Jena Philosophy of Spirit

[p. 258]

|258| in-itself is an other than their actual one, and they have not yet externalized theirs, do not recognise the universal one, but only their singularity counts in it¹³⁸⁾ – But it is in itself, it is there, it is their in-itself; i.e. it is their external power, which compels them. – Thus all states have been founded, through the sublime power of great men – not physical strength, for many are physically stronger than one; but the great man has something in his features which the others may well call their lord; they obey him against their will, against their will his will is their will – their immediately pure will is his will – but their conscious will is something else; the great man has the former on his side, and they must, even though they do not want to – This is the advantage of the great man, to know the absolute will, to pronounce it, all gather round his banner, he is their god. – Thus Theseus founded the state of Athens, thus in the French Revolution a fearful power sustained the state, the whole in general.¹³⁹⁾ This power is not despotism, but tyranny, pure appalling domination, but it is necessary and just, in so far as it constitutes the state as this actual individual, and sustains it – This state is the simple absolute spirit, which is certain of itself, and for which nothing determinate counts but itself, – no concepts of good and bad, shameful and base, malice and fraud; it is sublime above all this, – for evil is in it reconciled with itself – In this great sense Machiavelli’s Prince is written, that in the constituting of the state in general, what is called assassination, treachery, cruelty etc. has no meaning of evil, but of what is reconciled with itself. – His writing has even been taken for irony – but what deep feeling of the misery of his fatherland, what enthusiasm of patriotism underlies his cold, considered doctrines, – he expresses in the preface and in the

138) In the margin: first uncultivated – moment of immediacy in general –

139) In the margin: After Solon Pisistratus made the laws of the former the citizens’ own.

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