2. All that exists, then, has only truth in so far as it is a definite existence of the Idea. For the Idea is alone the truly real. The truth of the phenomenal is not derived from the fact that its particular existence is of an inward or external character, and as such is in a general sense reality; it is so wholly in virtue of the fact that such reality is adequate to the notion. Then alone is determinate existence real and true. And the truth, to which we here refer, is not a _subjective_ interpretation of it, namely, that a particular existence is accordant with my own conception of it. It is truth in the objective sense that the reality of the Ego, or of any external object, action, or circumstance actually contributes to the realization of the notion. If this identity is not established the existence remains purely phenomenal. Instead of the objectification of the notion in its completeness what obtains is purely a detached aspect of it; and with regard to this, whatever self-subsistence it may appear to have in opposition to the unity and universality of the notion, such can only work to its final confusion by setting it in hostility to the true notion itself. Our conclusion, therefore, is that only the reality which adequately expresses the notion is truly reality, and the reason it is so is that therein the Idea manifests itself as existence. 3. We have maintained that beauty is _Idea_. It follows that _beauty_ and _truth_ are, in one aspect of them, _identical_. In other words, beauty must itself in its intrinsic being be true. A closer investigation will further show to us that truth must be _distinguished_ from beauty. The idea is true in the sense that it is so by virtue of its essential being and according to its fundamental principle[193], and as such truth it is thought[194]. It is not its sensuous and external existence, but the _universal_ Idea of thought as present in this. At the same time the Idea is driven to seek its realization in external and objectively determined existence, both in the sphere of Nature and that of Mind. The true, in the absolute sense, also exists. And in so far as, in this its external existence, it is immediately apprehended by consciousness, and the notion rests in immediate unity with its external appearance, the Idea is not only true, but is also _beautiful._ The _beautiful_ may therefore be defined as the _sensuous semblance_[195] of the Idea. For the sensuous condition and the objective world generally maintain no real self-subsistence in beauty, but have merely to surrender the immediacy of their _being._ In beauty such are posited simply as the determinate existence and externality of the notion, and as a form of reality, which itself manifests the _notion_ in unity with its external appearance in this its particular objective existence. For this reason it can only pass as the semblance of the notion.