[9th Paragraph]
This way of talking reveals a bad conscience. Hegel describes it with mockery. It talks most about spirit where there is least spirit. It talks of life where its own talk is most leathery. And it has the word “people” on its lips just where it thinks most of itself.
Its surest mark is hatred of the law. Why? In the law, right becomes a clear, universal statement. It applies equally to all and says exactly what is valid. But feeling wants to stay free to do what it likes. That is why it feels the law as a dead letter and a fetter. It does not find itself in the law. For the law asks about the matter, not about its mood.
So the law becomes a mark of recognition, a Shibboleth. In the Bible, that was a password. The enemies could not say it properly, and that is how people recognized them. The law divides the false brothers and friends of the people from the true ones.
Hegel’s text: Preface, paragraph 9 →