(COMPILED BY GEORGE BLACK.)
G. W. F. Hegel (1770-1831), another great German, was of opinion that all that exists is Process, which means development by union of opposites, which again means not a mere addition of the one to the other but a blending of them in a third, as two necessary sides of the same, so that, equally false when apart, they are equally true when together. We see this on a great scale when we consider the two opposite notions without which the world would be inexplicable to us — thought and nature. Thought, viewed abstractly, or away from nature, gives us the Logic of abstract notions ; viewed by itself it gives us the Philosophy of Nature. Really, however, when we attempt to view either separately, we are driven from one to the other, and we reach the Philosophy of Spirit in which thought makes itself its own object (that happens whenever we think about thought), and thought and externality are concretely combined. The truth lies always in the concrete view ; all else is abstract and half truth. But the process of thinking begins with the half truth ; it passes from a notion, relatively abstract, first of all to its equally abstract opposite, and thence to a notion that is relatively concrete uniting the two abstractions. This reconciling Third is then found to be abstract, and thought is driven to its opposite, thence reaching a new concrete.
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Here Hegel to some extent foreshadows evolution but his dialectic is unlike development as ordinarily conceived ; it resembles Spencer's evolution by homogeneity, heterogeneity, individuation ; but it is not Darwinian evolution, where the last stages of a species do not of necessity embody and include the previous. Evolution is popularly supposed to infer that all changes must be continuous and without sudden break. There is seldom any idea of the priority of the whole to the parts, or any conception of development as a change in which the later outcome may be said to explain or determine the early stages more fully than the latter the former. Which is to say that several complex organisms may be evolved from one simple form but that, the process completed, any of these complexities can only be traceable to one unmistakable source of origin. But Darwinism differs from this view in its application to cases where preservation of identity is not possible, and where even the continuity of growth exists for us only in retrospect. Darwin explains the origin of species by supposing a tendency to rapid multiplication, leading necessarily to a struggle for existence ; secondly, by supposing that in every living thing propagated there is some slight difference from its fellows, such variations giving an advantage in the struggle to some over others, the result being a natural selection or survival of the fittest. The result is eventually so great an alteration of the living creature that it seems to belong to a new species ; but is really the old organism sifted and resifted by natural selection. The modification of species has been effected by the natural selection of numerous successive and slight but favorable variations, aided in an important manner by the inherited effects of the use and disuse of parts, and in an unimportant manner (that is, in relation to adaptive structures whether past or present) by the direct action of external conditions, and by variations, which seem to us in our ignorance to arise spontaneously. Selection implies choice of what is there, but not origination of the matter of choice. But absolute extinction of the unit is not a necessary consequence of natural selection. Variations, whether spontaneous or artificial, may be transmitted from one generation to another. Selection gives us only difference and not developments. What survives in the lowest forms is not identical with what went before — there is no identity, no consciousness of identity. In the higher forms Darwin makes no pretence that survival means moral fitness. The morally worst men may be only the fittest to survive because fitted to suck advantage from their surroundings. As Bonar shows, the philosophical conception of evolution, long ago presented by Greek and perfected by German philosophy, is that of a change where the past is not abolished but preserved, for what is now visibly present was in the past potentially so, and the subject which has experienced the development remains identical throughout the changes, that which was in germ at the beginning reaching its maturity at the end. Hegel would add that the development proceeds by a conflict of opposite principles. In his view of development, the conflicting opposites are not destroyed ; the surviving and victorious concrete includes them. Nothing is lost. This and other features of his Dialectic come more obviously into prominence with human beings than with material objects or even with plants and animals.
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Hegel is best known by his Philosophy of History, wherein he describes the whole progress of development in history as an enlarging of the nation through added freedom ; the Philosophy of Right (1820) ; and his early treatise on Natural Right (1802)— largely a criticism of Fichte and Kant. Hegel argues that his logic or dialectic is not simply in man's thoughts but in things themselves— for things and thought are one world. He accounts himself the most concrete of thinkers, for the opposite elements which other philosophers have regarded abstractly as necessarily separate, he regards concretely as necessarily united. The process of development takes place by virtue of this conflict and union; the reconciling third element, held abstractly, awakens an opposite element of its own, and the two are then reconciled in a new concrete.
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Hegel inspires modern Socialism by his argument that true freedom does not lie in mere recognition of the individual's rights as a person, though the recognition of such rights is indeed indispensable; nor does freedom lie in mere consciousness of empire over oneself in obedience to a mere inward law of duty; it lies in a man's oneness with social institutions, where, while he has rights, he finds his duties also embodied. (As a mere matter of terminology, I consider that the term Freedom is rightly applicable to that absence from control possible only in a savage condition, and that Liberty is more fully descriptive of that capacity to act which is only trammeled by a desire not to limit the liberties of others in return for their abstention from limiting ours.) According to Hegel, law and morality are thus opposites which are reconciled and made concrete in the Family, Civil Society, and the State. The last includes all the foregoing as its elements ; and it follows that there must always exist rights and duties, families and associations, all under the one State — as imperishable as they. Hegel distinguishes Civil Society from the body politic and it is in civil society that the law of economics have their special sphere of action. Though spontaneously formed, civil society passes necessarily in organized groups ; and, the more numerous and the better organized the groups, the stronger and more nearly perfect is the State in which they grow. The strength of a State must on occasion be asserted outwardly in conflict with other States; and the absolute cessation of such struggles cannot now be expected, and is not to be desired. There is no outward force to bring the various States to one mind (how about a Counsel of Nations?) but the indwelling and controlling power of Providence secures victory to that State which represents the general march of intellect at its farthest point. (That can only be true of intellect when applied to the national and combative arts.) What is real is rational.
