Hegel And The Mirror I
Hegel’s Three Types of History
This article is the start of a new series originally published on Substack at this address: https://collwyn.substack.com/p/hegel-and-the-mirror-i
Synopsis of the new series.
This new series will focus on Hegel’s philosophy of history, based on the German original, and its relevance in today’s world.
Outline of the new series.
(1) The first parts will focus on exposing and restituting Hegel’s understanding of history, by exposing all his key concepts and their respective connections. I am also intending to take Hegel at his word: this is indispensable as many recensions and appropriations of Hegel (materialistic, atheistic or even decolonial) have, in my view, muddled his thinking and intentions somewhat; I will offer these expositions in a bite-sized manner, so the reader has time to integrate Hegel’s successive concepts, which are all interlinked.
(2) The middle parts will engage with selected critics from the recent secondary literature, shedding light on Hegel’s contemporary relevance in the wider intellectual debates.
(3) A personal reflection in the final part will be provided, essentially asking if Hegel’s systematic approach of history has survived the historical developments of the last two hundred years following his passing.
Method.
This work relies on the German original at the latest Suhrkamp edition (see details in bibliography) and the verbatim notes will be provided. Translations into English for the most important quotes are mine, although standard academic ones are widely available in the English-speaking world for further reference. Charts and graphs will be included to facilitate the understanding and visualization of Hegel’s concepts (see summary chart at the bottom of this part I).
Introduction.
This first article provides the frame for Hegel’s historical thinking, namely what he calls the three types of history, i.e. the three ways of thinking about history.
Hegel essentially distinguishes between original (narrative), reflective and philosophical history.
This will serve as a first foundation to the series.
I. The first type of history: the original one (ursprünglich).
A. The original historians: who they were.
Hegel thinks here of the original or earliest known historians, like Herodotus or Thucydides1, whom we have come to call classics in our days, as well as subsequent pre-modern continuators such as monk chroniclers in medieval times or early modern historians like Guicciardini2, Frederick the Great3 or the Cardinal de Retz4.
B. Historical material and approach.
The original historians essentially described the world they lived in, including events, personalities and mores. This historical writing was characterized by its relative immediacy:
(1) A limited historical spectrum: ancient writers mostly made contemporary accounts of the world they lived in, bar a few historical asides. Original historians evolved in and wrote within a relatively limited space-time horizon: “These are short time spans, individual portrayals of men and events.”5 The material original historians worked on was, essentially, their immediate environment: “what is contemporary and alive in their environment is what their historical material is about.”6
(2) A personal view: ancient historians talked about which they themselves lived through, or what had been directly reported to them. The personalist dimension could not be overstated. This pertains to the function these historians often fulfilled in their times: men of state or senior military officers (Caesar, Xenophon etc.).7 In other words, most original historians were the actors as much as the story-tellers.
Hegel makes a qualified exception for the more recent historians, such as Frederick the Great and the Cardinal de Retz, noting their horizons were broader8, however such histories are still classified by Hegel as original, as the writers took parts in the related events.
C. Implication for original history: a lack of reflexivity.
While Hegel is fully aware of the historiographical relevance of such original narratives and their deserving praise9 , Hegel swiftly points out their limitations.
The most important implication for Hegel is the lack of reflexivity of this type of historical writing. While the study of such authors can be useful to restitute the then experienced reality, such accounts are not reflective history per se, only descriptive, and, therefore, of limited wider relevance for a more objective, wider-ranging historical understanding.10
In Hegelian parlance, these historians live in the thick of things (im Geist der Sache11) and have not elevated their gaze to a more reflective (i.e., distance-taking) standpoint. In other words, there is no distinction between the spirit which inspires the historian and the spirit of the events themselves.12
II. The second type of history: reflective history.
“In this respect, nothing is more vapid than the oft-repeated appeal to Greek and Roman examples, as happened so often with the French during the Revolution.”13
A. Primer.
Reflective history is very different, because its content is not merged within the contemporary immediacy, but rather reflects the perspective of the historian writing about it: there is a distance between the historian (subject) and history (object), and, as a result, the spirit which informs such historical writing transcends the spirit of the time which is being written about.14
Hegel distinguishes the following sub-types of reflective history.
