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 In the life of feeling this subject exists rather in the above-mentioned identity with the content, it is definite consciousness in it, and remains as this individual “I,” object and end to itself. As the religious individual “I,” it is end to itself; this individual “I” is object and end in general; in the expression, for instance, that I am blessed, and in so far as this blessedness is brought about through belief in the truth, the “I” is filled with truth and penetrated by it. Filled in this way with yearning, it is unsatisfied in itself; but this yearning is the yearning of religion; it is, accordingly, satisfied in having this yearning in itself; in it it has the subjective consciousness of itself, and of itself as the religious self. Carried beyond itself only in this yearning, it is just in it that it preserves itself and the consciousness of being satisfied, and in close connection with this the consciousness of its contentment with itself. But this inwardness involves at the same time the opposite condition which consists in that most unhappy sense of division experienced by the pure hearted. While I regard myself strictly as this particular and abstract “I,” and compare my particular impulses, inclinations, and thoughts, with what ought to fill my nature, I am able to feel that this contrast is a painful contradiction within myself, which becomes permanent, owing to the fact that “I,” as this particular subjective “me,” have it as my aim and object to concern myself about myself as my individual self. It is just this fixed reflection which prevents me from being filled by the substantial content, by the Thing or true fact, for in the true fact I forget myself; in the very act of becoming absorbed in it that reflection upon myself disappears of itself. I am characterised as subjective only in that opposition to the Thing which remains with me through reflection on myself. In thus keeping myself outside of the Thing or true fact, and since this Thing constitutes my end, the real interest is transferred from the attentive observation of the Thing back to myself. I thus go on unceasingly


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 emptying myself, and continue in this condition of emptiness. The hollowness which thus attaches to the highest end pursued by the individual, namely, pious effort and anxiety about the welfare of his own soul, has led to the most inhuman manifestations of a feeble and spiritless reality, ranging from the quiet anxiety of a loving disposition to the suffering caused to the soul by despair and madness. This was still more the case in former times than in these later days when the sense of satisfaction in the yearning has gained the upper hand of the sense of division, and has produced in the soul a feeling of contentment and even a sense of irony itself. Unreality in the heart, such as that referred to, is not only emptiness, but is also narrow-heartedness. It is its own formal, subjective life with which it is filled; it always has this particular “I” as its object and end. It is only the truly Universal, the Universal in-and-for-itself, which is broad, and the heart inwardly extends only by entering into this, and expanding within this substantial element, which is at once the religious, the moral, and the legal element. Speaking generally, love is the abandonment on the part of the heart of limitation to a particular point of its own, and its reception of the love of God is the reception of that development or unfolding of His Spirit which comprehends in itself all true content, and swallows up in this objectivity whatever is merely peculiar to the heart. In this substantial element the subjectivity, which is for the heart itself a one-sided form, is given up, and this at the same time supplies the impulse to throw off the subjectivity. This is the impulse to action in general, or, more strictly speaking, it is the impulse to take part in the action of the content which is divine in-and-for-itself, and is therefore the content which has absolute power and authority. It is this, accordingly, which constitutes the reality or real existence of the heart, and it is indivisibly both that inner reality and also outer reality.

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 When we have thus distinguished between what, because it is buried in and absorbed into the Thing or true object, is the unsophisticated heart, and the heart which in reflection is consciously occupied with itself, we find that the distinction constitutes the relation in which the heart stands to the substantial element. So long as the heart remains within itself, and consequently remains outside of this element, it is by its own act in an external and contingent relation to this element. This connection, which leads the heart to declare what is just, and to lay down the law in accordance with its own feeling, has been already mentioned. To the objectivity of action, that is, to action which originates in the truly substantial element, subjectivity opposes feeling, and to this substantial element and to the thinking knowledge of it it opposes immediate knowledge. Here, however, we do not stay to consider the nature of action, but simply remark that it is just this substantial element, represented by the laws of justice and morality and the commandments of God, which is by its very nature the true Universal, and has consequently its root and basis in the region of thought. If sometimes the laws of justice and morality are regarded merely as arbitrary commands of God—which would mean, in fact, that they were irrational—still it would take us too far to make that our starting-point. But the putting on a permanent basis and the investigation of the conviction, on the part of the conscious subject, of the truth of the principles which ought to constitute for him the basis of his action, is thinking knowledge. While the unsophisticated heart yields itself up to these principles, its insight is as yet so undeveloped, and any pretension on its part to independence is so foreign to it, that it reaches them rather by the road of authority, and thus this part of the heart in which they are implanted is alone the place of conscious thought, for they are themselves the thoughts of action, and are inherently universal principles. This heart


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 cannot, therefore, offer any opposition to the development of what is its own objective basis, any more than it can to that of those truths which belong to it, and which at first appear in themselves rather as theoretical truths pertaining to its religious faith. As, however, this possession, and the intensity which characterises it, are already in the heart only through the mediation of education, which has asserted its influence upon its thought and knowledge just as it has upon its volition, so, in a still greater degree, the further developed content, and the alteration in the circle of its ideas which are implicitly native to the place where they are found, also represent mediating knowledge mediated into the conscious form of thought.


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 FIFTH LECTURE

may sum up what has gone before as follows. The heart ought not to have any dread of knowledge; the determinateness of feeling, the content of the heart, ought to have a substantial form. Feeling or the heart must be filled by the Thing or true object by what actually exists, and consequently be broad and true in character. But this Thing, this substantial element, is simply the truth of the Divine Spirit, the Universal in-and-for-itself, though just because of this it is not the abstract Universal, but the Universal in the development which belongs essentially to itself. The substantial element is thus essentially implicit thought, and exists in thought. But thought, what constitutes the really inner nature of faith itself, if it is to be known as essential and true—in so far as faith is no longer something implicit and merely natural, but is regarded as having entered into the sphere of knowledge with all its requirements and claims—must at the same time be known as something necessary, and must have gained a consciousness of itself and of the connected nature of its development. It thus extends and proves itself at the same time; for, speaking generally, to prove simply means to become conscious of the connection, and consequently of the necessity of things, and in relation to our present design it means the recognition of the particular content in the Universal in-and-for-itself, and of how this absolute truth itself is the result, and is consequently the final truth of all particular content. This connection, which is thus present to consciousness, must not be a subjective movement of thought outside of reality, but must follow this latter, and must simply


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 unfold its meaning and necessity. Knowledge is just this unfolding of the objective movement of the content, of the inner necessity which essentially belongs to it, and it is true knowledge since it is in unity with the object. For us this object must be the elevation of our spirit to God, and is thus what we have referred to as the necessity of absolute truth in the form of that final result into which everything returns in the Spirit.

But because it contains the name of God, the mention of this end may easily have the effect of rendering worthless all that was urged against the false ideas of knowledge, cognition, and feeling, and all that was gained in the way of a conception of true knowledge.

It has already been remarked that the question as to whether our reason can know God, was made a formal one; that is to say, it was referred to the criticism of knowledge, of rational knowledge in general, and connected with the nature of faith and feeling in such a way that what is included under these special heads is to be understood apart altogether from any content. This is the position taken up by immediate knowledge, which itself speaks with the fruit of the tree of knowledge in its mouth, and transfers the problem to the formal sphere since it bases the justification of such knowledge, and of this exclusively, on the reflections which it makes regarding proof and philosophical knowledge, and as a consequence it has to put the true and infinite content outside of the range of its reflections, because it does not get beyond the idea of finite knowledge and cognition. With this presupposition of a knowledge and cognition which are merely finite, we contrasted the knowledge which does not remain outside of the Thing or true reality, but which, without introducing any of its own qualities, simply follows the course of true reality, and we have directed attention to the substantial element in feeling and the heart, and have shown that, speaking generally, it exists essentially for