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Lassalle's criticism of Hegel, that he represented transitory historical phases of property as flowing from the philosophical notion of property itself, is justifiable. But there is little justification for the view that Hegel's method is merely negative and destructive. Engel's attempt to deduce from Hegel's own logic that the Hegelian Idealism must give place to pure Materialism could be replied to in the true Hegelian spirit by the statement that the next step in development would overthrow materialism and replace it by a truth that conciliated the two opposites, idealism and materialism with one another. Whether the Pantheism resulting would be to Hegel's mind need not be debated.
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In Law the Person ; in Morality the Subject; in Civil Society the Citizen, are the centres of attention. Individualism is only possible on a social basis. Even if the only bond be the common rule regulating the relations of individuals, the advancement or depression of any one is bound up with the advancement or depression of the others. There is a mutual dependence, a unity, though the latter is not deliberately contrived. "It is not freedom but necessity." The endeavor to satisfy my subjective particular nature proves to depend for its success on my coincidence with others — in division of labor and in other matters, social and political.
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The object of Political Economy is to look at the "relations and movements of masses of people in their qualitative and quantitative concreteness and complication." This science finds out laws for a mass of contingencies. It discovers how combinations re-act upon each other, and how particular spheres form themselves into groups, influence other spheres and get help or hindrance from them. This inter-connection — seemingly incredible since everything seems at the mercy of individual caprice — resembles the Planetary System which shows to the eye only irregular movements but has its discoverable laws notwithstanding. The prominent figure in Civil Society is Man, as Citizen supplying his wants. Of human beings the wants are unlimited. Not merely food but good food is wanted ; not merely a living but what is styled a comfortable living. Multiplicity of wants beget division of labor with, according to Hegel, leisure for mental culture. The very mechanical character of the division corrects itself by its tendency to lead to the invention of actual machines. Thus individuals, aiming at private wealth, secure the general wealth. But the participation of any particular individual in the latter depends on two considerations — (1) whether he has capital, (2) whether he has a dexterity prized by other men. Unequal participation in wealth is possible from both these classes. If the grouping of men in families is the first foundation for the State, the grouping of them economically in Classes is the second. "The first origin of States is rightly ascribed to the introduction of agriculture, bringing with it the institution of marriage, for agriculture leads to the working of the soil, and thereby to exclusive private property" (in the thing produced). Agricultural life brings settled manners and permanent possessions ; but individual independence is the growth rather of the industrial labor associated with large cities. What a man gets by this kind of labor, he owes to himself. It may come to him, either (1) by concrete work, as an artisan, for his own particular wants, or (2) by abstract joint work for the general wants, as a manufacturer ; or (3) as a merchant by the work of exchanging goods by means of the thing called money, in which the abstract value of all wares is realised. Money is the means of expressing, and measuring quantitatively, every kind of property ; thus in the State we find citizens made to contribute to State expenses more equitably by money than they could be compelled to do by personal services or otherwise. In addition to the agricultural and industrial classes there is the Class of Public servants. Their business is to serve the general interests of society and their wants are supplied by the State that takes their services.
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Where all are seeking the satisfaction of wants and the obtainal of property there is needed a general protection of persons and property, often reckoned the whole work of the State but really only its primary work. The particularity of the competing members of a civil society requires a generality as its supporting basis— the generality of laws and their administration. Such a system can only grow up where civilization has discovered to men numerous wants, and they have methodically set to work to satisfy them. Then only can social rules pass from the category of custom into the form of written law, which differs from custom in being a defined, and general expression of what in custom was only indistinct habitual observance. The element of individual feeling, prejudice, or revenge, gives place to an endeavor after impartial logic ; and the matter of the laws is thus brought with in the knowledge of all, and what was before taken for granted is now formally brought out and laid down.
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Dealing with finite matters, laws constantly fall short of perfect adequacy, and yet at each given time should be made adequate. The conflict of this postulate of adequacy results in what Hegel calls (in Kantian terms) " the antimony of legislation," in spite of which legislation is indispensable. There is another seeming contradiction in the fact that crime, treated as a wrong to society, and not merely to an individual, seems to be made greater, whereas the punishments of it may be less than in a disorganized community. There is no contradiction — the punishments may safely be made less because Society is conscious of greater strength than any individual revenger of injuries, and can be merciful in proportion to its strength.
