01 - Introduction to The Philosophy of History by Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel

Dive into Hegels enlightening lectures on the philosophy of world history, crafted to ease students into his complex ideas. Hegels engaging discourse sheds light on accessible themes like world events while he intricately defines and explores the concept of Geist, or spirit. This notion reflects the evolving culture of humanity, continuously adapting to societal changes while simultaneously driving those transformations through what Hegel termed the cunning of reason. A significant focus of the text is on world history rather than confined regional narratives. Influenced by the enigmatic writings of Jakob Bhme and captivated by the thoughts of Spinoza, Kant, Rousseau, and Goethe, Hegel examined the contradictions of modern philosophy and society. He sought to interpret these tensions‚like those between knowledge and faith, freedom and authority‚as part of a comprehensive, evolving rational unity he called the absolute idea or absolute knowledge. This unity emerges through contradiction and negation, leading to an uplifting resolution that preserves these conflicts as integral phases of development. Ultimately, Hegel posits that this rational, self-conscious whole is realized through individual minds, culminating in a collective understanding of this intricate developmental process. (summary by Wikipedia and D.E. Wittkower)

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:03):
Original History. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings
are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer,
please visit LibriVox dot org. Introduction to the Philosophy of

(00:23):
History by Geyug Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, translated by J. Sibrie introduction.
The subject of this course of lectures is the philosophical
history of the world, and by this must be understood

(00:45):
not a collection of general observations respecting it, suggested by
the study of its records and proposed to be illustrated
by its facts, but universal history itself. To gain a
clear idea at the outset of the nature of our task,
it seems necessary to begin with an examination of the
other methods of treating history. The various methods may be

(01:10):
ranged under three heads. First original history, second reflective history,
and third philosophical history. One of the first kind, the

(01:30):
mention of one or two distinguished names will furnish a
definite type to this category. Belong Herodotus, Thucydides, and other
historians of the same order, whose descriptions are for the
most part limited to deeds, events, and states of society
which they had before their eyes, and whose spirit they shared.

(01:55):
They simply transferred what was passing in the world around
them to the realm of representatives intellect. An external phenomenon
is thus translated into an internal conception, in the same
way the poet operates upon the material supplied him by
his emotions, projecting it into an image for the conceptive faculty.

(02:20):
These historians did, it is true, find statements and narratives
of other men ready to hand. One person cannot be
an eye and ear witness of everything. But they make
use of such aids only as the poet does, of
that heritage of an already formed language to which he

(02:41):
owes so much, merely as an ingredient. Historiographers bind together
the fleeting elements of story and treasure them up for
immortality in the temple of Nemoseny. Legends, ballad, stories, tradition
must be excluded from such original history. These are but

(03:06):
dim and hazy forms of historical apprehension, and therefore belong
to nations whose intelligence is but half awakened. Here, on
the contrary, we have to do with people fully conscious
of what they were and what they were about. The
domain of reality actually seen or capable of being so

(03:29):
affords a very different basis in point of firmness, from
that fugitive and shadowy element in which were engendered those
legends and poetic dreams whose historical prestige vanishes as soon
as nations have attained a mature individuality. Such original historians

(03:50):
then change the events, the deeds, and the states of
society with which they are conversant into an object for
the conceptive faculty. The narratives they leave us cannot therefore
be very comprehensive in their range. Herodotus, Thucydides, Guicciardini may

(04:10):
be taken as fair samples of the class. In this respect,
what is present and living in their environment is their
proper material. The influences that have formed the writer are
identical with those which have molded the events that constitute
the matter of his history. The author's spirit and that

(04:30):
of the actions he narrates is one and the same.
He describes scenes in which he himself has been an actor,
or at any rate, an interested spectator. It is short
periods of time, individual shapes of persons and occurrences, single
unreflected traits of which he makes his picture, and his

(04:54):
aim is nothing more than the presentation to posterity of
an image of events as clear as that which he
himself possessed in virtue of personal observation or lifelike descriptions.
Reflections are none of his business, For he lives in
the spirit of his subject. He has not attained an

(05:15):
elevation above it. If, as in Caesar's case, he belongs
to the exalted rank of generals or statesmen, it is
the prosecution of his own aims that constitutes the history.
Such speeches as we find enthusidides, for example, of which

(05:37):
we can positively assert that they are not bona fide reports,
It would seem to make against our statement that a
historian of his class presents us no reflected picture. That
persons and people appear in his works in propria persona. Speeches,

(05:58):
it must be allowed, are veritable transactions in the human commonwealth,
in fact, very gravely influential transactions. It is indeed often
said such and such things are only talk by way
of demonstrating their harmlessness. That for which this excuse is

(06:20):
brought may be mere talk, and talk enjoys the important
privilege of being harmless. But addresses of peoples to peoples,
or orations directed to nations and to princes are integrant
constituents of history. Granted such orations as those of Pericles,

(06:44):
the most profoundly accomplished genuine noble statesmen, were elaborated by Thucydides.
It must yet be maintained that they were not foreign
to the character of the speaker. In the oration in question.
These men proclaim the maxims adopted by their countrymen and

(07:05):
which formed their own character. They record their views of
their political relations, and of their moral and spiritual nature,
and the principle of their designs and conduct. What the
historian puts into their mouths is no supstitious system of ideas,

(07:26):
but an uncorrupted transcript of their intellectual and moral habitudes.
Of these historians, whom we must make thoroughly our own,
with whom we must linger long if we would live
with their respective nations and enter deeply into their spirit.

(07:47):
Of these historians, to whose pages we may turn not
for the purpose of erudition merely, but with a view
to deep and genuine enjoyment, there are fewer than might
be imagined. Herodotus, the father that is the founder of history,

(08:08):
and Thucydides have been already mentioned Xenophon's Retreat of the
ten Thousand is a work equally original. Caesar's commentaries are
the simple masterpiece of a mighty spirit. Among the ancients,
these analysts were necessarily great captains and statesmen in the

(08:30):
Middle Ages, if we accept the bishops, who are placed
in the very center of the political world, the monks
monopolize this category as naive chroniclers, who were as decidedly
isolated from active life as those elder analysts had been
connected with it. In modern times, the relations are entirely altered.

(08:53):
Our culture is essentially comprehensive and immediately changes all events
into historical representations belonging to the class in question. We
have vivid, simple, clear narrations, especially of military transactions, which
might fairly take their place with those of Caesar in

(09:15):
richness of matter and fullness of detail. As regards strategic
appliances and attendant circumstances, they are even more instructive. The
French memoirs also fall under this category. In many cases
these are written by men of mark, though relating to

(09:36):
affairs of little note, they not unfrequently contain a large
proportion of anectotal matter, so that the ground they occupy
is narrow and trivial. Yet they are often veritable masterpieces
in history, as those of Cardinal Retz, which in fact
trench on a larger historical field. In Germany, such masters

(10:01):
are rare. Frederick the great Estois de Montan is an
illustrious exception. Writers of this order must occupy an elevated position.
Only from such a position is it possible to take
an extensive view of affairs, to see everything. This is

(10:22):
out of the question for him who from below merely
gets a glimpse of the great world through a miserable
cranny and original history. This recording is in the public domain.