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 consciousness and for conscious thought, in so far as its truth has to be worked out in what constitutes its most inner nature. But owing to the mention of the name of God, this object defined as knowledge in general, as well as the study of it, have been forced into an inferior position, and connected with that subjective way of looking at things for which God is something above. Since, in what has gone before, this aspect of the matter has received sufficient elucidation, and can be here indicated merely, rather than examined in detail, the only other thing to do would be to explain the relation of God in and to knowledge as deduced from the nature of God. In connection with this it may be remarked, first of all, that our subject, namely, the elevation of the subjective spirit to God, directly implies that in this very act of elevation the one-sidedness of knowledge, that is, its subjectivity, is abolished, and that it is itself essentially this process of abolition and absorption. Consequently, the knowledge of the other side of the subject, namely, the nature of God, and, together with this, His relation in and to knowledge, comes in here of itself. But there is one drawback connected with what is of an introductory and incidental character, and is yet necessary here, and it is this, that any thorough treatment of the subject renders it superfluous. Still we may so far anticipate as to say that there can be no thought here of carrying our treatment of the subject to the point reached by the explanation so intimately connected with it, of the self-consciousness of God, and of the relation of His knowledge of Himself to the knowledge of Himself in and through the human spirit. Without referring you here to the more abstract and systematic discussions on this subject to be found in my other works, I may call attention to a very remarkable book which has recently appeared, entitled, “Aphorisms on Agnosticism and Absolute Knowledge in Relation to the Science of Christian Faith,” by C. Fr. G         l (Berlin: C. Franklin). It


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 makes reference to my statement of philosophical principles, and contains quite as much thoroughly grounded Christian belief as it does speculative and philosophical depth. It throws light on all the points of view from which the Understanding directs its attack on the Christianity of knowledge, and answers the objections and counter-arguments which the theory of agnosticism (Nichtwissen) has brought against philosophy. It shows in particular the misunderstanding and the want of understanding of which the pious consciousness is guilty when it ranges itself on the side of the explaining Understanding in connection with the principle of agnosticism, and thus makes common cause with it in its opposition to speculative philosophy. What is there advanced regarding the self-consciousness of God, His knowledge of Himself in men, and Man’s knowledge of himself in God, has direct reference to the point of view just indicated, and it is marked by speculative thoroughness while casting light on the false opinions which have been attributed alike to philosophy and to Christianity in connection with these subjects.

But even in connection with the purely general ideas to which we here confine ourselves, in order that, taking God as the starting-point, we may discuss the relation in which He stands to the human spirit, we are met more than anywhere else by an assumption which is in contradiction with any such design—namely, that we do not know God; that even in the act of believing in Him we do not know what He is, and therefore cannot start from Him. To take God as the starting-point would be to presuppose that we were able to state, and had stated, what God is in Himself as being the primary object. That assumption, however, permits us to speak merely of our relation to Him, to speak of religion and not of God Himself. It does not permit of the establishment of a theology, of a doctrine of God, though it certainly does allow of a doctrine of religion.


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 If there is not exactly any such doctrine, we at least hear much talk—an infinite amount of it, or rather, little talk with infinite repetitions—about religion, and therefore all the less about God Himself. This everlasting explanation of religion, of its necessity, its usefulness, and so on, together with the insignificant attempts to explain God, or the prohibition even of any attempt at explaining His nature, is a peculiar phenomenon of the culture of our time. We get off most easily when we rest contented with this standpoint, so that we have nothing before us but the barren characterisation of a relation in which our consciousness stands to God. As thus understood, religion means at least that our spirit comes into contact with this content, and our consciousness with this object, and is not merely, so to speak, a drawing out of the lines of longing into empty space, an act of perception which perceives nothing and finds nothing actually confronting it. Such a relation implies, at all events, this much, that we not only stand in a certain connection with God, but that God stands also in a certain connection with us. This zeal for religion expresses, hypothetically at least, something regarding our relation to God, if it does not express exclusively what would be the really logical outcome of the principle of the impossibility of knowing God. A one-sided relation, however, is not a relation at all. If, in fact, we are to understand by religion nothing more than a relation between ourselves and God, then God is left without any independent existence. God would, on this theory, exist in religion only, He would be something posited, something produced by us. The expression that God exists in religion only, an expression which is both frequently employed and found fault with, has, however, the true and important meaning that it belongs to the nature of God in His condition of complete and perfect independence that He should exist for the spirit of Man, and should communicate Himself to Man. The meaning here expressed is totally different from that


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 previously referred to, according to which God is merely a postulate, a belief. God is, and gives Himself to men by coming into a relation with them. If this word is is limited to the expression of the truth that we do indeed know or recognise the fact that God is, but do not know what He is, and is thus used with a constantly recurring reflection on knowledge, then this would imply that no substantial qualities can be attributed to Him. Thus we should not have to say we know that God is, but could merely speak of is; for the word God introduces an idea, and consequently a substantial element, a content with definite characteristics, and apart from these God is an empty word. If in the language of this agnosticism (Nichtwissen) those characteristics to which we must still find it possible to refer are limited to express something negative—and for this the expression the Infinite is peculiarly appropriate, whether by it is meant the Infinite in general or those so-called attributes extended into infinity—then all that this gives us is merely indeterminate Being, abstraction, a kind of supreme or infinite Essence which is expressly our product, the product of abstraction, of thought, and does not get beyond being mere Understanding.

If, however, God is not thought of as existing in subjective knowledge merely, or in faith, but if it is seriously meant that He exists, that He exists for us, and has on His part a relation to us, and if we do not get beyond this merely formal characteristic, it is all the same implied that He communicates Himself to men, and this is to admit that God is not jealous. The Greeks of purely ancient times attributed jealousy to God when they represented Him as putting down all that was generally regarded as great and lofty, and as wishing to have and actually placing everything on a level. Plato and Aristotle were opposed to the idea of divine jealousy, and the Christian religion is still more opposed to it since it teaches that God humbled Himself even to taking on the


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 form of a servant amongst men, that He revealed Himself to them; that, consequently, far from grudging men what is high, nay even what is highest, He, on the contrary, along with that very revelation, laid on them the command that they should know God, and at the same time indicated that this was Man’s highest duty. Without appealing to this part of the teaching of Christianity, we may take our stand on the fact that God is not jealous, and ask, Why should He not communicate Himself to Man? It is recorded that in Athens there was a law according to which any man who had a lighted candle and refused to allow another to light his at it, was to be punished with death. This kind of communication is illustrated even in connection with physical light, since it spreads and imparts itself to some other thing without itself diminishing or losing anything; and still more is it the nature of Spirit itself to remain in entire possession of what belongs to it, while giving another a share in what it possesses. We believe in God’s infinite goodness in Nature, since He gives up those natural things which He has called into existence in infinite profusion, to one another, and to Man in particular. And is He to bestow on Man what is thus merely material and which is also His, and withhold from him what is spiritual, and refuse to Man what alone can give him true value? It is as absurd to give such ideas a place in our thoughts as it is absurd to say of the Christian religion that by it God has been revealed to Man, and to maintain at the same time that what has been revealed is that He is not now revealed and has not been revealed.

On God’s part there can be no obstacle to a knowledge of Him through men. The idea that they are not able to know God must be abandoned when it is admitted that God has a relation to us, and since our spirit has a relation to Him, God exists for us, or, as it has been expressed, He communicates Himself and has revealed Himself.


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 God reveals Himself, it is said, in Nature; but God cannot reveal Himself to Nature, to the stone, to the plant, to the animal, because God is Spirit; He can reveal Himself to Man only, who thinks and is Spirit. If there is no hindrance on God’s side to the knowledge of Him, then it is owing to human caprice, to an affectation of humility, or whatever you like to call it, that the finitude of knowledge, the human reason is put in contrast to the divine knowledge and the divine reason, and that the limits of human reason are asserted to be immovable and absolutely fixed. For what is here suggested is just that God is not jealous, but, on the contrary, has revealed and is revealing Himself; and we have here the more definite thought that it is not the so-called human reason with its limits which knows God, but the Spirit of God in Man, it is, to use the speculative expression previously employed, the self-consciousness of God which knows itself in the knowledge of Man.

This may suffice by way of calling attention to the main ideas which are floating about in the atmosphere of the culture of our time as representing the results of the “Enlightenment,” and of an understanding which calls itself reason. These are the ideas which directly meet us, to begin with, when we undertake to deal with the general subject of the knowledge of God. It was possible only to point out the fundamental moments of the worthlessness of those categories which are opposed to this knowledge, and not to justify this knowledge itself. This, as being the real knowledge of its object, must receive its justification along with the content.

Note.—The rendering of Nichtwissen in this Lecture by “Agnosticism” involves something of an anachronism, and is not technically strictly accurate; but we have no other English word which seems so well to suggest the meaning.—E.B.S.


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 SIXTH LECTURE

questions and investigations regarding the formal element in knowledge we for the present consider as settled or as put on one side. We at the same time escape the necessity of putting in a merely negative form the exposition of what is known as the metaphysical proofs of the existence of God. Criticism which leads to a negative result is not merely a sorry business, but, in confining itself to the task of showing that a certain content is vain, it is itself a vain exercise, an exertion of vanity. In defining those proofs as the grasping in thought of what we have called the elevation of the soul to God, we declared that in criticism we must directly reach an affirmative content.

