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A General Introduction to Hegel_s system
The Origin and Significance of Hegel’s Logic: A General Introduction to Hegel’s System J.B Baillie Macmillian, New York and London 1901 Batoche Books Kitchener 1999 Contents Preface Chapter I: Introduction Chapter II: First Stage—From 1797 to 1800—Hegel’s Early Logic 22 Chapter III: Second Stage—From 1801 to 1807 45 Chapter IV: Hegel and his Contemporaries 72 Chapter V: Transition—Origin of The “Phenomenology of Mind” and of the “Logic” 85 Chapter VI: Third Stage—From 1807 to 1812–16—The Phenomenology of Mind 111 Chapter VII: The “Phenomenology” (continued)—Phenomenology and Logic 135 Chapter VIII: Origin and Nature of the Content of the Logic 150 Chapter IX: Origin and Nature of the Method of the Logic 175 Chapter X: Relation of Logic to Nature 211 Chapter XI: Retrospective—The Historical Setting of Hegel’s Logic 219 Chapter XII: Criticism 225 Preface The student of Hegel usually finds the Logic the most forbidding and impossible part of the System At the same time he is aware, not merely from Hegel’s own statements, but from the general nature of Hegel’s philosophy, that unless he can discover the clue to the tale of the categories, Hegel’s System will remain for the most part a sealed secret In his perplexity he generally abandons, after a short struggle, the effort to understand the System, and regards it either with contempt or despair according to his temperament The difficulties felt are due partly to the strangeness of the System, the absence of apparent points of contact with ordinary thought, and partly also to the fact that Hegel has made no confession regarding the path which led him to his final result Other difficulties of course remain, even when the preliminary obstacles are overcome; but they are of a different kind and hardly so paralysing to continued interest It is one thing not to understand what an author means in given context, for this difficulty arises from what we already know of the author and the context in question; it is quite another matter not to be sure what the author really intends to say in any context at all It is the aim of the present work to attempt to remove these initial difficulties more particularly in the way of understanding the Logic, but also regarding the point of view of the System generally The author has tried to show how the Science of Logic as expounded by Hegel arose in the course of the development of his System, and to state its general meaning He has thought that if the way could be indicated by which the Logic grew up in the mind of its author, much of the preliminary obscurity which hangs over it might be removed, and such philosophical value as it claims to possess might be more easily appreciated The purpose of 6/J.B.Baillie the inquiry is thus primarily historical So far as the author has deviated from this, it is mainly to bring out by critical suggestions the connexion between one period in Hegel’s development and the succeeding The concluding chapter is devoted solely to criticism, in order to refer, as shortly as the scope of the inquiry would allow, to some of the points of importance which must be taken into account in estimating Hegel’s result It does not claim in the least to be exhaustive or even, as it stands, quite sufficient; but to have done less would have left the work more incomplete than it is, and to have done more would have been to go beyond the natural limits of the inquiry, and probably of the patience of the reader The same may also be said of the Notes appended to Chapter IX, the subjects of which could not possibly be treated fully in short compass Such views as have been expressed the writer expects to develop in a further treatment of Hegel’s System, which he hopes shortly to undertake The method of exposition adopted may seem at times a little misleading The author has identified himself so much with Hegel’s point of view that, it may be objected, it is difficult to distinguish Hegel from his interpreter There is perhaps something to be said against this method Still it seems the best in the circumstances, if one is to avoid the unsympathetic attitude of the mere onlooker, or, what is quite as common in expositions of Hegel, the mere restatement of Hegel’s position in his own words But in fact the method is not so dangerous as it seems, for it will be easy to detect at what points the writer is giving his own views, and where the narrative is purely historical It ought perhaps to be mentioned that all the stages in Hegel’s development are not equally important for the understanding of the Logic The reader who is interested simply in finding how the later Logic arose may skip altogether the First Stage (Chapter II) The statement of his earliest position is of slight value in itself, and is merely retained for the sake of completeness in the historical account Hegel’s views at this time were