“The auspices for philosophy are bad if, when proceeding ostensibly on the investigation of truth, we start saying farewell to all uprightness, honesty and sincerity, and are intent only on passing ourselves off for what we are not. We then assume, like those three sophists [Fichte, Schelling and Hegel], first a false pathos, then an affected and lofty earnestness, then an air of infinite superiority, in order to impose where we despair of ever being able to convince.” IfsFirstsPhilosophyAbleOrderThreeAirHonestyDespairInfiniteAssumingPassingPassingsConvinceAffectedSincerityInvestigationSuperiorityFarewellLoftyProceedingPathosEarnestnessHegelSaying FarewellUprightness Author:Arthur Schopenhauer
“To a society that inarticulately and thoughtlessly takes itself to be divine, Hegel says, Yes, we are indeed divine, and philosophy can show how this is both possible and necessary.” PhilosophyShowsDivineHegel Book:Kierkegaard's Critique of Reason and Society Source: Kierkegaard's Critique of Reason and Society
“Life is more than thought: what a man feels, and what his senses awaken in him, are more indispensable to his life's fullness than subsequent reflection on their significance. Both Stirner and Nietzsche have elaborated Faust's opening speech in which he bemoans his wasted years in academia: this speech is Goethe's own impeachment of Kant and Hegel . Philosophy proceeds always under the risk of making a fetish of thinking.” ThinkingMenFeelsYearsPhilosophyLife IsRiskSpeechReflectionSensesOpeningSignificanceIndispensableFullnessAcademiaFetishHegelImpeachmentFaust Author:John Carroll
“Contemporary philosophy illustrates Hegel's dictum that philosophy is its own time apprehended in thought, for in our age philosophy yields to the objectifying technical impulse and loses its ancient task of pursuing the Socratic ideal of the wisdom of the examined life.” PhilosophyAgeLosesIdealsTasksAncientContemporaryImpulseYieldHegelSocraticExamined LifeObjectifying Author:Donald Phillip Verene
“Hegel's philosophy is so odd that one would not have expected him to be able to get sane men to accept it, but he did. He set it out with so much obscurity that people thought it must be profound. It can quite easily be expounded lucidly in words of one syllable, but then its absurdity becomes obvious.” PeopleMenPhilosophyAbleAcceptingProfoundObviousExpectedOddSaneAbsurdityObscuritySyllablesHegel Book:Last Philosophical Testament: 1943-68 Source: Last Philosophical Testament: 1943-68
“Academic environments are generally characterised by the presence of peole who claim to understand more than in fact they do. Linguistic Philosophy has produced a great revolution, generating people who claim not to understand when in fact they do. Some achieve great virtuosity at it. Any beginner in philosophy can manage not to understand, say, Hegel, but I have heard people who were so advanced that they knew how not to understand writers of such limpid clarity as Bertrand Russell or A.J. Ayer.” PeoplePhilosophyFactsEnvironmentHeardAchieveRevolutionClaimsClarityManageAcademicBeginnersHegelVirtuosity Author:Ernest Gellner
“That Hegel is a metaphysician, and that he thinks metaphysics is fundamental to philosophy, is plain enough from his definition of philosophy.” ThinkingEnoughPhilosophyFundamentalsDefinitionsMetaphysicsHegel Author:Frederick C. Beiser
“Since substance is infinite, the universe as a whole, i.e., god, Hegel is telling us that philosophy is knowledge of the infinite, of the universe as a whole, i.e, god. You cannot get more metaphysical than that. I think that Hegel scholars have to admit this basic fact rather than burying their heads in the sand and trying to pretend that Hegel is concerned with conceptual analysis, category theory, normativity or some such contemporary fad.” ThinkingTryingPhilosophyWholeFactsUniverseTheoryConcernedInfiniteContemporarySubstanceAnalysisSandCategoriesScholarMetaphysicalFadsHegelBurying Author:Frederick C. Beiser
“The great German idealists from Kant to Hegel saw this idealism or nihilism as a reductio ad absurdum of any philosophy, and so they struggled by all conceptual means to avoid it.” MeanPhilosophySawsAdsIdealismNihilismIdealistHegel Author:Frederick C. Beiser
“The fact is that philosophy has been a decisive source of inspiration in all the great crises that Europe has faced. It has been so in the time that preceded the fall of the Roman Empire, when Augustine of Hippo delineated the features of a new spiritual civilization; in the age of religious wars, when Descartes and Hobbes established the principles of modern science and politics; and at the turn of the French Revolution, interpreted by Kant and Hegel as an event destined to change the history of the world.” WorldHas BeensWarPhilosophyFactsInspirationAgeSpiritualTurnsFallReligiousPrinciplesModernEventsSourceRevolutionCivilizationEuropeCrisisFeaturesEmpiresDestinedWorld HistoryRoman EmpireModern ScienceFrench RevolutionHegelAugustineHippoHobbesSource Of InspirationReligious Wars Author:Roberto Esposito
“Surely the world will be a better place, at least marginally, if people have a better understanding of Kant and Hegel, if Marx's thought its studied and appreciated, if people gain a better understanding of Fichte, whose philosophy is far more important than people realize.” PeopleIfsWorldImportantPhilosophyUnderstandingRealizingGainsBetter PlaceAppreciatedHegel Author:Allen W. Wood