And so, too, our treatment of the subject is not to be historical. Since time will not permit of me doing otherwise, I must partly refer you to histories of philosophy for the literary portion of the subject, and, indeed, the range of the historical element in these proofs may be held to be of the greatest possible extent, to be universal in fact, since every philosophy has a close connection with the primary question or with subjects which are most intimately related to it. There have, however, been times when this question was treated of in the express form of these proofs, and the interest which was felt in refuting atheism directed attention to them in a supreme degree and secured for them thorough treatment—times when the insight of thought was considered indispensable even in theology in connection with those of its parts which were capable of being known in a rational way. Besides, the historical element in anything which is a substantial


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 content for itself, can and should have an interest for us when we are clear about the thing itself, and that thing which we have got to consider here deserves above anything else to be taken up for itself, apart from any interest which might otherwise attach to it by its being connected with material lying outside of it. To occupy ourselves too exclusively with the historical element in subjects which are in themselves eternal truths for Spirit, is a proceeding rather to be disapproved of, for it is only too frequently an illusion which deceives us as to what is of real interest. Historical study of this kind has the appearance of dealing with the Thing or actual reality; while, on the contrary, we are as a matter of fact dealing with the ideas and opinions of others, with external circumstances, with what, so far as the actual reality is concerned, is past, transitory, and vain. We may certainly meet with historically learned persons who are what is called thoroughly conversant with all the details of what has been advanced by celebrated men, Fathers of the Church, philosophers, and such like, regarding the fundamental principles of religion, but who, on the other hand, are strangers to the true object or Thing itself. If such people were to be asked what they considered to be the reality and the grounds of their conviction regarding the truth they possessed, they would very likely be astonished at such a question as something which did not concern them here, their real concern being, on the contrary, with others, with theories and opinions, and with the knowledge not of something actual but of theories and opinions.

It is the metaphysical proofs which we are considering here. I make this further remark inasmuch as it has been the custom to deduce a proof of the existence of God, ex consensu gentium, a popular category over which Cicero long ago waxed eloquent. The knowledge that all men have imagined, believed, known this, carries with it a tremendous authority. How could any man resist it and say, I alone contradict all that all men picture to


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 themselves as true, what many of them have perceived to be the truth by means of thought, and what all feel and believe to be the truth. If, to start with, we leave out of account the force of such a proof, and look at the dry substance of it which is supposed to rest on an empirical and historical basis, it will be seen to be both uncertain and vague. All that about all nations, all men who are supposed to believe in God, is on a level with similar appeals to all generally; they are usually made in a very thoughtless fashion. A statement, which is necessarily an empirical statement, is made regarding all men, and which covers all individuals, and consequently all times and places; future ones, too, if strictly taken, for we are supposed to be dealing with all men. But it is not possible to get historical evidence regarding all nations. Such statements regarding all men are in themselves absurd, and are to be explained only by the habit people have of not treating seriously such meaningless and trite ways of speaking. But apart from this, nations, or if you choose to call them tribes, have been discovered, whose dull minds, being limited to the few objects connected with their outward needs, had not risen to a consciousness of anything higher which might be called God. What is supposed to be the historical element in the religion of many peoples rests principally on uncertain explanations of sensuous expressions, outward actions, and the like. Of a great many nations, even such as are otherwise highly civilised, and with whose religion we have a more definite and thorough acquaintance, it may be said that what they call God is of such a character that we may well hesitate to recognise it as God. A dispute of the most bitter kind has been carried on between two Roman Catholic monastic orders as to whether the names Thian and Chang-ti, which occur in the Chinese State-religion, the former meaning heaven, and the latter lord, might be used to designate the Christian God, that is to say, as to whether these


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 names did not express ideas which are utterly opposed to our ideas of God, so opposed that they contain nothing in common with ours, not even the common abstract idea of God. The Bible makes use of the expression, “the heathen who know not God,” although these heathen were idolaters, i.e., as it is well put, although they had a religion. Here, all the same, we draw a distinction between God and an idol, and spite of the broad meaning attached in modern times to the name religion, we would perhaps shrink from giving the name God to an idol. Are we to call the Apis of the Egyptians, the monkey, the cow, &c., of the Hindus and other nations, God? Even if we were to speak of the religion of these peoples, and consequently allow that they had something more than a superstition, still we might hesitate to speak of their having belief in God. Otherwise God would be represented by the purely indeterminate idea of something higher of an entirely general character, and not even of something invisible and above sense. One may take up the position that even a bad or false religion should still be called a religion, and that it is better that the various nations should have a false religion rather than none at all, which reminds us of the story of the woman who, to the complaint that it was bad weather, replied that such weather was at least better than no weather at all. Closely connected with this position is the thought that the value of religion is to be found only in the subjective element, in the fact of having a religion, it being a matter of indifference what idea of God is contained in it. Thus belief in idols, just because such a belief can be included under the abstract idea of God in general, is regarded as sufficient, just as the abstract idea of God in general is considered satisfactory. This is certainly the reason, too, why such names as idols and heathen are regarded as something antiquated, and are considered as objectionable because of their invidious meaning. As a matter of fact, however, this abstract


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 antithesis of truth and falsehood demands a very different solution from that given in the abstract idea of God in general, or, what comes to the same thing, in the purely subjective view of religion.

In any case the consensus gentium with regard to belief in God turns out to be a perfectly vague idea, both as regards the element of fact as such expressed in it, and also as regards the substantial element composing it. But neither is the force of this proof binding in itself, even if the historical basis had been of a firmer and more definite kind. A proof of this kind does not amount to being an individual inner conviction, since it is a matter of accident whether or not others agree with it. Conviction, whether in the form of faith or knowledge based on thought, certainly takes its start from something outside, from instruction, from what is learnt, from authority in fact; still it is essentially an inner act of self-remembrance on the part of Spirit. The fact that the individual himself is satisfied is what constitutes Man’s formal freedom, and is the one moment in presence of which authority of every kind entirely falls away; and the fact that he finds satisfaction in the Thing, in the actual reality, is what makes real freedom, and is the other factor in presence of which, in the very same manner, all authority sinks out of sight. They are truly inseparable. Even in the case of faith the one absolutely valid method of proof referred to in the Scriptures does not consist of miracles, credible accounts and the like, but of the witness of the Spirit. With regard to other subjects we may yield to authority, either from confidence or from fear; but the exercise of the right referred to is at the same time the higher duty laid upon us. In connection with the kind of conviction implied in religious belief in which the innermost nature of Spirit is directly involved, both as regards the certainty of itself (conscience) and because of its content, the individual, in consequence of this, has the absolute right to demand that his own witness and


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 not that of outside minds should be what decides and gives confirmation.

The metaphysical method of proof which we are here considering, constitutes the witness of thinking Spirit in so far as this latter is thinking Spirit not merely potentially, but actually. The object with which it takes to do, exists essentially in thought, and even if, as was previously remarked, it is taken in the sense of something represented in feeling, still the substantial element in it belongs to thought, which is its pure self, just as feeling is the empirical self, the self which has become specialised or separate. In reference to this object an advance was made at an early period to the stage of thinking, witnessing, that is, proving, so soon, in fact, as thought emerged from its condition of absorption in sensuous and material conceptions and ideas of the sky, the sun, the stars, the sea, and so on, and disengaged itself, so to speak, from its wrapping of pictures of the imagination which were still permeated by the sensuous element—so that Man came to be conscious of God as essentially objectivity which was to be thought of, and which had been reached by thought. So, too, the subjective action of Spirit by a process of recollection brought itself back from feeling, picture-thought, and imagination, to its essence, namely, thought, and sought to have before it what belongs peculiarly to this sphere, and to have it in its pure form as it exists in this sphere. The elevation of the soul to God in feeling, intuition, imagination, and thought—and as being subjective it is so concrete that it has in it something of all these elements—is an inner experience. In regard to it we have likewise an inner experience of the fact that accidental and arbitrary elements enter into it. Consequently there arises on external grounds the necessity for analysing that elevation, and for bringing into clear consciousness the acts and characteristic qualities contained in it, in order that it may be purified from other contingent elements, and from the contingency


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 which attaches to thought itself; and in accordance with the old belief that what is substantial and true can be reached only by reflection, we effect the purification of this act of elevation whereby it attains to substantiality and necessity, by explaining it in terms of thought, and give thought the satisfaction of realising that the absolute right possessed by it has a right to satisfaction totally different from that belonging to feeling and sense-perception or ordinary conception.


