| |
|
|
|
[XXXII.2.]
But as this still takes place within the confines of the estrangement,
this negation of the negation is in part the restoring of these fixed
forms in their estrangement; in part a stopping at the last act--the act
of self-reference in alienation--as the true mode of being of these fixed
mental forms;*
*(This means that what Hegel does is to put in place of these fixed abstractions
the act of abstraction which revolves in its own circle. We must therefore
give him the credit for having indicated the source of all these inappropriate
concepts which originally appertained to particular philosophers; for
having brought them together; and for having created the entire compass
of abstraction as the object of criticism, instead of some specific abstractions.)
(Why Hegel separates thought from the subject we shall see later;
at this stage it is already clear, however, that when man is not, his
characteristic expression cannot be human either, and so neither could
thought be grasped as an expression of man as a human and natural subject
endowed with eyes, ears, etc., and living in society, in the world, and
in nature.)
and in part, to the extent that this abstraction apprehends itself and
experiences an infinite weariness with itself, there makes its appearance
in Hegel, in the form of the resolution to recognise nature as
the essential being and to go over to intuition, the abandonment of abstract
thought--the abandonment of thought revolving solely within the orbit
of thought, of thought sans eyes, sans teeth, sans ears, sans everything.)
[XXXIII.2.]
|
|
| |
[XXXII.1.]
The absolute idea, the abstract idea, which "considered with regard
to its unity with itself is intuiting" (Hegel, Encyclopadie,
3rd edition, p. 222 [1 244]), and which (loc. cit.) "in its own
absolute truth resolves to let the moment of its particularity
or of initial characterisation and other-being, the immediate idea,
as its reflection, go forth freely from itself as nature"
(loc. cit.).
this whole idea which behaves in such a strange and bizarre way, and which
has given the Hegelians such terrible headaches, is from beginning to
end nothing else but abstraction (i.e., the abstract thinker),
which, made wise by experience and enlightened concerning its truth, resolves
under various (false and themselves still abstract) conditions to abandon
itself and to replace its self-absorption, (nothingness), generality
and indeterminateness by its other-being, the particular, and the determinate;
resolves to let nature, which it held hidden in itself only as
an abstraction, as a thought-entity, go forth freely from itself: that
is to say, this idea resolves to forsake abstraction and to have a look
at nature free of abstraction. The abstract idea, which without
mediation becomes intuiting, is indeed nothing else but abstract
thinking that gives itself up and resolves on intuition. This entire
transition from logic to natural philosophy is nothing else but the transition--so
difficult to effect for the abstract thinker, who therefore describes
it in such a far detached way--from abstracting to intuiting.
The mystical feeling which drives the philosopher forward from
abstract thinking to intuiting is boredom - the longing for a content.
(The man estranged from himself is also the thinker estranged from his
essence--that is, from the natural and human essence. His thoughts
are therefore fixed mental forms dwelling outside nature and man. Hegel
has locked up all these fixed mental forms together in his logic, interpreting
each of them first as negation that is, as an alienation of human
thought--and then as negation of the negation--that is, as a superseding
of this alienation, as a real expression of human thought.
[XXXIII.1.]
|
|
|