On The Stage On Which We Are

The Beginning Of Religion, More Precisely Its Content, Is The Concept Of Religion Itself, That God Is The Absolute Truth, The Truth Of All Things, And Subjectively That Religion Alone Is The Absolutely True Knoweldge.

The East Knew And To The Present Day Knows Only That One Is Free; The Greek And The Roman World, That Some Are Free; The German World Knows That All Are Free. The First Political Form Therefore Which We Observe In History, Is Despotism, The Second Democracy And Aristocracy, The Third, Monarchy.

Every Philosophy Is Complete In Itself And, Like A Genuine Work Of Art, Contains The Totality. Just As The Works Of Apelles And Sophocles, If Raphael And Shakespeare Had Known Them, Should Not Have Appeared To Them As Mere Preliminary Exercises For Their Own Work, But Rather As A Kindred Force Of The Spirit, So, Too Reason Cannot Find In Its Own Earlier Forms Mere Useful Preliminary Exercises For Itself.

Rulers, Statesmen, Nations, Are Wont To Be Emphatically Commended To The Teaching Which Experience Offers In History. But What Experience And History Teach Is This - That People And Governments Never Have Learned Anything From History, Or Acted On Principles Deduced From It. Each Period Is Involved In Such Peculiar Circumstances, Exhibits A Condition Of Things So Strictly Idiosyncratic, That Its Conduct Must Be Regulated By Considerations Connected With Itself, And Itself Alone.

The Valor That Struggles Is Better Than The Weakness That Endures.