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 SEVENTH LECTURE

necessity we feel of understanding the elevation of the spirit to God from the point of view of thought, is suggested by a formal characteristic which meets us at the very first glance when we consider what direction is taken by the proof of the existence of God, and which has to be taken notice of first of all. The study of a subject from the point of view of thought is an exposition, a differentiation of what in our very first experience we arrive at by a single stroke. In connection with the belief that God is, this analysis comes into direct contact with a point which has already been incidentally touched upon, and is to be dealt with more thoroughly here, namely, the question as to the distinction to be drawn between what God is and the fact that He is. God is; what then does this mean? what is it supposed to be? God is, to begin with, a figurative idea, a name. So far as the two determinations contained in the proposition, namely, God and Being, are concerned, the most important thing is to determine or define the subject for itself, all the more that here the predicate of the proposition which would otherwise be indicated by the peculiar determination of the subject, namely, what this subject is, contains merely dry Being. But then God is for us more than mere Being. And, conversely, just because He is an infinitely richer content than mere Being, and is infinitely different from it, the important thing is to add to it this determination as representing a determination which is different from that of Being. This content which is thus distinguished from Being is an idea, a thought, a conception which is to be explained for itself, and have its


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 meaning determined afterwards. Thus in the Metaphysic of God, or what is known as natural theology, we start by unfolding the meaning of the notion or conception of God. This is in accordance with the ordinary mode of dealing with the subject, since we consider what our previously formed idea of God contains, and in so doing further presuppose that we all have this idea which we express by the term God. The notion, accordingly, for itself, and apart altogether from the question of its reality, brings with it the demand that it should be true in itself as well, and consequently, as being the notion, that it should be logically true. Since logical truth, in so far as thought takes the form of Understanding merely, is reduced to identity, to what does not contradict itself, nothing more is demanded than that the notion should not contradict itself, or, as it is otherwise expressed, that it be possible, since possibility is itself nothing more than the identity of an idea with itself. The second thing, accordingly, is to show that this notion exists, and this is the proof of the existence of God. But because that possible notion is, in this very matter of identity, of bare possibility, reduced to this the most abstract of categories, and becomes no richer by means of existence, the product thus reached does not answer to the fulness of the idea of God, and we have accordingly a third division of the subject, in which we treat still further of the attributes of God and of His relations to the world.

These are the distinctions which meet us when we begin to examine the proofs of the existence of God. It is the work of the Understanding to analyse what is concrete, to distinguish and to define the elements belonging to it, then to hold firmly to them and abide by them. If at a later stage it once more frees them from their isolation, and recognises that it is their union which constitutes the truth, still they are from this standpoint to be regarded as being true before their union as well, and consequently when outside of this condition of unity. It is accordingly


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 the interest of the Understanding to show that Being essentially belongs to the notion or conception of God, and that this notion must necessarily be thought of as being or existing. If this is the case, then the notion must not be thought of as separate from Being; it has no real truth apart from Being. The result thus reached is opposed to the idea that the notion should be regarded as true in itself, and as something the existence of which must be assumed, to begin with, and then established. If the Understanding here declares that this first separation made by it and what arises from the separation have no truth, then the comparison, the other separation which further arises in connection with this, is proved to be without any foundation. The notion, that is to say, is to be first considered, and then afterwards the attributes of God are to be dealt with. It is the notion or conception of God which constitutes the content of Being; it can be, and ought also to be, nothing else than the “substance of its realities.” But how then should the attributes of God be anything but realities and His realities. If the attributes of God are supposed to express rather His relations to the world, the mode of His action in and towards an Other different from Himself, then the idea of God involves this much at least, that God’s absolute independence does not permit Him to come out of Himself, and shows us what happens to be the condition of the world, which is supposed to be outside of Him and to be contrasted with Him, and which we have no right to suppose is already separate from Him. Thus His attributes, His action and mode of existence, remain shut up within His notion, find their determination in it alone, and are essentially nothing more than its relation to itself; the attributes are merely the determinations of the notion itself. But, again, if we start from the world looked at in itself as something which is external so far as God is concerned, so that the attributes of God describe His relations to it, then the world, as a product of His creative power, gets a definite character


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 only through His notion, in which again, consequently, we find, after having followed this unnecessary and roundabout road through the world to God, that the attributes get their definite character, while the notion, if it is not to be something empty, but, on the contrary, is to be something full of content, is made explicit only through them. It results from this that the differences which we have met with are so formal that they cannot be taken as the basis of any substantial element, or of any particular spheres of existence which, if regarded apart from each other, could be considered as representing something true. The elevation of the spirit to God is found in one thing, in the determination of His notion, of His attributes, and of His Being; or God as notion or idea is the absolutely Indeterminate, and it is only when there is a transition, namely, to Being—and this is the transition in its very first and most abstract form—that the notion and the idea enter on the stage of determinateness. This determinateness, to be sure, is poor enough, but the reason of this just is that the Metaphysic referred to begins with possibility, a possibility which, although it is meant to be that of the notion of God, comes to be the mere possibility of the Understanding, which is devoid of all content, simple identity. Thus we find that in reality we are dealing merely with the final abstractions of thought in general and Being, and with their opposition as well as with their inseparableness, such as we have seen these to be. Since we have pointed out the nullity of the differences with which the metaphysical principle in question starts, we have to remember that only one result follows so far as the process involved in them is concerned, this, namely, that along with the differences we give up the process. One of the proofs which we have to consider will have for its content the very contrast of thought and Being, which we already see making its appearance here, and which will therefore be examined in its proper place in accordance with the value which it itself possesses. Here, however,


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 we might give prominence to the affirmative element which it contains for the knowledge of the at first absolutely general and formal nature of the notion. We must pay attention to this so far as it has reference to the speculative basis and connection of our treatment of the subject in general. This is an aspect of the question which we merely indicate, whereas in itself it can indeed be nothing else but the truly leading one; but it is not our intention to follow it out in our treatment of the subject, or to confine ourselves to it alone.

It may therefore be remarked by way of preliminary, that what was previously called the notion or conception of God for itself and its possibility, is now to be called thought simply, and indeed abstract thought. A distinction was drawn between the notion of God and the possible existence of God. It was only such a notion which was in harmony with possibility, with abstract identity; and so, too, of what was intended to be taken not as the Notion in general but as a particular notion, in fact as the notion of God, nothing remained but simply this very abstract characterless identity.

It is already implied in what has been said that we cannot take any such abstract determination of the Understanding as applicable to the Notion, but rather that we must simply regard it as concrete in itself, as a unity which is not indeterminate but essentially determinate, and thus only as a unity of determinations; and this unity itself, which is thus joined on to its determinations, is therefore nothing but the unity of itself and its determinations, so that apart from the determinations the unity is nothing and disappears, or, more strictly speaking, it is even degraded to the condition of what is merely an untrue determinateness, and requires to get into relation in order to be true and real. To what has just been said, we may further add that such a unity of determinations—and it is they which constitute the content—is therefore not to be taken as a subject to which they are attached as representing several predicates which would


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 have their bond of union only in it as in a third thing, but would be in themselves outside of this unity and mutually opposed. On the contrary, their unity is to be regarded as belonging essentially to them, that is to say, as a unity which is constituted solely by the determinations themselves, and, conversely, the separate determinations as such are to be considered as in themselves inseparable from each other, and able to pass over into each other, and as having no meaning taken by themselves apart from one another, so that as they constitute the unity this latter is their soul and substance.

It is this which constitutes the concrete element of the Notion in general. We cannot engage in philosophical speculation regarding any object whatever without employing universal and abstract categories of thought, least of all when God, the profoundest subject of thought, the absolute Notion, is the object, so that it was not possible to avoid pointing out what the speculative notion or conception of the Notion itself is. Here it will be possible to develop this notion only in the way of an historical sketch; that its content is true in-and-for-itself is shown in the logical part of philosophy. Some examples might make it plainer for ordinary thought, and not to go too far—and Spirit, certainly, is always what is nearest—it is sufficient to think of the life-force which is the unity, the simple unit of the soul, and which is at the same time so concrete in itself that it appears only in the form of the process of its viscera, of its members and organs, which are essentially different from it and from each other, and which, yet, when separated from it, perish, and cease to be what they are, namely, life, that is, they no longer have the meaning and signification which belong to them.

