mackintosh in his honour, and no fewer than five American counties are named Paoli for the same reason. Oliver Cromwell set up a Christian republic called the Commonwealth of England (1649–1660) which he ruled after the overthrow of King Charles I . James Harrington was then a leading philosopher of republicanism. John Milton was another important Republican thinker at this time, expressing his views in political tracts as well as through poetry and prose. In his epic poem Paradise Lost , for instance, Milton uses Satan's fall to suggest that unfit monarchs should be brought to justice, and that such issues extend beyond

27300-561: The start of the Imperial form of government in Rome). By this time, too many principles defining some powers as "untouchable" had been implemented. In Europe, republicanism was revived in the late Middle Ages when a number of states, which arose from medieval communes , embraced a republican system of government. These were generally small but wealthy trading states in which the merchant class had risen to prominence. Haakonssen notes that by

27482-531: The state, freeing it from civil wars and disorder. Tacitus was one of the first to ask whether such powers were given to the head of state because the citizens wanted to give them, or whether they were given for other reasons (for example, because one had a deified ancestor ). The latter case led more easily to abuses of power. In Tacitus' opinion, the trend away from a true republic was irreversible only when Tiberius established power, shortly after Augustus' death in 14 CE (much later than most historians place

27664-494: The status quo, of having a very weak monarch, and opposed those who thought a stronger monarchy was needed. These mostly Polish republicans, such as Łukasz Górnicki , Andrzej Wolan , and Stanisław Konarski , were well read in classical and Renaissance texts and firmly believed that their state was a republic on the Roman model, and started to call their state the Rzeczpospolita . Atypically, Polish–Lithuanian republicanism

27846-539: The staunch opposition to slavery , displaying a nationalist , xenophobic and anti-Portuguese discourse. In 1870 a group of radical liberals, convinced of the impossibility of achieving their desired reforms within the Brazilian monarchical system, met and founded the Republican Party. From its founding until 1889, the party operated in an erratic and geographically diverse manner. The republican movement

28028-692: The stories found in the Bible should be understood as myths "constructed not by individuals but by the earliest Christian communities in response to the teaching of Christ and the Messianic tradition which they had inherited from the Old Testament ". The Young Hegelians were not popular at the university due to their radical views on religion and society. Bauer was dismissed from his teaching post in 1842, and Marx and other students were warned that they should not bother submitting their dissertations at

28210-460: The subject of issuing instructions on how the world ought to be: philosophy, at any rate, always comes too late to perform this function. As the thought of the world, it appears only at a time when actuality has gone through its formative process and attained its completed state [ sich fertig gemacht ]. This lesson of the concept is necessarily also apparent from history, namely that it is only when actuality [ Wirklichkeit ] has reached maturity that

28392-497: The surveillance of Prince Sayn-Wittgenstein , the interior minister of Prussia and his reactionary circles in the Prussian court. In the remainder of his career, he made two trips to Weimar , where he met with Goethe for the last time, and to Brussels , the Northern Netherlands , Leipzig, Vienna , Prague, and Paris. During the last ten years of his life, Hegel did not publish another book but thoroughly revised

28574-664: The text which has become known as the Life of Jesus and a book-length manuscript titled "The Positivity of the Christian Religion." His relations with his employers becoming strained, Hegel accepted an offer mediated by Hölderlin to take up a similar position with a wine merchant's family in Frankfurt in 1797. There, Hölderlin exerted an important influence on Hegel's thought. In Berne, Hegel's writings had been sharply critical of orthodox Christianity, but in Frankfurt, under

28756-442: The time of his unexpected death, he was in fact making plans to revise and republish it. As Hegel was no longer in need of money or credentials, H. S. Harris argues that "the only rational conclusion that can be drawn from his decision to republish the book… is that he still regarded the 'science of experience' as a valid project in itself" and one for which later system has no equivalent. There is, however, no scholarly consensus about

28938-464: The tradition as far as Montesquieu , formed the authoritative literature of this culture; and its values and concepts were those with which we have grown familiar: a civic and patriot ideal in which the personality was founded in property, perfected in citizenship but perpetually threatened by corruption; government figuring paradoxically as the principal source of corruption and operating through such means as patronage, faction, standing armies (opposed to

