§ 48
In a Constitution the main feature of interest is the self-development of the rational, that is, the
political condition of a people; the setting free of the successive elements of the Idea: so that the
several powers in the State manifest themselves as separate, - attain their appropriate and special
perfection, - and yet in this independent condition, work together for one object, and are held
together by it - i.e., form an organic whole. The State is thus the embodiment of rational freedom,
realising and recognising itself in an objective form. For its objectivity consists in this, - that its
successive stages are not merely ideal, but are present in an appropriate reality; and that in their
separate and several working, they are absolutely merged in that agency by which the totality - the
soul - the individual unity - is produced, and of which it is the result.
§ 49
The State is the Idea of Spirit in the external manifestation of human Will and its Freedom. It is to
the State, therefore, that change in the aspect of History indissolubly attaches itself; and the
successive phases of the Idea manifest themselves in it as distinct political principles. The
Constitutions under which World-Historical peoples have reached their culmination, are peculiar
to them; and therefore do not present a generally applicable political basis. Were it otherwise, the
differences of similar constitutions would consist only in a peculiar method of expanding and
developing that generic basis; whereas they really originate in diversity of principle. From the
comparison therefore of the political institutions of the ancient World-Historical peoples, it so
happens, that for the most recent principle of a Constitution - for the principle of our own times -
nothing (so to speak) can be learned. In science and art it is quite otherwise; e. g., the ancient
philosophy is so decidedly the basis of the modern, that it is inevitably contained in the latter, and
constitutes its basis. In this case the relation is that of a continuous development of the same
structure, whose foundation-stone, walls, and roof have remained what they were. In Art, the
Greek itself, in its original form, furnishes us the best models. But in regard to political constitution,
it is quite otherwise: here the Ancient and the Modern have not their essential principle in common.
Abstract definitions and dogmas respecting just government, - importing that intelligence and virtue
ought to bear sway - are, indeed, common to both. But nothing is so absurd as to look to Greeks,
Romans, or Orientals, for models for the political arrangements of our time. From the East may be
derived beautiful pictures of a patriarchal condition, of paternal government, and of devotion to it
on the part of peoples; from Greeks and Romans, descriptions of popular liberty. Among the latter
we find the idea of a Free Constitution admitting all the citizens to a share in deliberations and
resolves respecting the affairs and laws of the Commonwealth. In our times, too, this is its general
acceptation; only with this modification, that - since our States are so large, and there are so many
of "the Many," the latter, - direct action being impossible, - should by the indirect method of
elective substitution express their concurrence with resolves affecting the common weal; that is,
that for legislative purposes generally, the people should be represented by deputies. The
so-called Representative Constitution is that form of government with which we connect the idea
of a free constitution, and this notion has become a rooted prejudice. On this theory People and
Government are separated. But there is a perversity in this antithesis; an ill-intentioned ruse
designed to insinuate that the People are the totality of the State. Besides, the basis of this view is
the principle of isolated individuality - the absolute validity of the subjective will - a dogma which
we have already investigated. The great point is, that Freedom in its Ideal conception has not
subjective will and caprice for its principle, but the recognition of the universal will; and that the
process by which Freedom is realised is the free development of its successive stages. The
subjective will is a merely formal determination - a carte blanche - not including what it is that is
willed. Only the rational will is that universal principle which independently determines and
unfolds its own being, and develops its successive elemental phases as organic members. Of this
Gothic-cathedral architecture the ancients knew nothing.
§ 50
At an earlier stage of the discussion, we established the two elemental considerations: first, the
idea of freedom as the absolute and final aim; secondly, the means for realising it, i.e. the
subjective side of knowledge and will, with its life, movement, and activity. We then recognised
the State as the moral Whole and the Reality of Freedom, and consequently as the objective unity
of these two elements. For although we make this distinction into two aspects for our
consideration, it must be remarked that they are intimately connected; and that their connection is
involved in the idea of each when examined separately. We have, on the one hand, recognised the
Idea in the definite form of Freedom conscious of and willing itself, - having itself alone as its
object: involving at the same time, the pure and simple Idea of Reason, and likewise, that which
we have called subject - self-consciousness - Spirit actually existing in the World. If, on the other
hand, we consider Subjectivity, we find that subjective knowledge and will is Thought. But by the
very act of thoughtful cognition and volition, I will the universal object - the substance of absolute
Reason. We observe, therefore, an essential union between the objective side - the Idea, - and the
subjective side - the personality that conceives and wills it. - The objective existence of this union
is the State, which is therefore the basis and centre of the other concrete elements of the life of a
people, - of Art, of Law, of Morals, of Religion, of Science. All the activity of Spirit has only this
object - the becoming conscious of this union, i.e., of its own Freedom. Among the forms of this
conscious union Religion occupies the highest position. In it, Spirit - rising above the limitations of
temporal and secular existence - becomes conscious of the Absolute Spirit, and in this
consciousness of the self-existent Being, renounces its individual interest; it lays this aside in
Devotion - a state of mind in which it refuses to occupy itself any longer with the limited and
particular. By Sacrifice man expresses his renunciation of his property, his will, his individual
feelings. The religious concentration of the soul appears in the form of feeling; it nevertheless
passes also into reflection; a form of worship (cultus) is a result of reflection. The second form of
the union of the objective and subjective in the human spirit is Art. This advances farther into the
realm of the actual and sensuous than Religion. In its noblest walk it is occupied with representing,
not indeed, the Spirit of God, but certainly the Form of God; and in its secondary aims, that which
is divine and spiritual generally. Its office is to render visible the Divine; presenting it to the
imaginative and intuitive faculty. But the True is the object not only of conception and feeling, as in
Religion, - and of Intuition, as in Art, - but also of the thinking faculty; and this gives us the third
form of the union in question - Philosophy. This is consequently the highest, freest, and wisest
phase. Of course we are not intending to investigate these three phases here; they have only
suggested themselves in virtue of their occupying the same general ground as the object here
considered - the State.