We have still to trace in detail the result of the notion or conception of the speculative Notion in the same fashion in which we have dealt with the conception itself. That is to say, since the characteristics of the


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 Notion exist only in its unity, and are therefore inseparable—and in conformity with the character of our object we shall call it the Notion of God—each of these characteristics themselves, in so far as it is taken in itself, and as distinct from any other, must be regarded not as an abstract characteristic, but as a concrete notion or conception of God. But God is at the same time one only, and accordingly no other relation exists between these notions except the relation which was previously declared to exist among them as characteristics; that is to say, they are to be regarded as moments of one and the same notion, as being necessarily related to each other, as mutually mediating each other, as inseparable, so that they exist only in virtue of their relationship to each other, and this relation is the living unity which comes into existence through them, and is regarded as their hypothetical basis. It is with a view to their thus appearing in different forms that they are implicitly the same notion, only posited differently, and that, in fact, this different way in which they are posited, or different mode of appearance, is in necessary connection with the other, so that the one comes out of the other, and is posited by means of it.

The difference between the Notion in this form and the Notion as such consists, accordingly, merely in this, that the latter has in it abstract determinations representing the aspects it presents, while the Notion in its more determinate form, the Idea namely, has itself concrete aspects within itself for which those universal determinations merely supply a basis. These concrete aspects or sides are, or rather seem to be, a complete whole existing for itself. When it is conceived of as differentiated in them, within the sphere which constitutes their specific determinateness, and likewise in itself, then we get the further determination of the Notion, a multiplicity not only of determinations, but a wealth of definite forms which are accordingly purely ideal, and are posited and


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 contained in the one Notion, in the one subject. And the unity of the subject with itself becomes the more intensive the greater the number of differences developed in it. The further continuous determination or specification which takes place is at the same time a going into itself on the part of the subject, a going down into or absorption of itself in itself.

When we say that it is one and the same Notion which is merely further determined, we are employing a formal expression. Any further and continued determination of what is one and the same adds several determinations to what is thus further defined. This richness in increased determination or specification must not, however, be thought of simply as a multiplicity of determinations, but rather as concrete. These concrete aspects regarded in themselves even take on the form of a complete self-existing whole. But when posited in one notion, in one subject, they are not independent and separate from one another in it, but rather exist ideally, and the unity of the subject accordingly becomes all the more intensive. The greatest intensity of the subject in the ideality of all concrete determinations, of the most complete antitheses, is Spirit. By way of giving a clearer conception of this, we shall refer to the relation of Nature and Spirit. Nature is contained in Spirit, is created by it, and spite of its apparently immediate Being, of its apparently independent reality, it is in itself something merely posited or dependent, something created, something having an ideal existence in Spirit. When in the course of knowledge we advance from Nature to Spirit, and Nature is defined as simply a moment of Spirit, we do not reach a true multiplicity, a substantial two, the one of which would be Nature, and the other Spirit; but, on the contrary, the Idea which is the substance of Nature, having taken on the deeper form of Spirit, retains in itself that content in this infinite intensity of ideality, and is all the richer because of the determination


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 of this ideality itself, which is in-and-for-itself, self-conscious, or Spirit. In connection with this mention of Nature regarded in reference to the several characteristics which we have to treat of in the course of our investigation, we may mention, by way of preface, that it does indeed appear in this shape as the totality of external existence, but at the same time as one of those characteristics above which we are to raise ourselves. Here we do not go on either to consider that speculative ideality, nor to a study of the concrete shape in which the thought-determination in which it has its root, appears as Nature. The peculiar feature of the stage it occupies certainly forms one of the characteristics of God, a subordinate moment in the same notion. Since in what follows we mean to confine ourselves to its development, and to how the differences continue to be thoughts as such, moments of the Notion, the stage referred to will be regarded not as Nature but as necessity, and life as a moment in the notion or conception of God, which, however, may further be conceived of as Spirit, and possessed of the deeper quality of freedom, in order that it may be a notion or conception of God which would be worthy of Him and also of us.

What has just been said regarding the concrete form of a moment of the notion reminds us of a peculiar aspect of the matter, according to which the characteristics or determinations increase in the course of their development. The relation of the characteristics of God to one another is a difficult subject in itself, and is all the more difficult for those who are not acquainted with the nature of the Notion. But without some acquaintance at least with the notion of the Notion, or, at all events, without having some idea of it, it is not possible to understand anything about the Essence of God as representing Spirit in general. What has been said, however, will get its direct application in that part of our treatment of the subject which immediately follows.


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 EIGHTH LECTURE

the preceding lecture the speculative fundamental characteristics connected with the nature of the Notion, and its development into the manifoldness of specific qualities and definite forms, have been indicated. If we look once more at the special problem we are dealing with, we find that there, too, we are at once met by a multiplicity. We find that there are several proofs of the existence of God. There is an external empirical multiplicity or difference, which presents itself, first of all, as something which has had an historical origin, and which has nothing to do with the differences which follow from the development of the Notion, and which we take, accordingly, in the form in which we directly come upon it. We may, however, have a feeling of distrust in reference to that multiplicity if we happen to reflect that here we have not to do with a finite object, and remember that our study of an infinite object must be philosophical, and that we are not to deal with it and expend labour upon it in a haphazard and external fashion. An historical fact, nay even a mathematical figure, contains a number of references within it, and relations to what is outside of it, in accordance with which a conception is formed of it, and from which we reason syllogistically to the principal relation upon which they themselves depend, or to another specific quality which is of importance here and which is closely connected with them. It is said that some twenty proofs of the Pythagorean problem have been discovered. The more important an historical fact is, the more points of connection it presents with the circumstances of the time and with other historical events,


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 so that in showing the necessity for accepting the fact as true we may start from any one of these points. The direct testimonies may also be very many in number, and each testimony in so far as it is not otherwise self-contradictory has in this sphere the force of a proof. If in the case of a mathematical proposition one single example is held to be sufficient, it is principally in connection with historical subjects and juridical cases that a multiplicity of proofs must be held to strengthen the force of the proof itself. In the region of experience or phenomena, the object, as being an empirical and individual thing, has the quality of contingency, and thus the particularity of the knowledge we have of it gives the object the same mere appearance of Being. It is its connection with other facts which gives the object its necessary character, and each of these again belongs in itself to this contingent sphere. Here it is the extension and repetition of such connection which gives to objectivity the kind of universality which is possible in this region. The verification of a fact or a perception by means of the mere number of the observations taken, relieves the subjectivity of perception from the reproach of being an illusion, a deception, or any one of those forms of error which it may by way of objection be declared to be.

In dealing with God since we presuppose the existence of an absolutely general idea of Him, it is found, on the one hand, that He infinitely transcends that region in which all objects whatsoever stand in a connected relation with one another; and that, on the other hand, since God exists only for the inner element of Man’s nature in general, we directly meet in this sphere with the contingency of thought, conception, and imagination, in the most varied forms and with what is expressly allowed to be contingency, namely, that of sensations, emotions, and such like. We thus get an infinite number of starting-points from which it is possible to advance to God, and from which we must necessarily advance, and


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 hence the infinite number of such essential transitions which must have the force of proofs. So, too, the verification and confirmation of conviction by means of the repetition of the experiences gained of the way to truth, must appear to be necessary in order to counteract the infinite possibility of deception and error which, on the other hand, lurks in the way to truth. The individual’s trust and the intensity of his belief in God are strengthened by the repetition of the essential elevation of his spirit to God, and by the experience and knowledge he gains of God’s wisdom and providence as shown in countless objects, events, and occurrences. In proportion to the inexhaustible number of the relations in which things stand to the one object is the inexhaustible need felt by Man as he enters more and more deeply into the infinitely manifold finitude of his outward surroundings and his inner states, to continuously repeat his experience of God, that is, to bring before his eyes by new proofs the fact of God’s working in the world.

When we are in presence of this species of proof we at once feel that it belongs to a different sphere from that of the scientific proof. The empirical life of the individual, composed as it is of the most varied changes of mood and of conditions of feeling consequent on its entrance into different external states, takes occasion both from these states and when it is in them to multiply the result it has arrived at that there is a God, and seeks more and more anew to make this belief its own, and to make it a living belief for itself as being an individual existence subject to change. The scientific field, however, is the sphere of thought. Here the “many times” of the repetition, and the “at all times” which really represents the result, are united together in what is “once.” We have to deal with the one thought-determination, which, being one, comprises in itself all those special forms of the empirical life split up as it is into the infinite particularities of existence.


