The Philosophy of Fine Art, volume 3 (of 4): Hegel's Aesthetik — Georg Hegel — John Shaqi
The Philosophy of Fine Art, volume 3 (of 4): Hegel's Aesthetik
Georg Hegel · en
For this reason we get on the one hand _objectivity_, which in so far
as it is not the unique configuration of spirit, stands over against
it as inorganic Nature. It is this relation of bare objectivity which
converts architecture into a mere suggestive symbol, which does not
possess its spiritual significance in itself. The point of extreme
contrast to objectivity as such is _subjectivity_, that is the
soul[122], emotional life in the entire range of all its particular
movements, moods, passions, exterior and interior agitations and
actions. Between these two we are confronted with the spiritual
individuality which no doubt has a definite structure, but which
is not as yet deepened to the extent of the essential ideality
of the individual soul; in which, instead of the full personal
singularity, the substantive universality of Spirit and its objects
and characteristic traits is the prevailing factor. In its generality
it is not as yet absolutely withdrawn into its own exclusive domain
to the point of purely spiritual unity; rather it comes before us as
this midway point[123] still hailing from the objective side, that is
the side of inorganic Nature, and consequently even carries as part of
itself corporeality, as the particular form of existence appropriate
to spirit, in the body that not merely is its own, but also discloses
it. In this mode of externality, which no longer remains something
simply opposed to what is ideal, spiritual individuality has now
to be displayed, not, however, as living form, that is to say as
corporeality continuously referred back to the point of unity implied
in the singularity of spiritual life, but rather as form set forth and
manifested in its external guise, into the mould of which Spirit has no
doubt been poured, without, however, being from this outward bond of
association, made visible in the sense that it is so when it withdraws
into its own essential and ideal domain[124].