We write down what is right in itself and make it known. Then we call it law. And right becomes positive right, the right that is valid here and now.

More than a rule:

A law does not only say: This is how you shall behave. It is first of all a piece of thinking. Whoever words a law must grasp the right in its clear, universal form. Only through this does right get its exact determination.

And customary right?

People already know their customs too. Animals have instincts, humans have customs. But customs are vaguer. Often only a few people know them. People say that customs are more alive. That is an illusion. A law does not stop being a custom of a people just because someone writes it down.

An example from England:

In England there is an “unwritten law”. But it stands in countless thick books of court judgments. In this way the judges keep making it themselves. This leads to great confusion.

A code of law:

It would be a great insult to deny a cultured people the ability to give itself a code of law. A code of law, after all, need not invent new right. It should put the existing right into a clear and ordered form.

Summary: Right becomes law when we grasp it in thought and make it known. Customary right is vaguer. A people can and should give itself a clear code of law.

§ 485. This unity of the rational will with the individual will, which is the immediate and distinctive element of the activity of the former, constitutes the simple actuality of freedom. Since it, and its content, belongs to thought and is the universal in itself, the content has its true determinacy only in the form of universality. Posited in this way for the consciousness of intelligence, with the determination of being a valid power, it is law – freed from the impurity and contingency that it has in practical feeling and in drive, and likewise no longer in that form, but, in its universality, impressed upon the subjective will, as the latter’s habit, disposition, and character, it is as custom.

§ 529. The principle of contingent particularity, developed into the system mediated by natural need and free arbitrary will, into its universal relations and a course of external necessity, has within it, as the determination of freedom that is fixed for itself, at first formal right. 1. The actualization that belongs to right in this sphere, for understanding consciousness, is that it be brought to consciousness as the fixed universal, and be known and posited in its determinacy as what is valid; – the law. The positive [element] of laws concerns, at first, only their form, in general as being valid and known, whereby the possibility is at the same time given of their being known by everyone in the ordinary external way. The content in this may in itself be rational, or also irrational and thereby wrong. But since right, comprehended as existing in determinate existence, is something developed, and its content analyzes itself in order to attain determinacy, this analysis, on account of the finitude of the material, falls into the progression of the spurious infinity; the final determinacy, which is absolutely essential and breaks off this progression of unactuality, can in this sphere of the finite only be arrived at in a way bound up with contingency and arbitrary will; whether three years, ten thalers, and so on, or only 2½, 2¾, 2⅘, and so on, years, and so forth into infinity, would be just, cannot be decided in any way through the concept, and yet it is the higher thing that a decision be made. Thus the positive enters of itself into right as contingency and arbitrariness – though of course only at the ends of the determining, on the side of external existence. This happens, and has always happened of itself in all legislations; it is only necessary to have a determinate consciousness of this, as against the supposed goal and talk, as if the law could and should be determined on all sides through reason or legal understanding, through purely rational and intelligent grounds. It is the empty opinion of perfection, to make such an expectation and demand of the sphere of the finite. Those for whom laws are even an evil and something unholy, and who hold governing and being governed by natural love, inherited divinity, or nobility, through faith and trust, to be the genuine condition, but the rule of laws to be the corrupted and unjust condition, overlook the circumstance that the heavenly bodies, and so forth, as also the cattle, are governed according to laws, and indeed governed well – laws which, however, in these objects are only inward, not for themselves, not as posited laws; but that the human being, however, is this: to know his law, and that he can therefore truly only obey such a known law, just as his law can only be a just law as a known one, but otherwise, already according to its essential content, must be contingency and arbitrary will, or at least be mixed and contaminated with these. The same empty demand for perfection is used for the opposite of the above, namely for the opinion that a code of laws is impossible or impracticable. In this a further defect of thought occurs, namely placing the essential and universal determinations in one class together with the particular detail. The finite material is determinable onward into the spurious infinite; but this progression is not, as it is represented in space, for example, a generating of spatial determinations of the same quality as the preceding ones, but rather a proceeding into ever more particular and ever more particular determinations, through the acuity of the analyzing understanding, which invents new distinctions that make new decisions necessary. If determinations of this kind likewise receive the name of new decisions or new laws, then, in proportion as this development proceeds further, the interest and the substance of these determinations diminish. They fall within the already existing substantial, universal laws, just as improvements to a floor, a door, and so forth, [fall] within the house, and are indeed something new, but are not a house. If the legislation of an uncultivated condition has begun with particular determinations, and has, in keeping with their nature, continually increased them, then, on the contrary, in the progress of this multitude, the need arises for a simpler code of laws, that is, for gathering that multitude of particulars into their universal determinations – which it befits the understanding and the culture of a people to find and to know how to express; – just as in England this casting of particulars into universal forms, which in fact alone deserve the name of laws, has recently been begun, in some respects, by Minister Peel, who has thereby won the thanks, indeed the admiration, of his countrymen.

