Hegel's Lectures on the History of Philosophy: Volume 1 (of 3)Hegel, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich
Philosophy
Hegel's Lectures on the History of Philosophy: Volume 1 (of 3)
Hegel, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich
Philosophy -- History
the separation, almost irrational.” This confutes those who think that
God gives wisdom in sleep or in somnambulism. But in connection with
the many channels it becomes similar to the whole. This whole, the
universal and divine understanding, in unity with which we are logical,
is, according to Heraclitus, the essence of truth. Hence that which
appears as the universal to all, carries with it conviction, for it has
part in the universal and divine Logos, while what is subscribed to by
an individual carries with it no conviction from the opposite cause. He
says in the beginning of his book on Nature: “Since the surroundings
are reason, men are irrational both before they hear and when they
first hear. For since what happens, happens according to this reason,
they are still inexperienced when they search the sayings and the works
which I expound, distinguishing the nature of everything and explaining
its relations. But other men do not know what they do awake, just as
they forget what they do in sleep.” Heraclitus says further: “We do and
think everything in that we participate in the divine understanding
(_λόγος_). Hence we must follow the universal understanding. But
many live as if they had an understanding (_φρόνησιν_) of their own;
the understanding is, however, nothing but interpretation” (being
conscious) “of the manner in which all is ordered. Hence in so far
as we participate in the knowledge (_μνήμης_) of it, we are in the
truth; but in so far as we are singular (_ἰδιάσωμεν_) we are in error.”
Great and important words! We cannot speak of truth in a truer or less
prejudiced way. Consciousness as consciousness of the universal, is
alone consciousness of truth; but consciousness of individuality and
action as individual, an originality which becomes a singularity of
content or of form, is the untrue and bad. Wickedness and error thus
are constituted by isolating thought and thereby bringing about a
separation from the universal. Men usually consider, when they speak of
thinking something, that it must be something particular, but this is
quite a delusion.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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