Third Part. Ethical Life
α) The objective ethical, which takes the place of the abstract good, is the substance made concrete through subjectivity as infinite form. It therefore posits distinctions within itself, which are thereby determined through the concept and through which the ethical has a firm content, one that is necessary for itself and a subsistence elevated above subjective opinion and liking — laws and institutions that are in and for themselves.
Differences – α) legal determination of content, β) difference from self-consciousness – individual duties – nature of the matter
In the whole of ethical life both the objective and the subjective moment are present: but both are only forms of one and the same. The good is here substance, that is, the fulfillment of the objective with subjectivity. If one considers ethical life from the objective standpoint, one can say that the ethical human being is unconscious of himself. In this sense Antigone proclaims that no one knows whence the laws come: they are eternal. That is, they are the determination that is in and for itself, flowing from the nature of the matter. But no less does this substantial element also have a consciousness, although to this there always accrues only the position of a moment.
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