The following extracts on the French revolution
are taken from Hegel's
The Philosophy of
History.
The extracts are from the 1956 Dover edition of Hegel's The
Philosophy of
History, part 4, section 2, chapter 3: "The Eclairissement
and
Revolution".
A discussion of
them will be found in
Reason and Revolution by Herbert
Marcuse.
The consciousness of the spiritual is now the essential basis
of the
political fabric, and philosophy has thereby become dominant.
It has been
said, that the French revolution resulted from philosophy, and
it is not
without reason that philosophy has been called
"weltweisheit" (world
wisdom); for it is not only truth in and for itself, as the
pure
essence of
things, but also truth in its living form as exhibited in the
affairs of
the world.
We should not, therefore, contradict the assertion that the
revolution received its first impulse from philosophy. But
this philosophy
is in the first instance only abstract thought, not the
concrete
comprehension of absolute truth - intellectual positions
between which
there is an immmeasurable chasm.
The principle of the freedom of the will, therefore, asserted
itself
against existing right. Before the French revolution, it must
be allowed,
the power of the grandees had been disminished by Richelieu,
and they had
been deprived of privileges; but, like the clergy, they
retained all the
prerogatives which gave them an advantage over the lower
class. The
political condition of France at that time presents nothing
but a confused
mass of privileges altogether contravening thought and reason
- an utterly
irrational state of things, and one with which the greatest
corruption of
morals, of spirit was associated - an empire characterized by
destitution
of right, and which, when its real state begins to be
recognized, becomes
shameless destitution of right. The fearfully heavy burdens
that pressed
upon the people, the embarrassment of the government to
procure for the
court the means of supporting luxury and extravagance, gave
the first
impulse to discontent. The new spirit began to agitate men's
minds:
oppression drove men to investigation. It was perceived that
the sums
extorted from the people were not expended in furthering the
objects of the
State, but were lavished in the most unreasonable fashion.
The entire
political system appeared one mass of injustice. The change
was
necessarily violent, because the work of transformation was
not undertaken
by the government. And the reason why the government did not
undertake it
was that the court, the clergy, the nobility, the parliaments
themselves,
were unwilling to surrender the privileges they possessed,
either for the
sake of expediency or that of abstract right; moreover,
because the
government as the concrete centre of the power of the State,
could not
adopt as its principle abstract individual wills, and
reconstruct the State
on this basis; lastly, because it was Catholic, and therefore
the idea of
freedom - reason embodied in laws - did not pass for the final
absolute
obligation, since the holy and the religious conscience are
separated from
them. The conception, the idea of right asserted its
authority all at
once, and the old framework of injustice could offer no
resistance to its
onslaught. A constitution, therefore, was established in
harmony with the
conception of right, and on this foundation all future
legislation was to
be based. Never since the sun had stood in the firmament and
the planets
revolved around him had it been perceived that man's existence
centres in
his head, i.e. in thought, inspired by which he builds up the
world of
reality...not until now had man advanced to the recognition of
the
principle that thought ought to govern spiritual reality.
This was
accordingly a glorious mental dawn. All thinking being shared
in the
jubilation of this epoch. Emotions of a lofty character
stirred men's minds
at that time; a spiritual enthusiasm thrilled through the
world, as if the
reconciliation between the divine and the secular was now
first
accomplished.
Napoleon
Hegel was a professor at Jena when, in October 1806, Napoleon
won the
battle of Jena against the Prussians. About this time, Hegel
wrote to a
friend:
I saw Napoleon, the soul of the world, riding through the
town...It is a wonderful sight to see, concentrated in a
point, sitting on
a horse, an individual who over-runs the world and masters it.
In The
Philosophy of History he has this to say about the extension
of the French
revolution by conquest:
We have now to consider the French revolution in its organic
connection
with the history of the world; for in its substantial import
that event is
world-historial... As regards outward diffusion its principle
gained access
to almost all modern states, either through conquest or by
express
introduction into their political life. Particularly all the
Romanic
nations, and the Roman Catholic world in special - France,
Italy, Spain -
were subjected to the dominion of liberalism. But it became
bankrupt
everywhere; first, the grand firm in France, then its branches
in Spain and
Italy; twice, in fact, in the states into which it had been
introduced.
This was the case in Spain, where it was first brought in by
the Napoleonic
constitution, then by that which the Cortes adopted - in
Piedmont, first
when it was incorporated with the French empire, and a second
time as the
result of internal insurrection; so in Rome and in Naples it
was twice set
up. Thus liberalism as an abstraction, emanating from France,
traversed
the Roman world; but religious slavery held that world in the
fetters of
political servitude. For it is a false principle that the
fetters which
bind right and freedom can be broken without the emancipation
of conscience
- that there can be a revolution without a reformation. These
countries,
therefore, sank back into their old condition - in Italy with
some
modifications of the outward political condition. Venice and
Genoa, those
ancient aristocracies, which could at least boast of
legitimacy, vanished
as rotten despotisms. Material superiority in power can
achieve no enduring
results: Napoleon could not coerce Spain into freedom any
more than Philip
2nd could force Holland into slavery