Hegel

George Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, who lived a.d. 1770 1831, was
one of the greatest and most influential of the modern German
philosophers. His philosophy is known as that of Absolute
Idealism. It is almost impossible to state his philosophy in
popular terms, and in a limited space, so subtle and complicated
is his thought and so voluminous the expression thereof. The
following brief synopsis, therefore, must be accepted only with
the above understanding. Hegel was a Rationalist of the most
extreme type, although his expression differed from that of
the English philosophers of that school, and his conceptions
blended Rationalism with Idealism in a striking manner. He
held that reality is but a manifestation of mind, and mind a
manifestation of reality. The universe, he held, is the product of
thought, and its life and activities are those of thought nature
is petrified intelligence. History, he held, is but the record of
the process of absolute spirit toward complete self-realization.
Mind, or reason, is all there is the real is rational and the
rational is real, he said. He held that in knowing what is we
knew reason, for reason is all that is. He held that progress, in
reality, is an illusion, and that the consummation of the infinite
end consists merely in removing the illusion which makes it
seem still unaccomplished the idea makes itself that illusion
by setting up an antithesis to confront itself, and its acting
consists in getting rid of the illusion which it has created. He
also held that the motive force of the world-development was
opposition and negation everything is what it is by reason
of what it is not, and everything, therefore, both is and is not
at the same time, and can be understood only by combining
the is and the is not in a higher synthesis. But he is careful
to state, the contradictories are not annulled when combined,
but are merely conserved though when thus conserved they
are no longer contradictory. By this process of reasoning, Hegel
held that Being and Not-Being are one from a union of and
conservation of these two contradictories he obtained the idea
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of Becoming. After Hegel s death his followers divided into
opposing schools, each claiming to truly represent his thought,
although diametrically opposed to each other. To such radical
extremes was Hegelism carried by his followers that his
system fell into disfavor in Germany, although at present it is
experiencing a revival in England and America under the name
of Neo-Hegelism, and in some of the New Thought cults.
Schopenhauer
Arthur Schopenhauer, the German philosopher, who was
an active opponent, philosophically and personally, of Hegel,
lived a.d. 1788 1860. To many he is known as the apostle of
pessimism, although his general philosophy has attracted great
attention, particularly in Germany. His general philosophy is
known as Voluntarism, or the doctrine that ultimate reality is
to be conceived of as an universal will, instead of an universal
reason. He held that reality, or the universal Thing-in-Itself,
is the principle of will, which manifests itself in various
degrees and phases as physical, chemical, magnetic and vital
force in nature, its most striking phase, however, being the
Will-to-Live which manifests through all living forms, seeking
expression and objective life. The Will-to-Live, he held, is
instinctive rather than rational, and acts as blind nature in
the struggles to perpetuate life, in the struggle for existence and

the reproduction of the species. He claimed that the instinct

of self-preservation and of sexual attraction is but the urge of
the Will-to-Live seeking channels of expression. He held that
reason is merely a by-product of Will an excrescence, so to
speak and that reason cannot expect to apprehend reality, for
the latter is Will. The force of intellect, he holds, is inferior to
that of the Will, and is subordinated to the latter, eventually,
whenever, as often happens, the two come in conflict. In Will,
he claims, we view nature from the inside, while in intellect we
view her from the outside. The phenomenal world he regards as
merely presentation to the Will in fact, an illusion similar to
Western Philosophies.
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the Maya of the Hindus. Schopenhauer, in fact, was a Western
Buddhist, and his philosophy follows that latter school in many
essential details.
Schopenhauer held that the World-Spirit, which he calls
Will, does not act according to reason, but rather by caprice
instigated by a desire or lust for expression. His Will is ever
at work building up; tearing down; replacing; repairing;
changing always at work always acting always doing. It
is ever filled with intense longing to express itself into shape
and form and force ever desiring change. Finally it develops
self-consciousness and reason in man, and then turns its
gaze inward upon itself, studying its own nature through
man s philosophy and metaphysics. In man the instinctive
Will rises to reason, and for the first time is able to control its
own instinctive nature. In creating intellect the Will forges an
instrument destined to master and conquer itself.
This, briefly, is Schopenhauer s conception of the World-Spirit,
derived largely from Buddhistic sources, and destined to play
an important part in later Western thought.
von Hartmann
Edward von Hartmann (1842 1906), the German
philosopher, built largely upon Schopenhauer s foundation,
although differing from him greatly in his final conclusions.
He accepted Schopenhauer s idea of the World-Spirit, ever
at work building up and tearing down ever seeking change
in shape, form and manifestation of force but he held that
the conception of Will without rational idea was illogical and
unthinkable, just as Hegel s conception of rational idea without
Will was illogical. He thereupon, seeks to harmonize and
reconcile the two conceptions. He postulates the existence of
a World-Spirit in which Will and rational idea are combined as
the two phases, or two poles, just as the color and perfume of
the rose are complementary and essential. But he holds that
the rational idea phase of the World Spirit is unconscious, and,
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in fact, he applies the term the unconscious to his conception
of the World-Spirit. This unconscious spirit he pictures as
using its powers of ideation and Will in the work of objective
manifestation, ever at work creating new shapes and forms,
and manifesting change and variety. Like a somnambulist it
proceeds with its work, according to logical ideas, instinctively
but according to the laws of rationality. Finally the unconscious
manifests consciousness, and then self-consciousness in man,
and may even proceed to higher forms of consciousness in
higher beings yet to be evolved. But, in itself, it is unconscious
and must ever remain so, its only consciousness being obtained

through its created manifestations. Such is von Hartmann s

conception of the unconscious World-Spirit. His conception
of unconscious mind has been used, often without due credit,
but later writers and investigators of the subliminal mind; the
subjective mind; the subconscious mind; etc., in man. It is
very probable that his philosophy will be developed in greater
detail by future philosophers and workers along the lines of
psychic research.