Commentary

Hegel’s Preface to the Philosophy of Right strikes some interesting notes in its attempt to make ethics a function purely of reason.  Since morality, in general, is a concept that is strongly associated with religion and spirituality (which, it seems to me at least, are on some level immaterial and non-rational), it is somewhat peculiar to see it presented in Hegel’s manner.

Hegel’s premise, that “reason…actualizes itself in the element of self-consciousness” through the function and action of the state, leads the way to his explicit notion that through each individuals’ manifestation of reason, the individual will reach the ethical conclusions of the state (257).   In the Preface, Hegel blames the variance of individual belief on man’s misconception that to have “free thought” is to have deviant thought.  This is the notion, he says, that leads to doubt and the belief in the subjectivity of the state’s laws.  His response begs the question, however, “what is it that accounts for the plurality of ideas among individuals, even those who pursue philosophical (thus, rational) inquiry?”

Hegel states, “as the thinking spirit is not satisfied with possessing the truth in this simple way, it must conceive it, and thus acquire a rational form for a content which is already rational implicitly” (256).  He grants that the individuals’ independent study of philosophy will result in an objective theory of ethics that could not be reached without such study.  As a purely pragmatic culmination of reason, thus ethics, perhaps Hegel is implying, not that a person will blindly come to the ethical conclusion of the state, but rather that a person will come to the conclusion that the state has the collective individual’s best interest at heart.  It is in this way that, “it must be on its guard against constructing a state as it ought to be. Philosophy cannot teach the state what it should be, but only how it, the ethical universe, is to be known” (263).

Moreover, the answer to my question is perhaps found in Hegel’s statement regarding the thoroughness of philosophical inquiry.  “A half philosophy leads away from God,” he says, “while a true philosophy leads to God… This saying is applicable to the science of the state. Reason cannot content itself with a mere approximation” (261).  Hegel would reconcile the variation of ideas among citizens of the state by asserting that for some (namely, those who are in conflict with the ideals of the state), philosophical inquiry has not been pursued intensively enough to understand the true nature of the ethical universe.