68 quotes
To comprehend what is, is the task of philosophy: and what is is Reason.
The essence of the modern state is the union of the universal with the full freedom of the particular, and with the welfare of individuals.
Elements of the Philosophy of Right (1820)
Only one word more concerning the desire to teach the world what it ought to be. For such a purpose philosophy at least always comes too late.
Elements of the Philosophy of Right (1820)
To be aware of limitations is already to be beyond them.
Inwardness and Existence (1989)
Not curiosity, not vanity, not the consideration of expediency, not duty and conscientiousness, but an unquenchable, unhappy thirst that brooks no compromise leads us to truth.
Our task does not require us to contemplate Nature as a Rational System in itself though in its own proper domain it proves itself such but simply in its relation to Spirit.
Lectures on the Philosophy of World History (1832)
For a man without the pride of being the center of things the end of his collective whole is supreme, and being, like all other individuals, so small a part of that, he despises himself.
History is not the soil of happiness. The periods of happiness are blank pages in it.
Lectures on the Philosophy of World History (1832)
The fate of the Jewish people is the fate of Macbeth who stepped out of nature itself, clung to alien beings, and so in their service had to trample and slay everything holy in human nature.
The Spirit of Christianity and its Fate (1799)
Philosophy must indeed recognize the possibility that the people rise to it, but must not lower itself to the people.
But it is rather true that the people, in so far as this term signifies a special part of the citizens, does not know what it wants.
Elements of the Philosophy of Right (1820)
The heart is everywhere, and each part of the organism is only the specialized force of the heart itself.
Encyclopedia of the Philosophical Sciences (1816)
Life has a value only when it has something valuable as its object.
Lectures on the Philosophy of World History (1832)
Discord which appears at first to be a lamentable breach and dissolution of the unity of a party, is really the crowning proof of its success.
The Phenomenology of Spirit (1807)
What is now often said, that man need not know God, and may yet have the knowledge of this relation, is false. Since God is the First, He determines the relation, and therefore in order to know what is the truth of the relation, man must know God.
Lectures on the Philosophy of World History (1832)
In the same way the wild tribes of North America too killed their aged who had reached decrepitude, the meaning of which is unmistakable, namely, that man is not to perish by means of nature, but is to have due honour rendered to him at human hands.
Volume 1 (1827)
What is reasonable is real; that which is real is reasonable.
Elements of the Philosophy of Right (1820)
The great thing however is, in the show of the temporal and the transient to recognize the substance which is immanent and the eternal which is present.
It is because the method of physics does not satisfy the comprehension that we have to go on further.
Encyclopedia of the Philosophical Sciences (1816)
It is easier to discover a deficiency in individuals, in states, and in providence, than to see their real import or value.
Lectures on the Philosophy of World History (1832)