§ 51
The general principle which manifests itself and becomes an object of consciousness in the State, -
the form under which all that the State includes is brought, is the whole of that cycle of phenomena
which constitutes the culture of a nation. But the definite substance that receives the form of
universality, and exists in that concrete reality which is the State, - is the Spirit of the People itself.
The actual State is animated by this spirit, in all its particular affairs - its Wars, Institutions, &c. But
man must also attain a conscious realisation of this his Spirit and essential nature, and of his original
identity with it. For we said that morality is the identity of the subjective or personal with the
universal will. Now the mind must give itself an express consciousness of this; and the focus of
this knowledge is Religion. Art and Science are only various aspects and forms of the same
substantial being. In considering Religion, the chief point of enquiry is whether it recognises the
True - the Idea - only in its separate, abstract form, or in its true unity; in separation - God being
represented in an abstract form as the Highest Being, Lord of Heaven and Earth, living in a remote
region far from human actualities, - or in its unity, - God, as Unity of the Universal and Individual;
the Individual itself assuming the aspect of positive and real existence in the idea of the Incarnation.
Religion is the sphere in which a nation gives itself the definition of that which it regards as the
True. A definition contains everything that belongs to the essence of an object; reducing its nature
to its simple characteristic predicate, as a mirror for every predicate, - the generic soul Pervading
all its details. The conception of God, therefore, constitutes the general basis of a people's
character.
§ 52
In this aspect, religion stands in the closest connection with the political principle. Freedom can
exist only where Individuality is recognised as having its positive and real existence in the Divine
Being. The connection may be further explained thus: - Secular existence, as merely temporal -
occupied with particular interests - is consequently only relative and unauthorised; and receives its
validity only in as far as the universal soul that pervades it - its principle - receives absolute validity;
which it cannot have unless it is recognised as the definite manifestation, the phenomenal existence
of the Divine Essence. On this account it is that the State rests on Religion. We hear this often
repeated in our times, though for the most part nothing further is meant than that individual subjects
as God-fearing men would be more disposed and ready to perform their duty; since obedience to
King and Law so naturally follows in the train of reverence for God. This reverence, indeed, since
it exalts the general over the special, may even turn upon the latter, - become fanatical, - and work
with incendiary and destructive violence against the State, its institutions, and arrangements.
Religious feeling, therefore, it is thought, should be sober - kept in a certain degree of coolness, -
that it may not storm against and bear down that which should be defended and preserved by it.
The possibility of such a catastrophe is at least latent in it.
§ 53
While, however, the correct sentiment is adopted, that the State is based on Religion, the position
thus assigned to Religion supposes the State already to exist; and that subsequently, in order to
maintain it, Religion must be brought into it - buckets and bushels as it were - and impressed upon
people's hearts. It is quite true that men must be trained to religion, but not as to something whose
existence has yet to begin. For in affirming that the State is based on Religion - that it has its roots
in it - we virtually assert that the former has proceeded from the latter; and that this derivation is
going on now and will always continue; i.e., the principles of the State must be regarded as valid in
and for themselves, which can only be in so far as they are recognised as determinate
manifestations of the Divine Nature. The form of Religion, therefore, decides that of the State and
its constitution. The latter actually originated in the particular religion adopted by the nation; so
that, in fact, the Athenian or the Roman State was possible only in connection with the specific
form of Heathenism existing among the respective peoples; just as a Catholic State has a spirit and
constitution different from that of a Protestant one.
§ 54
If that outcry - that urging and striving for the implantation of Religion in the community - were an
utterance of anguish and a call for help, as it often seems to be, expressing the danger of religion
having vanished, or being about to vanish entirely from the State, - that would be fearful indeed -
worse in fact than this outcry supposes; for it implies the belief in a resource against the evil, viz.,
the implantation and inculcation of religion; whereas religion is by no means a thing to be so
produced; its self-production (and there can be no other) lies much deeper.
§ 55
Another and opposite folly which we meet with in our time is that of pretending to invent and carry
out political constitutions independently of religion. The Catholic confession, although sharing the
Christian name with the Protestant, does not concede to the State an inherent Justice and
Morality, - a concession which in the Protestant principle is fundamental. This tearing away of the
political morality of the Constitution from its natural connection, is necessary to the genius of that
religion, inasmuch as it does not recognise Justice and Morality as independent and substantial.
But thus excluded from intrinsic worth, - torn away from their last refuge - the sanctuary of
conscience - the calm retreat where religion has its abode, - the principles and institutions of
political legislation are destitute of a real centre, to the same decree as they are compelled to
remain abstract and indefinite.
§ 56
Summing up what has been said of the State, we find that we have been led to call its vital
principle, as actuating the individuals who compose it, - Morality. The State, its laws, its