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 But these different spheres are different only as regards form; the matter of them is the same. Thought only brings the manifold content into a simple shape. It epitomises it without depriving it of its value or of anything that is essential to it. Its peculiar work rather is to bring this essential element into prominence. But here, too, we get various different determinations. First of all, the thought-determination is seen to be related to the starting-point from which Spirit rises from the finite up to God. Even if it reduces the innumerable characteristics to a few categories, these categories are still several in number. The finite, which has been called in a general way the starting-point, has various characteristics, and these consequently are the source of the different metaphysical proofs of the existence of God, that is to say, the proofs belonging to the sphere of thought only. In accordance with the historical form of the proofs, as we have to deal with them, the categories of the finite in which the starting-points get their definite character are, first, the contingency of earthly things, and next, the teleological relation which they have in themselves and to one another. But besides this finite beginning, finite so far as the content is concerned, there is yet another starting-point, namely, the Notion of God, which so far as its content is concerned is infinite and something that ought to be, and the only finite element in which is that it can be something subjective, an element of which it has to be divested. We may without prejudice admit a variety of starting-points. This does not in itself in any way conflict with the demand which we considered ourselves justified in making that the true proof should be one only; in so far as this proof is known by thought to represent the inner element of thought, thought can also show that it represents one and the same path, although starting from different points. Similarly the result is one and the same, namely, the Being of God. This, however, is a kind of


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 Universal. A difference, however, emerges here to which we must give somewhat closer attention. It is intimately connected with what we have called the beginnings or starting-points. These differ according to their starting-points, each of which has a definite content; they are definite categories; the act whereby the spirit rises from them to God is in itself the necessary course of thought, which, in accordance with an expression commonly used, is called a syllogistic argument. This has necessarily a result, and this result is defined in accordance with the definite character which attaches to the starting-point, for it follows only from this. Thus it comes about that the different proofs of the existence of God result in giving different characteristics or aspects of God. This is opposed to what is considered most probable, and to the opinion that in the proofs of the existence of God the interest centres in the fact of existence only, and that this one abstract characteristic or determination ought to represent the common result of all the different proofs. The attempt to get out of them determinations of the content is rendered unnecessary by the fact that the whole content is found ready to hand in the ordinary idea of God, and this idea thus presupposed, whether in a more definite or in a vaguer form, or in accordance with the ordinary procedure of Metaphysics above referred to, is definitely laid down beforehand, and made to represent the so-called Notion of God. The reflection that the characteristics of the content result from the transitions which take place in the course of reasoning, is not expressly made here, and least of all in connection with the proof which descends to the particular after having started from what had been previously determined, namely, the notion or conception of God, and which is expressly intended merely to satisfy the demand that the abstract characteristic of Being should be attached to that conception.

But it is self-evident that the different premises, and


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 the variety of syllogisms which are constructed by means of these, will also yield several results differing in content. If, accordingly, the starting-points seem to permit us to take the fact of their being distinct from one another as implying a relation of equality or indifference between them, this indifference is of a limited character in view of the results which a multiplicity of characteristics of the conception of God yields; and indeed the primary question regarding their mutual relations crops up of itself in this connection, since God is one. The relation most readily thought of here is that according to which God is defined as being in His several characteristics one subject consisting of several predicates, as, for instance, when we are in the habit of speaking not only of finite objects which are described by a variety of predicates, but also when we attribute to God a variety of attributes, and speak of Him as being all-powerful, all-wise, as righteousness, goodness, and so forth. The Orientals speak of God as the many-named, or rather as the infinite-all-named, and imagine that the demand to declare what He is can be exhausted only by the inexhaustible statement of His names, that is, of His characteristics or specific qualities. We have already said of the infinite number of starting-points that they are comprised by means of thought in simple categories, and so here the necessity is still greater for reducing the multiplicity of attributes to a smaller number, or rather to one notion, all the more that God is one notion which has in it several inseparable notions; and while we allow with regard to finite objects that each in itself is certainly only one subject, an individual, that is, something indivisible, a notion or conception, we still regard this unity as being in itself manifold, made up of many things external to one another and separable, a unity which is in conflict with itself by the very fact of its existence. The finitude of living beings consists in this, that in them body and soul are separable, and, still more, that the members, nerves, muscles, and so on, the colouring


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 matter, oil, sweat, &c., &c., are also separable; in fact, that what we regard as predicates existing in an actual subject or individual, such as colour, smell, taste, and so on, can separate from each other as independent materials, and that it belongs to the very nature of the unity that it should thus break up into parts. Spirit reveals its finitude in its variety, and in general in the want of correspondence between its Being and its notion. It becomes manifest that the intelligence does not adequately correspond to the truth, the will to the Good, the Moral, and the Right, the imagination to the understanding, and both these to the reason, and so on, and, besides, that the sense-consciousness with which the whole of existence is always kept supplied, or at any rate nearly so, consists of a quantity of momentary, transitory, and so far untrue elements. This very thorough separability and separateness of the activities, tendencies, aims, and actions of Spirit, which we meet with in empirical reality, may in some degree serve as an excuse for conceiving of the Idea of Spirit as something which breaks up into faculties, capacities, activities, and the like; for it is as an individual form of existence, a definite single being, that it is this particular finite existence which is thus found in a separate form of existence external to itself. But it is God only who is this particular One, and only as He is this One is He God; thus subjective reality is inseparable from the Idea, and consequently cannot be separated in itself. It is here that we see the variety, the separation, the multiplicity of the predicates which are knit into a unity by the subject only, but which in themselves would be in a condition of difference which would result in their coming into opposition and consequently into antagonism with each other, and which would show in the most decided way that they were something untrue, and that multiplicity of characteristics was an unsuitable category.

The next shape taken by the reduction of the several


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 characteristics of God resulting from the several proofs, to the one notion or conception which is to be conceived of as being one in itself, is the ordinary one, according to which they are to be carried back to a higher unity, as it is called, i.e., a more abstract unity, and, since the unity of God is the highest of all, to what is consequently the most abstract form of unity. The most abstract unity, however, is unity itself, and from this it would result that the Idea of God means simply that God is unity—and to express this in terms implying a subject, or at least something which has Being—that He is the One in fact, a description, however, which implies that He is One only as against many, so that the One in Himself might still also be a predicate of the many, and therefore be unity in Himself, the One Substance rather, or, if you like, Being. But such an abstract form of determination would simply bring us back to this, that what would result from the proof of the existence of God would be simply the Being of God in an abstract sense, or, what comes to the same thing, that God Himself would simply be the abstract One (neuter) or Being, the empty Essence of the Understanding, over against which would be placed the concrete idea of God, which cannot find satisfaction in any such abstract characterisation. But not only is the ordinary idea not satisfied with this abstraction, the Notion looked at in its general aspect is by its very nature concrete itself, and what appears outwardly as difference and multiplicity of characteristics is simply the development of its moments, which all the while remains within itself. It is therefore the inner necessity of reason which shows itself active in thinking Spirit, and produces in it this multiplicity of characteristics; only, since this thought has not yet got a grasp of the nature of the Notion itself, nor consequently of the nature of its relation and the necessity of the connection, what are virtually stages in development appear to be simply an accidental multiplicity, the various elements of which follow on one another and are


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 outside of one another, just as this thought also, moving within the circle occupied by each one of these characteristics, so conceives of the nature of the transition which is called Proof, that the characteristics, while connected with each other, still remain outside of each other, and mediate with each other merely as independent. It does not recognise that mediation with self is the true and final relation in any such process. And it will become evident that this is the formal defect in these proofs.


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 NINTH LECTURE

we look at the difference which exists between the proofs of the existence of God with which we are dealing, as it actually presents itself, we come upon a distinction which is of an essential kind. One set of the proofs goes from the Being to the thought of God, that is, to put it more definitely, from determinate Being to true Being as representing the Being of God; the other set proceeds from the thought of God, from truth in itself, to the Being of this truth. This distinction, although it is brought forward as one which merely happens to exist in this form, and is of a contingent character, is based on a necessary principle which requires to be taken notice of. We have before us two characteristics—the thought of God and the Being of God. We may start from the one or from the other indifferently in following out the course of reasoning which is supposed to result in their union. Where it is thus a question merely of possible choice, it appears to be a matter of indifference from which we start; and further, too, if the one leads to their being brought into connection, the other appears to be superfluous.