§ 485. γ) These two moments can, on account of their one-sidedness, be called the subjective side of the objective will. Its true objectivity consists in this, that its concept, freedom, is actualized in the externally objective side, the finite material, so that this is a world determined by it, such that it is with itself therein, joined together with itself. Freedom, shaped into a world of external existence, takes on the form of necessity, whose substantial connection is constituted by the determinations of freedom, just as [it constitutes] the appearing connection, the same connection as its power, being-recognized, whereby the rational will is not only in itself, nor merely internal, nor merely immediate as the natural is, but its content is known and holds good, being as positive laws and their custom.

§ 529. In the system of the principle of contingent particularity – mediated by natural need and free arbitrary will, and raised to universal relations and a necessary course – the determination of freedom that is fixed for itself is at first only formal right. 1) The determinate being that belongs to it, for the understanding consciousness in this sphere, is that it be brought to consciousness as the fixed universal, and be known and posited in its determinacy as what is valid; – the law.

The positive [element] of laws concerns only their form in general as being valid and known, whereby the possibility is at the same time given of their being known by everyone in the ordinary external way. The content in this may in itself be rational, or also irrational, and thereby wrong. But since right, comprehended as existing in determinate existence, is something developed, and its content analyzes itself in order to attain determinacy, this analysis, on account of the finitude of the material, falls into the progression into the spurious infinite, and for this reason the final determinacy, which is absolutely essential, can only be arrived at in a contingent and arbitrary way (whether three years, ten thalers, and so on, or only 2 1/2, 2 3/4, 2 4/5, and so on, years, and so forth into infinity, would be just, cannot be decided in any way through the concept, and yet it is the higher thing that a decision be made). Thus the positive enters of itself – though of course only at the ends of the determining, on the side of external existence – as contingency and arbitrariness. This happens, and has always happened of itself in all legislations; it is only necessary to have a determinate consciousness of this, as against the supposed goal and talk, as if the law could and should be determined on all sides through reason or legal understanding, through purely rational and intelligent grounds. It is the empty opinion of perfection to make such an expectation and demand of the sphere of the finite.

Those for whom laws are even an evil and something unholy, and who hold governing and being governed by natural love, inherited divinity, or nobility, through faith and trust, to be the genuine condition, but the rule of laws to be the corrupted and unjust condition, overlook the circumstance that the heavenly bodies and so forth, as also the cattle, are governed according to laws, and indeed governed well – laws which, however, in these objects are only inward, not for themselves, not as posited laws; but that the human being, however, is this: to know his law, and that he can therefore truly only obey such a known law, just as his law can only be a true law as a known one, but otherwise must be mere contingency and arbitrary will, or at least be mixed and contaminated with these.

The same empty demand for perfection is used for the opposite of the above, for the opinion that a code of laws is impossible or impracticable. In this a further defect of thought occurs, namely placing the essential and universal determinations in one class together with the particular detail. The finite material is determinable onward into the spurious infinite; but this progression is not, as it is represented in space, for example, a generating of spatial determinations of the same quality as the preceding ones, but rather a proceeding into ever more particular and ever more particular determinations, through the acuity of the analyzing understanding, which invents new distinctions that make new decisions necessary. If such determinations likewise receive the name of new decisions or new laws, then, in proportion as this development proceeds further, the interest and the substance of these determinations diminish. They fall within the already existing substantial, universal laws, just as improvements to a floor, a door, and so forth, fall within the house, and are indeed something new, but not a house. If legislation has begun with particular determinations and has, in keeping with their nature, continually increased them, then, on the contrary, the need arises for a simpler code of laws, that is, for gathering that multitude of particulars into their universal determinations – which it befits the understanding and culture of a people to find and to know how to express; – just as in England this casting of particulars into universal forms, which in fact alone deserve the name of laws, has only recently been begun by Minister Peel, who has thereby won the thanks, indeed the admiration, of his countrymen.

§ 437. The laws express the nature and the determinations of the universal substance; first, insofar as they are immediate, they are limits on self-sufficient arbitrary will and on particular interest; but second, they are the absolute final end and the universal work, and so they are brought forth through the functions of the various estates, which individuate themselves further out of their universal particularization (§ 433), and through all the activity and private care of individuals, and are presented as valid custom.

§ 438. The abstract essence of the laws is the universal will that is in and for itself, but their actuality is living custom. But insofar as the extreme of individuality is reflected into itself partly as the immediate naturalness of the will, drive and inclination, partly toward arbitrary will in general, but also toward the moral abstraction of pure subjectivity and self-subsisting vanity, the other extreme opposed to this, namely the will that is in and for itself, is likewise determined toward individual actuality, the active subjectivity of the universal; – the government, and its personal, resolving and deciding apex, the prince.