29120-586: The transitional period between the Enlightenment and the Romantic movement in the Germanic regions of Europe, Hegel lived through and was influenced by the French Revolution and the Napoleonic wars . His fame rests chiefly upon The Phenomenology of Spirit , The Science of Logic , his teleological account of history, and his lectures at the University of Berlin on topics from his Encyclopedia of

29302-457: The tripartite structure of his system) also owes much to the hermetic tradition, in particular, the work of Jakob Böhme . The conviction that philosophy must take the form of a system Hegel owed, most particularly, to his Tübingen roommates, Schelling and Hölderlin. Hegel also read widely and was much influenced by Adam Smith and other theorists of the political economy . It was Kant's critical philosophy that provided what Hegel took as

29484-407: The truth that, "I am only myself." At the end of the dialectic, where the individual exists "by grace of spirit, the law of spirit is applied to spirit itself, and is dragged to its grave". The individual remains as the evidence of the dialectic, and where the physical and psychical worlds merge, the individual stands atop the rubble. The Individual is different from Stirner's Unique One in that whilst

29666-610: The university in October 1829, but his term ended in September 1830. Hegel was deeply disturbed by the riots for reform in Berlin in that year. In 1831 Frederick William III decorated him with the Order of the Red Eagle , 3rd Class for his service to the Prussian state. In August 1831, a cholera epidemic reached Berlin and Hegel left the city, taking up lodgings in Kreuzberg . Now in a weak state of health, Hegel seldom went out. As

29848-521: The violence of the 1793 Reign of Terror dampened Hegel's hopes, he continued to identify with the moderate Girondin faction and never lost his commitment to the principles of 1789, which he expressed by drinking a toast to the storming of the Bastille every fourteenth of July. Schelling and Hölderlin immersed themselves in theoretical debates on Kantian philosophy , from which Hegel remained aloof. Hegel, at this time, envisaged his future as that of

30030-441: The words of one scholar, "It is Hegel's insight that reason itself has a history, that what counts as reason is the result of a development. This is something that Kant never imagines and that Herder only glimpses." In praise of Hegel's accomplishment, Walter Kaufmann writes that the guiding conviction of the Phenomenology is that a philosopher should not "confine him or herself to views that have been held but penetrate these to

30212-487: The works of Plato , Aristotle and Polybius . These include theories of mixed government and of civic virtue . For example, in The Republic , Plato places great emphasis on the importance of civic virtue (aiming for the good) together with personal virtue ('just man') on the part of the ideal rulers. Indeed, in Book V, Plato asserts that until rulers have the nature of philosophers (Socrates) or philosophers become

30394-483: The world and masters it. Hegel biographer Terry Pinkard notes that Hegel's comment to Niethammer "is all the more striking since he had already composed the crucial section of the Phenomenology in which he remarked that the Revolution had now officially passed to another land (Germany) that would complete 'in thought' what the Revolution had only partially accomplished in practice." Although Napoleon had spared

30576-458: Was a German philosopher and one of the most influential figures of German idealism and 19th-century philosophy . His influence extends across the entire range of contemporary philosophical topics, from metaphysical issues in epistemology and ontology , to political philosophy , the philosophy of history , philosophy of art , philosophy of religion , and the history of philosophy . Born in 1770 in Stuttgart , Holy Roman Empire, during

30758-654: Was a stage of contemplating the Real, to Philosophy (the Present), which is a contemplation of the Ideal, and that since Hegel's philosophy was the summing-up and perfection of Philosophy, the time of Philosophy was up, and the time for a new era has dawned – the era of Action. In The Realm of Understanding and the Individual ( Das Verstandestum und das Individuum ), Karl Schmidt examined the history of Hegelianism and derived

30940-414: Was also a typical product of early German romanticism . "Unity of life" was the phrase used by Hegel and his generation to express their concept of the highest good. It encompasses unity "with oneself, with others, and with nature. The main threat to such unity consists in division ( Entzweiung ) or alienation ( Entfremdung )." In this respect, Hegel was particularly taken with the phenomenon of love as

31122-654: Was an uprising against British rule in Ireland lasting from May to September 1798 – the Irish Rebellion of 1798 – with military support from revolutionary France in August and again October 1798. After the failure of the rising of 1798 the United Irishman, John Daly Burk, an émigré in the United States in his The History of the Late War in Ireland written in 1799, was most emphatic in its identification of

