α. The activities of that first method operate, to begin with, on physical nature, from the observation of which men derive universal laws, and on this basis their knowledge is founded; the science of nature, however, only reaches to the stage of reflection. This kind of experimental physics was once called, and is still called philosophy, as Newton’s _Principia philosophiæ naturalis_ (Vol. I. p. 59) show. This work is one in which the methods of the finite sciences through observation and deduction are alone present—those sciences which the French still call the _sciences exactes_. To this, the understanding of the individual, piety was opposed, and hence in this respect philosophy was termed worldly wisdom (Vol. I. p. 60). Here the Idea in its infinitude is not itself the object of knowledge; but a determinate content is raised into the universal, or this last in its determinateness for the understanding is derived from observation, just as is, for instance, done in Keppler’s Laws. In Scholastic philosophy, on the other hand, man’s power of observation was set aside, and disputations respecting nature at that time proceeded from abstruse hypotheses. β. In the second place, the spiritual was observed as in its realization it constitutes the spiritual world of states, in order thus to investigate from experience the rights of individuals as regards one another, and as regards rulers, and the rights of states against states. Before this popes anointed kings, just as was done in Old Testament times to those appointed by God; it was in the Old Testament that the tithe was commanded; the forbidden degrees of relationship in marriage were also adopted from the Mosaic laws. What was right and permissible for kings was demonstrated from Saul’s and David’s histories, the rights of priesthood from Samuel—in short, the Old Testament was the source of all the principles of public law, and it is in this way even now that all papal bulls have their deliverances confirmed. It may easily be conceived how much nonsense was in this manner concocted. Now, however, right was sought for in man himself, and in history, and what had been accounted right both in peace and in war was explained. In this way books were composed which even now are constantly quoted in the Parliament of England. Men further observed the desires which could be satisfied in the state and the manner in which satisfaction could be given to them, in order thus from man himself, from man of the past as well as of the present, to learn what is right. b. The second method, that of Idealism, proceeds from what is inward; according to it everything is in thought, mind itself is all content. Here the Idea itself is made the object; that signifies the thinking it and from it proceeding to the determinate. What Realism draws from experience is now derived from thought _à priori_; or the determinate is also comprehended but not led back to the universal merely, but to the Idea.