But what thus at first appears to be an indifferent duality and an external possibility has a connection in the Notion, so that neither are the two ways of arriving at the truth indifferent to one another, nor is the difference between them merely of an external character, nor is one of them superfluous. This necessity is not of the nature of an accessory circumstance. It is closely connected with the deepest part of our subject, and chiefly with the logical nature of the Notion. So far as the Notion is concerned, the two paths are not merely different in a general way,


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 but are one-sided, both in reference to the subjective elevation of the spirit to God, and also in reference to the nature of God Himself. We wish to exhibit this one-sidedness in its more concrete form in reference to our subject. We have before us, to begin with, merely the abstract categories of Being and Notion, the contrast between them and their mode of relationship. It will be shown at the same time how these abstractions and their relations to one another constitute and determine the basis of what is most concrete.

That I may be able to put this thought in a more definite form, I may, by way of anticipation, refer to a further distinction, according to which there are three fundamental modes in which the connection of the two sides or characteristics appears. The first represents the passing over of the one characteristic into its Other; the second, their relativity, or the appearance of the one implicitly or actually in the Being of the Other; the third mode, again, is that of the Notion or the Idea, according to which the characteristic preserves itself in its Other in such a way that this unity, which is itself implicitly the original essence of the two, is considered as their subjective unity. Thus neither of them is one-sided, and they both together constitute the appearance of their unity, which is, to begin with, merely their substance, and thus eternally results from them as being the immanent appearance of totality, and is distinguished from them for itself as their unity, as this eternally unfolds itself in the form of their outward appearance.

The two one-sided ways of elevating the spirit to God thus indicated, accordingly directly exhibit their one-sidedness in a double form. The relations which spring from this call for mention. What has in general to be effected is that in the characteristic of the one side, namely, Being, the other characteristic, namely, the Notion, should appear, and, conversely, that in this latter the first-mentioned should be exhibited. Each determines itself to its Other, gives itself the characteristic of its Other in


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 and out of itself. If, accordingly, only the one side were to determine itself so as to be the other, this determination would, on the one hand, be merely a passing over, in which the first would lose itself, or, on the other hand, a manifestation of itself, outside of itself, in which each would certainly preserve its independent existence, but would not return into itself, would not be that unity for itself. If we give to the Notion the concrete signification of God, and to Being the concrete signification of Nature, and conceived of the self-determination of God in the form of Nature, as found only in the first of the connections indicated, this would be the process whereby God becomes Nature. But if, according to the second of the connections, Nature is to be taken merely as a manifestation of God, then she, as something in course of transition, would represent the unity inherent in this only for a third thing, only for us, and this would not be unity which is actually present in-and-for-itself, the true unity, determined beforehand. When we put this thought in more concrete forms, and conceive of God as the Idea existing for itself from which we start, and think of Being as also the totality of Being, as Nature, then the advance from the Idea to Nature takes (1) the form simply of a passing over into Nature, in which the Idea is lost and disappears. (2) In order to bring out more clearly the meaning of this transition, we may say that this would be merely an act of remembrance on our part that the simple result had issued from an Other which had, however, disappeared. So far, again, as the outward form is concerned, it would be simply we who had brought the semblance or appearance into relation with its Essence and referred it back to this. Or, looking at the question from a broader standpoint, we may say that God had merely created Nature, not a finite spirit which returns from Nature back to Him; that He had an unfruitful love of the world as of something which was the mere semblance or show of Himself, and which as such remained an Other in


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 relation to Him which did not reflect Him, and through which He did not shine as through Himself. And what is the third thing supposed to be; what are we supposed to be who have brought this show or semblance into relation with its Essence, and referred it back to its central point, and have been the means whereby the Essence first manifested itself and appeared in itself? What would this third thing be? What would we be? We would represent a knowledge whose existence was presupposed in an absolute way, in fact an independent act of a formal universality which embraced everything in itself, and in which that necessarily existing unity which is in-and-for-itself would itself be included as a mere phenomenon or semblance without objectivity.

If we form a more definite conception of the relation which is set forth in this determination, then it will be seen that the elevation to God of determinate Being, of Nature, and of natural Being in general, and, along with this, of our consciousness, the active form of this elevation itself, is simply religion or piety which rises to God in a subjective way only, either simply in the shape of an act of transition whereby we disappear in God, or by setting ourselves over against Him as a semblance or illusion. If the finite were thus to disappear in Him, He would be merely the absolute substance, from which nothing proceeds, and into which nothing returns to itself, and even to form ideas of or to think of the absolute substance would be already too much, something which would itself have to disappear. If, however, the relation of reflection is still preserved, the elevation of the pious mind to God, in the sense that religion as such, and consequently the subjective for itself, continues to represent what has Being and is independent, then what is primarily independent or self-existent, and the elevation to which constitutes religion, is something produced by religion, something conceived of, postulated, thought or believed, an appearance or semblance merely, not anything truly independent which starts from itself.


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 It is substance as an idea merely, which does not decide for itself, and which consequently is not the activity which as activity is found only in the subjective elevation as such. It would not in this case be known and recognised as true that God is the Spirit who Himself arouses in men that desire to rise to Him, that religious feeling in which the elevation begins.

If from this one-sidedness there results a broader idea and a further development of what does not, to begin with, get beyond something which has the character of a reflex semblance, and if we thus reach its emancipation, in which it, as being independent and active, would in its turn be defined as not-semblance, then we would attribute to this independent existence merely a relative, and consequently a half connection with its other side, which contained in it itself a non-communicating and incommunicable kernel which had nothing to do with the Other. We would be dealing merely with the superficial form, in which the two sides were apparently related to each other, and which would not imply a relation springing from their essence and established by their essence. Both sides consequently would be wanting in the true, total return of Spirit into itself, and Spirit would thus not search into the deep things of the Godhead. But this return into itself and this searching into the Other are essentially coincident; for mere immediacy, substantial Being, does not imply anything deep. It is the real return into self which alone makes the depths of God, and it is just the act of searching into the Essence which is return into self.

We may stop here with this preliminary reference to the more concrete sense of the difference indicated, and which we discovered by means of reflection. What had to be called attention to was that the difference is not a superfluous multiplicity; further, that the division springing from it, and which was, to begin with, of a formal and external character, contains two characteristics—Nature, natural things, and the progress of consciousness to God


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 and from Him back to Being, both of which equally and necessarily belong to one conception, and this quite as much in the course of the subjective procedure of knowledge as when they have an absolutely objective concrete sense, and, regarded each for itself, present a one-sidedness of a most important kind. So far as knowledge is concerned, their integration is found in the totality which the Notion in general represents, and, more strictly speaking, in what was said about it, namely, that its unity as a unity of the two moments is a result representing the most absolute basis and result of the two moments. Without, however, presupposing this totality and its necessity, it will follow from the result of the one movement—and since we are beginning we can begin only in a one-sided way from the one—that by its own dialectic nature it forces itself to go over into the other, and passes from itself over into this complete integration. The objective signification of what is, to begin with, a merely subjective conclusion will, however, at once make it evident that the inadequate, finite form of that proof is done away with. Its finitude consists, above all, in this one-sidedness which attaches to its indifference and its separation from the content. When this one-sidedness has been done away with and absorbed, it comes to have the content also in itself in its true form. The process of elevation to God is in itself the abolition of the one-sidedness of subjectivity in general, and, above all, of knowledge.

To the distinction which, regarded from the formal side, appears as a difference in the kinds of the proofs of the existence of God, there has yet to be added the fact that if we look at the proof from the one side according to which we pass from the Being of God to the conception of God, it presents itself under two forms.

The first proof starts from the Being which as something contingent does not support itself, and from this reasons to a true necessary Being in-and-for-itself—this is the proof ex contingentia mundi.


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 The other proof starts from Being in so far as it has a definite character determined in accordance with relations implying an end, and reasons to a wise author of this Being—this is the Teleological Proof of the existence of God.

We have still to deal with the other side, according to which the notion or conception of God is made the starting-point, and from which we reason to its Being—the Ontological Proof. As this is the plan we mean to follow out, there are thus three proofs which we have to consider; and also, as being of no less importance, we have to consider the criticism which has been given of them, and owing to which they have been discarded and forgotten.


