# The Ethical Theory of Hegel/Introduction

INTRODUCTION
One of the difficulties in the study of Hegel’s philosophy is that of finding a starting-point. The theory is a closed circle and does not seem to contain any convenient means of ingress. The approach which Hegel himself provides in the Phenomenology may well seem as formidable a fastness as the castle itself, and sometimes the method which recommends itself most is simply to break in at any point where the wall looks less forbidding than usual. To those who adopt this course the Philosophy of Right has some attractions. For one thing, the treatise is an elaborate re-mapping of ground which Hegel has dealt with on more than one previous occasion, and consequently the style is less burdened by the task of expressing novel ideas. This does not mean, of course, that the style is good, but it is not quite so cumbersome and abstruse as in some of his other writings, and the plan of thought is steadily worked out. Moreover, the work is an expression of Hegel’s mature thought and gives his final views on ethical and political subjects. Behind it lies his whole system, and difficult passages can be supplemented from various sources; on ethical points we can refer to his other ethical writings, and on points of general importance we have the Larger Logic, the Encyclopaedia, and, of course, the Phenomenology to help us. The notes, too, which were collected and added to the first edition of the Werke are very useful, and throw brilliant side-lights on the main principles. The language of these is freer and more vivid than that of the text, though perhaps it is also less strict and reliable.
But the Philosophy of Right has another attraction; for the subject is one with which every reflecting man cannot but be familiar. It is practically impossible in a civilized ​community to keep aloof from the earnest questioning concerning moral conduct, the nature of the state, the rights of labour and property, and in general the relation between the individual and society. And in these days we are forced to listen to some one, be he a newspaper editor, a street orator, or a politically minded acquaintance, who is eager to add his authority to that of the law and the prophets, and to instruct us on all questions of right and justice. Everyday experience often makes it possible for one to detect the general bearing of Hegel’s argument in this sphere, even when his expressions are unusual; for, after all, Hegel too was a good citizen and lived in the common atmosphere.
At the same time there is much that may be strange to us in Hegel’s view. Judgements of his, with which the plain man concurs, are linked up by Hegel with logical and metaphysical doctrines which seem very remote from the point at issue; and as one reads one finds out gradually that the short introduction to the Philosophy of Right is a substitute for a very large scheme of thought in which there are examined many important principles which one is apt to assume uncritically from time to time as occasion arises.
This book is intended to help any one who chooses ethical philosophy as his point of attack in the study of Hegel, and feels the need of some extraneous aid, greater than that which Hegel supplies in the introduction to the Philosophy of Right. It does not profess to say all that can or should be said on Hegel’s ethics by way of exposition, but it endeavours to develop the main content of that section of the philosophy in such a manner that its relation to the whole and the principles on which it rests may become apparent.
I do not intend to discuss the development of Hegel’s thought; my desire is rather to present it in its mature form. It will be well, therefore, to state here at the outset where that mature view is to be found, and on what works and in ​what degree reliance is to be placed. Hegel had a constant interest in ethical and political subjects, and the first group of writings which we may mention consists of minor treatises on what is sometimes called ‘practical politics’. He first broke ground by a discussion of the conditions of the state of Würtemberg in 1798, and this was followed in 1802 by a severe criticism of the German confederation. In 1817 Hegel returned to the affairs of Würtemberg, and in 1831 he wrote a trenchant review of English reform legislation. These writings do not all appear in the standard editions of Hegel’s works, and are most easily found in a volume entitled Hegel’s Schriften zur Politik und Rechtsphilosophie, edited by Lasson. They are, however, only of indirect philosophical interest, and we need not discuss them by themselves.
The second group of writings consists of two early treatises on ethical subjects, both dating about 1802; the first of these was published in the Critical Journal of Philosophy, edited by Schelling and Hegel, and is entitled Concerning the Scientific Modes of Treating Natural Right, and the second is a sketch of the System of Ethics. Both are contained in the volume of minor writings just mentioned. These works are to be used with caution. They are of extreme importance for the history of Hegel’s thought, since they show his view in a stage of germination. For his final standpoint, however, they are not authoritative except in a negative sense. They were written when Hegel was still under the influence of Schelling; and, while the criticism of previous thought which they contain is not cancelled by the more mature view, they are tinged not only in expression but also in principle with some presuppositions which Hegel afterwards discarded. The System of Ethics in particular is a difficult work to understand fully, because in it the general attitude, which may be broadly called Hegelian, is very imperfectly worked out, and is crossed by other tendencies. Accordingly, in my exposition, I have ​used these writings only to indicate how Hegel distinguished himself from those prior thinkers of whose inadequacy he had convinced himself at this date.
