[5th Paragraph]
The truth about right, ethical life, and the state is not new. It is old. And it is known: you find it in the laws, in public morality, and in religion.
What more does philosophy want, then? It wants to comprehend this truth. The content is already rational. Now it should also get a rational form.
Why? Because a thinking person is not content simply to take something over. Not because the state orders it, nor because all agree, nor because his feeling says so. He wants to see it for himself. Deep inside, he wants to know that he is one with the truth.
Hegel’s text: Preface, paragraph 5 →