Comments on: 153

By: Hegel (Simple)

Hegel (Simple) — Thu, 24 Sep 2026 10:54:28 +0000

§ 153: Free as a citizen

Every person has a right to freedom. Where does this right find its fulfillment? In ethical actuality. There, where he belongs to a good order.

An old answer:

A father once asked a wise man: How do I best raise my son to be a good person? The answer was: Make him the citizen of a state with good laws.

And what if we take the child out of the world?

Rousseau proposed raising a child in the country, far away from society. That did not work. We cannot cut a person off from the world. The spirit of the age gets in everywhere, even into the quietest corner.

Only as the citizen of a good state does the individual come into his right.

Summary: The right to freedom finds its fulfillment in a good ethical order. The best way to ethical life is to be the citizen of a good state. Away from the world, this does not succeed.

By: Eduard Gans (Additions)

Eduard Gans (Additions) — Wed, 29 May 1833 13:40:14 +0000

The pedagogical attempts to withdraw human beings from the general life of the present and to raise them up in the countryside (Rousseau in Émile) have been in vain, because it cannot succeed in estranging the human being from the laws of the world. Even if the education of the young must take place in solitude, one must not believe that the fragrance of the spirit-world will not eventually waft through this solitude, or that the power of the world-spirit is too weak to take possession of these remote parts. It is only in being a citizen of a good state that the individual first comes into his right.

By: Hegel (Notes)

Hegel (Notes) — Fri, 24 Jan 1823 08:10:32 +0000

there man attains his vocation – vocation of man in general: what is man supposed to be? – Particular vocation of the individual –
He is to cultivate his imagination, his thoughts, his thinking – also his will, his aesthetic capacity – son of his time – with bright throngs – remains therein –