obscure, and the obscurity is, the writer feels, not entirely removed by the statement of them which has been given But the account could hardly have been made shorter without increasing the degree of obscurity, nor longer without needlessly adding to the amount of it On the whole, this chapter will be found of interest mainly to the specialist As to the value of the Logic itself in the System it must be admitted that, so far as the interpretation of Hegel’s philosophy is concerned, the Hegel’s Logic/7 Logic is of primary importance Doubtless the truth of Idealism does not depend on the worth of the Logic, but rather conversely Still, for the appreciation of Hegel’s own position, the judgment on the Logic is the judgment on his System as it stands The other parts of his philosophy are more accessible; they are certainly more directly fruitful, and on the whole the essential value of his principle is more evident there, (e.g., in the Philosophy of Law), than in the Logic But for Hegel himself there seems little doubt that the construction of the Science of Logic is the supreme expression of Idealism Apart, however, from its place in Hegel’s System the Logic has still a unique value for the student of philosophy Indeed, it would be somewhat astonishing if such a stupendous intellectual achievement as Hegel’s Logic had merely an esoteric interest It is doubtful if there is any better or more important discipline for the student of philosophy than simply to reflect on the exact significance of the general terms which are the current coin of ordinary communication We use perpetually and without any effort of thought such terms as “something,” “reality,” “existence,” not to say “cause,” “substance,” and so on But we might be sorely put to it to say what exactly was meant by such ideas, and why we used them in certain cases and not in others Such an inquiry is not useless, for in point of fact it has somehow to be done when practical necessity calls for a precise distinction, e.g., in the legal definition of a “thing,” or the chemical conception of “substance.” And the inquiry is certainly not impossible; for it is a paradox to say we use terms perpetually and yet not know what we mean by them Indeed one would think that nothing could be easier than to determine exactly what everyday terms mean, and the thorough-going discussion of these common conceptions ought to be, as Hegel says, in a sense the easiest of all sciences It is just such an inquiry as this which is undertaken systematically in the Science of Logic And so long as it remains necessary, as it will always be important, to understand the definite significance of everyday notions, Hegel’s Logic will be indispensable; for though it is of course a system of conceptions and not a dictionary, yet the system cannot be constructed unless the fundamental conceptions at the root of common thought are first of all accurately grasped Within recent years considerable attention has been directed to the Logic Wallace’s Prolegomena and Mr M’Taggart’s Studies in the Hegelian Dialectic have each given assistance to students of the Logic; the former by an exposition of the various conceptions peculiar to the 8/J.B.Baillie System of Logic, the latter by a criticism of a special feature of it—its Method Neither of these professes to give the historical evolution of the Logic; and the same may be said of M Noël’s La Logique de Hegel, as well as of the most recent work on Hegel—that of Prof Kuno Fischer, who has just completed his exposition of Hegel’s Leben und Werke The works to which the author is directly indebted for help in the present inquiry are: Schaller, Die Philosophie unserer Zeit; Schmid, Die Entwickelungsgeschichte der Hegelschen Logik; Haym, Hegel und seine Zeit; and above all the great store-house of Hegelianism, Dr Stirling’s Secret of Hegel The chief sources used in the investigation are Hegel’s Werke, Bde i-vi, xvi and xviii, and Rosenkranz, Leben Hegel’s As various editions of the published works have appeared, and as even the volumes in the same edition have not all been published at the same time, the date of the volume referred to is given the first time the volume is quoted in the foot-notes It has been sought in this way to avoid all ambiguity in the reference In conclusion I can only very imperfectly express my indebtedness to those who have given me encouragement and help in the preparation of the work, and but for which, indeed, I should not have ventured to offer for the assistance of other students the results of such an investigation I desire more especially to acknowledge my obligations to Professor Seth Pringle-Pattison, to Dr Caird, and to Professor Adamson, for the kind suggestions and criticisms on different parts of the inquiry, which have enabled me to present the work in its present form And I shall always look back with pleasure to the hours spent in discussion with Mr J E M’Taggart of Trinity College, Cambridge, some