The third section of his ethical and political works consists of one volume, the Phenomenology. This was published in 1807 and marks Hegel’s breach with Schelling. It is thus the first treatise which presents the special standpoint of Hegel’s own thought. The Phenomenology occupies a peculiar position: it is both a part of philosophy, and an introduction to it. It is an analysis of the various attitudes of thought to the world and a review of the various phenomenal appearances of mind. It exposes the way in which each typical form of mind organizes itself, the relations which it maintains to its object, and the kind of object which it apprehends. It begins with the simplest attitude to the world, and passes stage by stage to the highest and most adequate. At each step it has a twofold task: it explains the nature of the point of view in question, and it does so in such a way that its inadequacies become plain and force us to pass to a more satisfactory standpoint.
At a certain point of this process Hegel reaches the ethical consciousness, explains its structure and function, and discusses its adequacy and validity. This examination, of course, is important for our purpose, and I have made free use of it. But there are two qualifications to be kept in mind in this reference. The first of these is that the Phenomenology is an analysis of actual phases of consciousness, or to put it otherwise, it deals with types of facts; and consequently the correspondence is not absolute between it and the analysis of the Philosophy of Right which considers the arrangement of the principles of the ethical world, not in their definite embodiment as phenomenal attitudes of mind, but in their interrelation as categories of the world. There is, of course, a very considerable agreement, for, as we shall see, these categories ​are themselves objective principles realized outwardly. But, nevertheless, one must not conclude a priori that the stages of the two treatments are necessarily the same. Assuming that the two works are consistent, one is justified in supplementing the analysis of a principle in one from the analysis of the other; for example, one can use the discussion of the moral consciousness in the Phenomenology to amplify the discussion in the Philosophy of Right of the kind of realization obtained by moral will which takes moral principles to be supreme. But one must not assume that the phase of mind which succeeds the moral consciousness is simply the embodiment of the next ethical category. The Phenomenology has to take into account a further inter-play of subject and object which is not necessary to the direct analysis of categories. The other point is a qualification of this. When he wrote the Phenomenology Hegel had in the main reached his final position, but the principles of his thought still required to be worked out and were subject to revision. I doubt if the division of the categories of mind which he finally adopted was altogether clear to him at this time, and this is borne out by certain changes of terminology. The word ‘mind’ is used in the Phenomenology to denote what is later called objective mind, and the account of the development of practical mind into objective mind, given with great care in the Encyclopaedia, does not appear in the Phenomenology. The Phenomenology is a ‘voyage of discovery’, and the first survey of the country travelled is not quite accurate. I think that if Hegel had written the Phenomenology when the plan of the Encyclopaedia was clear in his mind, the correspondence of the stages of the two works would have been closer at certain points.
Another writing which stands by itself is the Propaedeutik, a transcript of the lectures which Hegel dictated in philosophy from 1808 to 1811 to the higher classes of the Gymnasium at ​Nürnberg. The lectures are as simple as Hegel could make them—though they must have been out of the reach of schoolboys—and it is significant that he himself used the ethical approach to philosophy in this course as the most fitting for junior students. The tripartite division of the philosophy of mind, characteristic of his later work, appears here. But the final titles are not yet reached. The stages are (a) mind in its motion, (b) practical mind, and (c) mind in its pure exposition. The whole treatment of ethical mind is called practical rather than objective. The framework, however, is laid down, and the chief weakness is in the transitions.
In 1817 the first of the mature expositions of Hegel’s ethical philosophy appeared in the Encyclopaedia. This work is a complete, but brief, statement of Hegel’s philosophy as a whole—lacking, however, the approach offered in the Phenomenology—and his more specialized works are fuller statements of various positions adopted in it. In 1821 Hegel published the Outlines of the Philosophy of Right, in which the ethical and political portions of the Encyclopaedia are handled by themselves. Both of these works are authoritative. The Encyclopaedia was enlarged and revised in 1827 and in 1830. In it Hegel refers to the Philosophy of Right for details, and, conversely, one has to turn to the former work for the context in which the latter is set. From the nature of the case there is a better balance in the Encyclopaedia. The Philosophy of Right points out the way in which the principles of right realize mind and give it objectivity; and it is more concerned to show how the infinite self-contained whole which mind intrinsically is, comes to the light of day, than to display the insufficiency of the whole field of right. In consequence, the latter work speaks of the infinity of mind and the rationality of the will without further qualification, whereas the former is careful to note that this infinity is itself finite and the rationality not final. I see no reason to suppose, however, ​that there is more than a difference of emphasis, and I have tried to read the two books together.
The Philosophy of Right is an expansion of a part of the whole scheme; the last portion of it itself is greatly expanded by Hegel in his lectures on the Philosophy of History given from 1822 to 1831. I have used this work to amplify certain points.
The introduction to the Philosophy of Right presents considerable difficulty. It is a brief attempt to place the reader in a position to begin Hegel’s philosophy in the middle. I have chosen a somewhat different approach, and have drawn on various writings from which his general doctrine is to be gathered. The earlier portions of the Encyclopaedia, of course, are relevant, and I have made some reference to the Larger Logic which Hegel wrote during 1812-16. I have avoided discussion of peculiar doctrines of his philosophy of nature as far as possible, but I have introduced it wherever it seemed necessary to understand the general position.