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 TENTH LECTURE

proofs we have to deal with, regarded in their first aspect, presuppose the world in general, and, above all, its contingency. The starting-point is constituted by empirical things, and by the Whole composed of these things, namely, the world. The Whole is certainly superior to its parts, the Whole, that is to say defined as the unity which embraces and gives their character to all the parts, as, for instance, even when we speak of the Whole of a house, and still more in the case of that Whole which is a self-existent unity, as the soul is in reference to the living body. By the term world, however, we understand the aggregate of material things, the collection merely of that infinite number of existing things which are actually visible, and each of which is, to begin with, conceived of as existing for itself. The world embraces men equally with natural things. When the world is thus taken as an aggregate, and even as an aggregate merely of natural things, it is not conceived of as Nature, by which we understand something which is in itself a systematic Whole, a system of arrangements and gradations, and particularly of laws. The term world as thus understood expresses the aggregate merely, and suggests that it is based simply on the existing mass of things, and has thus no superiority, no qualitative superiority at least, over material things.

So far as we are concerned, these things further determine themselves in a variety of ways, and chiefly as limited Being, finitude, contingency, and so on. This is the kind of starting-point from which the spirit raises itself to God. It adjudges limited, finite or contingent Being to be untrue Being, above and beyond which true Being exists. It


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 escapes into the region of another, unlimited Being, which represents the Essence as opposed to that unessential, external Being. The world of finitude, of things temporal, of change, of transitoriness, is not the true form of existence, but the Infinite, Eternal, and Unchangeable. And even if what we have called limitless Being, the Infinite, Eternal, and Unchangeable, does not succeed in expressing the absolute fulness of meaning contained in the word God, still God is limitless Being, He is infinite, eternal, and unchangeable, and thus the spirit rises at least to those divine predicates or to those fundamental qualities of His nature which, though abstract, are yet universal, or at least to that universal region, to the pure æther in which God dwells.

This elevation of the soul to God is, speaking generally, that fact in the history of the human spirit which we call religion, but religion in a general sense, that is, in a purely abstract sense, and thus this elevation is the general, but merely the general, basis of religion.

The principle of immediate knowledge does not get beyond this elevation as a fact. It appeals to it, and rests in it as a fact, and asserts that it represents that universal fact in men, and even in all men, which is called the inner revelation of God in the human spirit, or reason. We have already sufficiently examined this principle, and I accordingly refer to it once more only in so far as we here confine our attention to the fact in question. This very fact, the act of elevation to God namely, is as such rather something which is directly of the nature of mediation. It has its beginning and starting-point in finite, contingent existence, in material things, and represents an advance from these to something else. It is consequently mediated by that beginning, and is an elevation to what is infinite and in itself necessary, only inasmuch as it does not stop short at that beginning which is here alone the Immediate (and this an Immediate which afterwards exhibits a merely relative character), but rises to the Infinite by the mediate


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 step of the abandonment and renunciation of such a standpoint. This elevation which is represented by consciousness, is consequently in itself mediated knowledge.

With regard to the point from which this elevation starts, we may here further remark that the content is not of a sensuous kind, not an empirical concrete content composed of sensation or perception, nor a concrete content of imagination—the truth rather being that the abstract thought-determinations implied in the ideas of the finitude and contingency of the world form the starting-point. The goal at which the elevation arrives is of a similar kind, namely, the infinitude or absolute necessity of God, conceived of not as having a more developed and richer determination, but as being wholly within the limits of these general categories. With regard to this aspect of the question it is necessary to point out that the universality of the fact of this elevation is false so far as its form is concerned. For instance, it can be maintained that even amongst the Greeks the thought of infinity, of inherently existing necessity as representing the ultimate principle of all things, was the possession of the philosophers only. Material things did not appear in this general way to the popular conception in the abstract form of material things and as contingent and finite things, but rather in their empirical and concrete shape. So in the same way God was not conceived of under the category of the Infinite, the Eternal, the inherently Necessary, but, on the contrary, in accordance with the definite shapes created by the imagination. Still less is it the case that those nations who occupied a lower stage of culture put their conceptions in any such actually universal forms. These general forms of thought do certainly pass through men’s minds, as we say, because men are thinking beings, and when they have received a fixed form in language they are still further developed into the conscious thought upon which the proof proper is based, but even in that case they take, to begin with, the form of characteristics of


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 concrete objects; they don’t require to get a fixed place in consciousness as independent in their own right. It was to the culture of our time that these categories of thought first became familiar, and they are now universal, or at least universally diffused. But those very people who have shared in this culture, and no less those who have been referred to as unpractised in the independent exercise of thought based on general conceptions, have not reached this idea in any immediate way, but, on the contrary, by following the varied course of thought, and by the study of the sense in which words are used. People have essentially learned to think, and have given currency to their thoughts. The culture which is capable of abstract conception is something which has been reached through mediation of an infinitely manifold character. The one fact in this fact of the elevation of Man to God is that it is a mediation.

It is this circumstance, namely, that the elevation of the spirit to God has mediation in itself, which invites to proof, that is, to the explication of the separate moments of this process of the spirit, and to their explication in the form of thought. It is the spirit in its most inward character, that is, in its thought, which produces this elevation, which in its turn represents the course followed by the thought-determinations or characteristic qualities of thought. What is intended to be effected by this process of proof is that this activity of thought should be brought into consciousness, that consciousness should recognise it as representing those moments of thought in a connected form. Against this unfolding of these moments which shows itself in the region of mediation through thought, faith, which wishes to continue to be immediate certainty, protests, and so, too, does the criticism of the Understanding, which is at home in the intricacies of that mediation, and is at home in the latter in order that it may introduce confusion into the elevation itself. So far as faith is concerned, we may say that however many faults Understanding may find with


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 these proofs, and whatever defective points there may be in their manner of unfolding the moments of the elevation of the spirit from the accidental and temporal to the infinite and eternal, the human heart will not allow itself to be deprived of this elevation. In so far as the human heart has been checked in this matter of elevation to God by the Understanding, faith has, on the one hand, appealed to it to hold fast by this elevation, and not to trouble itself with the fault-finding of the Understanding; but it has, on the other hand, told itself not to trouble about proof at all, in order that it may reach what is the surest standing ground, and in the interest of its own simplicity it has ranged itself on the side of the critical Understanding in direct opposition to proof. Faith will not allow itself to be robbed of its right of rising to God, that is, of its witness to the truth, because this is inherently necessary, and is more than any single chance fact connected with Spirit. There are facts, inner experiences in Spirit, and still more are there in the individual spirits—for Spirit does not exist as an abstraction, but in the form of many spirits—facts of an infinitely varied sort, and sometimes of the most opposite and depraved character. In order that this fact may be rightly conceived of as a fact of Spirit as such, and not merely as a fact belonging to the various ephemeral contingent spirits, it is requisite to conceive of it in its necessary character. It is this necessary character which alone vouches for its truth in this contingent and arbitrary sphere. The sphere to which this higher fact belongs is, further, essentially the sphere of abstraction. Not only is it very difficult to have a clear and definite consciousness of what abstraction is and what is the nature of its inner connection, but this power of abstraction is itself the real danger, and this is a danger which is unavoidable when abstraction has once appeared, when the believing human spirit has once tasted of the Tree of Knowledge, and thought has begun to spring up within it in the free and independent form which peculiarly belongs to it.


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 If, accordingly, we look more narrowly at the inner course followed by Spirit in thought and its moments, it will be seen, as has been already observed, that the first starting-point represents a category of thought, namely, that of the contingency of natural things. The first form of the elevation of the spirit to God is represented historically by the so-called Cosmological Proof of the existence of God. It has also been pointed out that on the definiteness of the starting-point depends also the definiteness of the goal which we wish to reach. Natural things might be defined in another way, and in that case the result or the truth would also be differently defined. We might have differences which would appear unimportant to very imperfectly developed thought, but which from that standpoint of thought which we at present occupy would be seen to be the very thing with which we were really concerned and which has to be reckoned with. If things were thus defined in a general way as existing, it might be shown that the truth of existence as determinate Being, was Being itself, indeterminate, limitless Being. God would thus be defined as Being—the most abstract of all definitions, and the one with which, as is well known, the Eleatics started. We recall this abstraction most vividly in connection with the distinction already made between thought in its inner and implicit form and the bringing forward of thoughts into consciousness. Who is there who does not use the word Being? (The weather is fine. Where are you? and so on, ad infinitum.) And who, in forming conceptions, does not make use of this pure category of thought, though it is concealed in the concrete content (the weather, and so on, ad infinitum), of which consciousness in forming any such conceptions is composed, and of which alone, therefore, it has any knowledge? There is an infinite difference between the possession and employment of the category of thought called Being in this way, and its employment by the Eleatics, who gave it a fixed meaning in itself, and conceived of it as the ultimate principle, as the Absolute,