of the fruits of which have doubtless appeared in the present volume ST ANDREWS, August 1901 Chapter I: Introduction I t will greatly facilitate the appreciation of the history of Hegel’s views on Logic if at the outset we give some indication of his attitude to the problem of philosophy as a whole, the direction from which he approached philosophy, and the primary influences which helped to determine the course of his mental development Hegel’s earliest conception of the nature of Logic has at least this in common with his latest, that Logic is no mere appendage or accident in his general system, but an integral element of it The statement, therefore, of his general Philosophical point of view will throw no inconsiderable light on his theory of Logic Hegel’s intellectual development illustrates in a very suggestive manner a peculiarity of his own system It consists in holding in succession opposite positions, along with the strenuous attempt to reconcile these opposites in such a way as to complete justice to the importance of each This, perhaps, may be taken as an indication that he possessed an unusually profound intellectual insight into the limitations inherent in the very nature of principles taken by themselves and in isolation; but more probably it was due to the natural sanity of a wellbalanced personality which instinctively recoils from over-emphasis on any one part, no matter how important, of that single and completed whole whose life it shares Hegel’s mind was continually and keenly alive to the value of the divergent aspects of the reality presented to it So much so, indeed, that a positive statement in one direction is unhesitatingly pitted against, and even “turned round” at times with bewildering facility into, its very counterpart—a modus operandi which 10/J.B.Baillie is to a large extent the source of the perplexity found in deciphering his meaning This appreciation of contrariety amongst the facts of experience is prominent at the very outset of his intellectual development, and determines it from first to last The first stage in Hegel’s career after leaving the gymnasium was devoted mainly to Theology No doubt in his case, as in that of many another Weltkind, the capricious hand of fortune had most to with deciding the course his earliest steps should take; but on this occasion fortune’s fingers turned the key of destiny at the first trial For, whatever may have been Hegel’s interest in school theology, and in spite of the fact that he ultimately abandoned the intention of directly serving the Church, it is unquestionably Hegel’s intense appreciation of the aims and objects of religion that gives the dominant tone to his whole philosophy Not only is this evident from such records as we have of his studies during the years immediately succeeding his residence at Tübingen Theological Seminary, but we shall find it impossible to understand the position he assigns to religion in his final scheme,1 and the incessant recurrence of its fundamental ideas and problems throughout his work, unless we assume this peculiarly intimate connexion in his own thought between religion and philosophy The problems of the religious consciousness of his time compelled him to seek some satisfaction for them in philosophy; and in the light of this origin of his inquiry his subsequent development must be interpreted This pronounced influence of religion on Hegel’s philosophy must not, however, be understood in any narrow sense; for with it there was inevitably associated the problem of morality The content of morality and religion is fundamentally the same Both express what in man is most concrete, most universal, and most vital to his interests, and hence both directly appealed to a mind like Hegel’s, which from the first was awake to all that was deepest and most real in human life These then must be taken together as supplying the objects with which Hegel was primarily concerned Now this native predisposition for ethico-religious inquiry put Hegel at once en rapport with the dominant spiritual movement of his time The wave of the new Humanism had at last (by 1794) broken over Germany, and carried with it everything and every one of affective significance during that epoch Not only had the new Copernican metaphysics become the passionate creed and conviction of the leading phi- ... world of passion and pain.13 For God’s exaltation above man did not affect man’s ability to know him; it was a moral and metaphysical exaltation, not an elevation beyond the range of man’s knowledge;... in it all that was characteristic of reason,—unity, and harmony of opposites Love, in fact, was the “analogue” of reason.7 “Life,” again, was treated as the supreme category by which to determine... human value of human deeds that led Hegel to learn of the past to appreciate the present And this too determined the nature of his interest in historical facts It was not their external character,