I am very conscious of the imperfection of the treatment given here. The presuppositions of the ethical standpoint are not sufficiently expounded, and I have had to be extremely dogmatic in my references to Hegel’s Logic. This I regret, but it seems inevitable. The full exposition of the Logic would occupy greater space than this book itself, and cannot be given propaedeutically. I regret also that I have not been able to carry forward my account into the region of what Hegel calls absolute mind. But again the task is so involved that I have had to content myself with little more than a bare indication of the problem which has to be solved by succeeding portions of philosophy. In reference to both these fields I have tried to adopt Hegel’s own point of view, and have not developed any criticism. Throughout the exposition I have not attempted to conceal the fact that I agree very substantially with Hegel’s treatment; and I have often ventured ​to put his argument in the terms which most naturally express my own opinion. Nevertheless the absence of criticism on any point is not to be taken as a sign that I regard Hegel’s view there as valid for all time. My first object has been exposition, and the criticism in which I have indulged has been subordinated to the purpose of making the development of the argument clear.
Almost a century has passed since Hegel published the Encyclopaedia, and the world has not stood still in the meantime. Some forms of social life which were present to Hegel have decayed, and passed into the keeping of history; other forms have developed since his time; and our knowledge of political life is both more accurate and more extensive than his possibly could be. As he himself might say, the world has become more mature and philosophy has now a more complete construction over against it to be built into an intellectual kingdom. But in spite of this undeniable immaturity of some parts of Hegel’s view, I feel sure that what is needed in social philosophy is development and not revolution. One important step which must be taken if we are to profit by the advance which has been made is to appropriate the truth of the philosophy which has come down to us. Hegel is the last great original thinker in the main line of the evolution of philosophy, and I doubt whether the new philosophic movements of our own day have mastered his thought. These movements are not at all to be ignored or despised, and they contain truth which Hegel did not reach. But at the same time we must keep in touch with the main stream, and we can find it nowhere more fully than in Hegel. Whenever the limits of his social experience seemed to me to obscure the rationale of his argument I have indicated my criticism: but throughout I have put his view in the best light I could and have tried to speak for him.
It may be well to indicate in this introductory statement ​the divisions of my argument. I have tried to show at the beginning the standpoint of Hegel’s philosophy as a whole, and the first chapter contains a brief account of his Logic with special reference to the dialectic. The account, of course, is purely introductory, and the conception of the dialectic is expanded at various later stages of the discussion. The second chapter considers certain topics of the Logic in order to make clear the nature of the principles with which we have to deal in ethical philosophy. The third chapter is occupied with the philosophic attitude and has a special reference to the standpoint of ethics. The fourth chapter is continuous with this and sets forth Hegel’s general conception of mind. The fifth chapter considers the analysis of these categories of mind which are dialectically prior to ethics and presupposed in it. The next two chapters, the sixth and the seventh, deal with abstract right, the first division of the world of right; in the succeeding two, eight and nine, the principles of morality are expounded and examined. Chapters ten, eleven, and twelve discuss the third main section of the subject, the ethical world proper. And I have concluded with a chapter which indicates very briefly the limits of the ethical world.
With regard to Hegel’s technical terms my procedure has been as follows. The important phrases, an sich and für sich, I have rendered by implicit, inherent, or intrinsic in the one case, and explicit, or very occasionally, independent, in the other. To the phrase an und für sich I have had to surrender, and have usually substituted the word absolute. Dasein is translated by definite mode or definite being. I find that by many translators Wirklichkeit is usually rendered by actuality, Realität by reality; but this use led me into considerable difficulty. The significance of the word reality in English philosophical writing is too profound to admit of this use, and it is much nearer the term Wirklichkeit as ​Hegel uses it. Accordingly I have translated Wirklichkeit by reality and Realität by reality. It should be noted that the terms are not used indiscriminately. Bestimmung I have allowed myself to render by determination, category, characteristic, nature, or even principle as the context suggests. There is no fixed equivalent in English, but the significance can generally be given fairly accurately. Begriff and Idee are rendered respectively by notion and ‘idea’—the quotation marks indicating that ‘idea’ is not to be understood in anything but Hegel’s technical sense. Other words present less difficulty.
I have usually taken advantage of Wallace’s translations from the Encyclopaedia and Professor Baillie’s translation of the Phenomenology. I have consulted versions of other parts of Hegel whenever they were available, particularly that of the Philosophy of Right by Dr. Dyde, but I have preferred to make my own translation. Unless otherwise stated, the references to Hegel’s Werke are to the edition of 1832-40; the exceptions being the early treatise of 1802 Concerning the Scientific Modes of Treating Natural Right, for which references are given to the edition in 1913 of Hegel’s Schriften zur Politik und Rechtsphilosophie by Georg Lasson as well as to volume I of the Werke, and the Philosophy of History which is quoted from the third edition of the Werke, dated 1848.