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The general elements of social power express themselves unmistakably in the formation of a corporate body for local government. The aim of a Corporation is not the mere securing of justice between man and man in accordance with the laws, but the positive advancement of the prosperity of citizens. The individual has been torn from the Family by Civil Society, and he has claims on it, as he had on the family. For its own part, regarded as a unity, Civil Society has also claims on him as standing to him in place of the family, and as itself collectively one family. "With the Poor, the General Power takes the place of the Family, coping with their immediate destitution and also with their aversion to labor, their tendency to crime, and the other vices that spring from their situation and their feeling of wrong." The existence of excessive property aids the concentration of excessive wealth in few hands. The proletariat have lost self-respect, and have lost the desire to make their own living ; and yet they claim the right to receive their subsistence. Then Hegel says : "Against Nature no man can assert a right, but in a State of Society, destitution at once wears the garb of a wrong inflicted on a particular class." The most inoperative question of modern Society is how best to help the poor. To give relief without labor is contrary to the first principle of civil society and individual independence ; to give it for labor is to increase the overproduction of goods which (in conjunction with the lack of corresponding productive consumers) was the primary cause of evil. Hegel did not see that if you give the needed opportunities for production that you increase the number of productive consumers. Under just conditions their consumption would be the equivalent of their production.
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The dialectic, argues he, which has shown itself in this tendency to the growth of a proletariat contemporaneously with that of great fortunes, pushes civil societies beyond their own bounds, and leads them to colonization, either sporadic or systematic, in order to find customers and subsistence. Readers of Marx will remember how ably he deals with this phase of modern society. Hegel regards the State as the eternal and necessary realization of the spirit of man. The divine idea is marred by many imperfections but is still recognizable even as in the criminal and cripple may be recognized the likeness of humanity. In the State we have a more true individuality and more true universality than in civil society. In its best form it is a condition of the best kind of individual action. It is not a more sum of the other elements ; it is something more, a bringer of new things. The State is the realization or concrete freedom. The State is bound up with the happiness of all its members. The conscious will and effort of individuals are as necessary to the State as is the State to them. Hegel illustrates his conception that the State is an organism not only by the old fable of the belly and the members but by an original physiological analogy. In the nervous system are two phases of feeling— abstract feeling or Sentiency, a dull feeling of internal movement and of the processes of nourishment and digestion, "when I keep myself to myself " ; and there is the phase of difference, when the feeling passes from within me to without me in what we call Irritability. Now the Family may be represented by the Sentiency; Civil Society by the Irritability; while the State is represented by the nervous system as an organized whole, which is only a living whole so far as it includes both sentinency and irritability. If the State is not built on family and civil society, it stands in the air. As Hume said that government is founded on opinion, so Hegel conceives that, though people may say in their haste it is a matter of brute force, what really holds things together is the profound feeling of order which all have. Constitutions are not usually made, they grow; nevertheless, the State is self-conscious, deliberate, and reasoning in all its actions ; and therefore religion, which is above all things a feeling of what is the Truth as distinguished from a logical and reasoned-out statement of it, must not be identified with politics either to the absorption of State in Church or Church in State. That devout men need no laws is the saying of a fanatic.
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Strangely enough, and this shakes one's faith in him, Hegel considered that the Sovereign Power is best represented by a constitutional monarch who puts, as it were, the dot on the i. But Representation is needed, not in order to discover political truth and give true decisions on any question, and not in order to provide checks on the King, but to complete the articulate and graduated organization, reaching from above to below and from below to above. The members of a Parliament, though they give voice to that element of liberty on behalf of particular groups or localities, are, when once elected, not mere delegates with a mandate, but beings possessed of thought and will of their own, and using them in the service not of a section but of the whole community.
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As the individual is not really individual till brought into relation with other persons, so the State is not really a State till brought into relation with other States. But States having no government over them, are to each other in a condition of Nature. There is no praetor to enforce contracts. The history of the world is the judgment of the world. What seems to be merely might is found to be also right. Any nation (limited by the conditions of physical nature) can represent the supreme spirit only in one epoch Hegel, like Dante, considers its right to rule during that epoch absolute. Four empires have played this large part — the Oriental, representing Substantiality in which individuals are lost; the Greek, in which individuality had free and artistic scope; the Roman, in which anarchy was reduced to rule but an abstract universal rule; and the German, in which universality and individuality, law and liberty, are reconciled in the modern State.
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In relation to social questions, Hegel, of all the abstract philosophers, was the most concrete, both in his ethics where the truth is represented as only attainable in society; and in his philosophy of history, where the true freedom worked out by history is represented as a reconciliation of man with the world. In economics, treated incidentally, his influence has been indirect, but of the three groups into which his followers parted, the Young Hegelians or Hegelians of the Left — headed by Karl Marx — have certainly made the most of his theory. Hegel owed much to Fichte but the convincingness of the former's logic and his impressive thoroughness have seemingly gained him more abiding fame.
Worker (Wagga, NSW), 1902 https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/145881284
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