Hegel's Development: Towards the Sunlight

HEGEL'S DEVELOPMENT

* Toward the Sunlight 1770-1801 BY

H. S. HARRIS

OXFORD AT THE CLARENDON PRESS

HEGEL'S DEVELOPMENT II

Toward the Sunlight 1770 -1801

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OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS

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The moral rights of the author have been asserted Database right Oxford University Press (maker) Reprinted 2002 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any fonn or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted by law, or under terms agreed with the appropriate reprographics rights organization. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address above You must not circulate this book in any other binding or cover and you must impose this same condition on any acquirer ISBN 0-19-8243588

TO

MAX H. FISCH

Viel hat von Morgen an, Seit ein Gesprach wir sind und horen voneinander, Erfahren der Mensch; bald sind wir aber Gesang. Dnd das Zeitbild, das der groBe Geist entfaltet, Ein Zeichen liegts vor uns, daB zwischen ihm und andern Ein BiindniB zwischen ihrn und andern Machten ist. HOLDERLIN

'I exhort myself always in the words of the Lebensliiufe: "Strive toward the sun, my friends, that the salvation of the human race may soon come to fruition! VVhat use are the hindering leaves? or the branches? Cleave through them to the sunlight, and strive till ye be weary! Tis good so, for so shall ye sleep the betted" , (HEGEL to SCHELLING, I6 April I795)

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

MOST of the first draft of this book was written in 1964-5 during a year of sabbatical leave from York University, Toronto. In that year I was awarded a Senior Fellowship by the Canada Council, together with a travel grant which enabled me to spend some time in England and to make a short visit to the Hegel-Archiv (then in Bonn, now in Bochum). In England I discussed my project with Sir Malcolm Knox and Warden G. R. G. Mure, and received valuable advice from both of them. In Bonn I was given access to typed transcripts of a handful of fragments from Hegel's Frankfurt period that have not yet been published. I was also able to consult a number of books which are not easily obtainable elsewhere; and the kind assistance of Dr. Gisela SchUler and Dr. Heinz Kimmerle enabled me to clear up several points of difficulty or uncertainty. Had it not been for the contribution that these two scholars have made to the task of ordering and dating Hegel's manuscripts in terms of the handwriting, which was begun by Hermann Nohl and carried on most notably by Franz Rosenzweig, my undertaking would have been both more difficult and more perilous than it is. In an undertaking of this kind one cannot hope to remember all that one owes to others. I have not even tried to list all the books that I had occasion to consult. But the enormous extent of my debt to previous students of Hegel's development will be apparent, I hope, from my footnotes. There are many to whom I might have owed more had I been more industrious; but I trust that my notes will make it clear that I have not approached my task lightly. In singling out for special mention here the work of three scholars on whom I have depended heavily I should like to underline the limitations of my own scholarship. No one can read everything; not even Hegel did that. But he tried conscientiously to absorb everything significant in the culture and the heritage of his own time and his own people. I cannot claim to have done that; were it not for the more heroic efforts of Carmelo Lacorte in that

x

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

direction, and the learned zeal of Johannes Hoffmeister in editing Hegel, and of Adolf Beck in editing H6lderlin's Letters, my work would be even more imperfect than it is. The making of a book from a manuscript is a process to which many people contribute in different ways. There is, to begin with, the often far from mechanical labour of the typist. My first protector against slips, errors, and oversights was Mrs. Marja B. Moens, who typed the whole of my original manuscript. She also typed most of the final draft, though Miss Beatrice M. Oliver and Miss Betty Yacoub ian also helped with this. My son David helped me make the analytical index, and Miss Lorraine Fadden typed it. The book was brought to the notice of the Clarendon Press by the sympathetic interest of Professor J. N. Findlay; and the final stages of its development were greatly influenced by the comments of the adviser to whom it was submitted by the Press. Not only did he make many valuable suggestions on points of detail, and help me to remove a number of errors and blemishes; but also his more general critical reactions alerted me to some of the dangers of false perspective that exist in a work conceived on the present scale. I have tried to obviate these dangers in my Prelude-Coda; if I have succeeded the Press adviser must have a large share of the credit.

H. S. H. Glendon College, York University Toronto Gebhard's Day, I970

CONTENTS

NOTE ON REFERENCES AND ABBREVIATIONS PRELUDE AND CODA I: STUTTGART 1770-1788: The Vocation of a Scholar I. The background of home and school 2. The Tagebuch 3. The collection of excerpts 4. The school essays 5. The gaps in the record Appendix A: Rosenkranz's description of Hegel's excerpt collection compared with the manuscripts discovered by Thaulow (and other surviving evidence) Appendix B: The chronology of Hegel's earliest manuscripts (17 85- 1788 ) II: TUBINGEN 1788-1793: The Church Visible and Invisible I. The atmosphere of the Stift 2. The philosophy course 3. The theology course 4. The theory of the €v "at 7Tav 5. The sermons 6. The function of a folk-religion III: BERNE 1793-1796: Reason and Freedom I. The background of Hegel's life in Berne 2. In search of a way forward 3. The God of Reason and his Gospel 4. The evils born of authority 5. A polemical interlude

xiii XV I

1

7 I4 30

44

47 52 57

57 72 88 96 108

II9 154 154 161 186 207 224

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CONTENTS 6. The road to Eleusis 231 Appendix: The 'earliest system-programme of German idealism' 249

IV: FRANKFURT 1797-1800: Phantasie und Herz 258 1. The 'crisis of Frankfurt' and the supposed 'revolution in Hegel's 258 thinking' 2. The spirit of Judaism 270 3. Authority and love 287 4. Faith and being 3I 0 5. Prospect and retrospect: 'the Spirit of Christianity' 322 6. Morality and love 332 7. Punishment and fate 346 8. The religion of love 355 9. The fate of love 369 10. Religion and philosophy 379 II. The 'ideal of my youth in reflective form' 399 V: FRANKFURT-JENA 1798-1802: The 'Way Back to Intervention in 409 the Life of Men' 1. The third canon of folk-religion 409 2. Hegel's first political studies 416 3. The genesis of the Verfassungsschrift 434 4. The 'Constitution of the German Empire': Part I 446 5. The 'Constitution of the German Empire': Part II 464 ApPENDIX: Texts I. The Tiibingen essay of 1793: Religion ist eine 481 2. The Berne plan of 1794: a) Unter objectiver Religion 508 3. The 'earliest system-programme of German idealism' (Berne 1796): eine Ethik 510 4. The Frankfurt sketch on 'Faith and Being' (1798): Glauben ist die Art 512 5. H