Description

Philosophy arises when, not content with the facts of existence (that is, of the world), men proceed to the inquiry into their reasons, and ultimately into their unconditioned reason, i.e. their necessity or rationality. It is not however, on this account, merely the work of an individual thinker; rather, there are laid down in it the practical and theoretical convictions of mankind just as the wisdom and the experience of individuals is laid down in their maxims and principles, and that of nations in their proverbs and laws. Just as a people or a country utters its wisdom and its will through the mouth of its sages and lawgivers, so the world-spirit (i.e. collective humanity) utters its (or the world its) wisdom and its will through the philosophers. If, therefore, we substitute "world wisdom" for philosophy, "the world" here stands as at once the subjective and objective genitive. The history of philosophy can be represented rightly, i.e. in its true nature, only with the help of philosophy, sine it alone enables but to trace in the sequence of systems, not random change, but progress, i.e. necessity, and sine also it is impossible, without a consciousness of the course of the human spirit, to show what has been the course of its wisdom, and the recognition of such necessity and such consciousness.