31304-628: Was buried on 16 November. In accordance with his wishes, Hegel was buried in the Dorotheenstadt cemetery next to Fichte and Karl Wilhelm Ferdinand Solger . Hegel's illegitimate son, Ludwig Fischer, had died shortly before while serving with the Dutch army in Batavia and the news of his death never reached his father. Early the following year, Hegel's sister Christiane committed suicide by drowning. Hegel's two remaining sons – Karl , who became

31486-410: Was founded in 1791 in Belfast and Dublin. The inaugural meeting of the United Irishmen in Belfast on 18 October 1791 approved a declaration of the society's objectives. It identified the central grievance that Ireland had no national government: "...we are ruled by Englishmen, and the servants of Englishmen, whose object is the interest of another country, whose instrument is corruption, and whose strength

31668-464: Was likely that the entire story of Jesus was fabricated. Ludwig Feuerbach wrote a psychological profile of a believer called The Essence of Christianity ( Das Wesen des Christentums ). He argues that the believer is presented with a doctrine that encourages the projection of fantasies onto the world. Believers are encouraged to believe in miracles, and to idealize all their weaknesses by imagining an omnipotent, omniscient, immortal God who represents

31850-458: Was not concerned with whether a form of government could be analysed as a "republic" or a "monarchy". He analysed how the powers accumulated by the early Julio-Claudian dynasty were all given by a State that was still notionally a republic. Nor was the Roman Republic "forced" to give away these powers: it did so freely and reasonably, certainly in Augustus ' case, because of his many services to

32032-474: Was not the ideology of the commercial class, but rather of the landed nobility, which would lose power if the monarchy were expanded. This resulted in an oligarchy of the great landed magnates. Victor Hugues , Jean-Baptiste Raymond de Lacrosse and Nicolas Xavier de Ricard were prominent supporters of republicanism for various Caribbean islands. Edwin Sandys , William Sayle and George Tucker all supported

32214-399: Was particularly absurd. Moreover, the original teachings of Jesus , which were aimed at aiding the poor and downtrodden, had slowly been perverted and usurped by the establishment to manipulate and oppress the populaces of the world by promising them a reward in the afterlife if they refrained from rebellion against the powers that be in this life. Bruno Bauer went further, and claimed that

32396-516: Was practical obedience to his enforced merging of Calvinism and Lutheranism and spreading of Protestantism in Catholic areas. Thus the Young Hegelians at first found it easier to direct their critical energies towards religion than politics. A major consolidator of the Young Hegelian movement was the journal Hallische Jahrbücher (1838–41) (later Deutsche Jahrbücher (1841–43)) which was edited by Arnold Ruge and received contributions from many of

32578-680: Was published in 1807. This is the first time that, at the age of thirty-six, Hegel lays out "his own distinctive approach" and adopts an "outlook that is recognizably 'Hegelian' to the philosophical problems of post-Kantian philosophy". Yet, the book was poorly understood even by Hegel's contemporaries and received mostly negative reviews. To this day, the Phenomenology is infamous for, among other things, its conceptual and allusive density, idiosyncratic terminology, and confusing transitions. Its most comprehensive commentary, scholar H. S. Harris 's two-volume Hegel's Ladder ( The Pilgrimage of Reason and The Odyssey of Spirit ), runs more than three times

32760-543: Was the daughter of a lawyer at the High Court of Justice at the Württemberg court Ludwig Albrecht Fromm (1696–1758). She died of bilious fever when Hegel was thirteen. Hegel and his father also caught the disease but narrowly survived. Hegel had a sister, Chistiane Luise  [ de ] (1773–1832); and a brother, Georg Ludwig (1776–1812), who perished as an officer during Napoleon's 1812 Russian campaign. At

32942-466: Was the most anarchistic of the Young Hegelians, and "...it is possible to discern, in the early writings of Edgar Bauer, the theoretical justification of political terrorism." Die Freien (The Free Ones) was a 19th-century circle of Young Hegelians formed at the University of Berlin and gathering for informal discussion over a period of a few years. Its leader was Bruno Bauer , a student who had attended Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel 's lectures and

33124-468: Was then asked to defend the position of the Old Hegelians against the claims of David Strauss 's Life of Jesus . After reviewing the book, Bauer was converted and became even more radical than Strauss, becoming an atheist and arguing that Christianity was not only historically baseless, but it was also irrational and a barrier to progress. Later in his life, he would disassociate himself from

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