B. General or wide-ranging history (allgemeine Geschichte).
These are the histories of an entire people or of the world, as related, for example, by Livy for Rome.15 The distinction with original historians is that the historical narrative is informed by the perspective of the historian, including his own judgment, or even spirit, per Hegel’s16.
Such histories require a higher level of abstraction, being temporally and psychologically detached from what they describe. In other words, events as described are not given per se, but integrated within a wider narrative, which, in turn, reflects the idiosyncratic perspective of its historian.
Hegel judged that, in his times, French and English general historians tended to have a more established method than their German counterparts: while all were perspectivists, the French and English relied more on a collective method drawn from their national culture, while German general historians were more idiosyncratic in their approach, leading to a great variety of perspectives.17
Another salient point about general history is its frequent transposition of past events and people to fit contemporary mores or thinking: Hegel notes Livy’s recension of the discourses of the old kings of Rome would better befit an advocate of Livy’s era than the tone that would have been used back then, as preserved in the ancient texts themselves.18 Hegel seems to perceive a risk of inadequacy or dissonance in terms of historical authenticity with this type of writing. While not automatic in itself, the fact the historian of today brings his own spirit into past events necessarily bears some risk of anachronisms, a historiographical issue well known by contemporary historians.
The last consideration about broad or general history is standing at odds with the original one in the following respect, too: because it is so wide-ranging, some major events, such as large battles, can at times be reduced to a short, almost clinical description, as opposed to the richer tapestry provided by the original historians who lived through such events.19
C. Pragmatic history.
The second sub-type of reflective history identified by Hegel is the pragmatic one. Such histories are assessing historical events within the perspective of what they can tell us today, in what one could call a moral transposition.
While such histories vary widely in quality20, the main point for Hegel is that such histories serve an edificatory purpose21, for instance the education of children22 when looking for moral models or some reflection on historical and personal dilemmas.
However, Hegel is overall fundamentally skeptical about the relevance of such history, for three reasons:
(i) For Hegel, history does not repeat itself. This is because each historical period presents such an absolutely unique (and non-repeated) set of circumstances (eigentümliche Umstände), which makes drawing lessons from it at best illusory. This conviction is rooted in Hegel’s conception of the very texture of history and reality, which we will expose in subsequent articles.
(ii) Hegel also contends that people have never drawn lessons from the past, and, when they have considered them, have never acted upon it.23
(iii) In addition, and in my view logically resulting from both (i) and (ii) above, Hegel notes that the present is always pressuring men, who are thrown amidst the crush of world events (Im Gedränge der Weltbegebenheiten), which resists any attempt at being wielded with historical-reflective tools (my translation): “Every epoch has such unique circumstances, is such an idiosyncratic state of things, that everything must be decided in and from it, and can only be decided that way. In the crush of world events, a general conception does not help, nor the recalling of similar events [in the past], because a pale memory is powerless against the liveliness and the freedom of the present day”.24
The latter is a very important consideration if one is to understand Hegel’s understanding of history: nothing resists the reality of the present, i.e. its “unpredictability” (to be fleshed out in subsequent articles).
Accordingly, echoing the quote at the beginning of this section, Hegel is severely critical of contemporaries trying to draw relevant models and inspiration for action from say, the ancient Greeks or the ancient Romans, as many French revolutionaries were then prone to do (my translation): “from this perspective, there is nothing more vapid than the oft-repeated appeal to Greek and Roman examples, as happened so often with the French during the Revolution.”
D. Critical history.
This one one might nowadays call meta-history, what Hegel calls a history of history. It is essentially the historical discipline which consists in evaluating the different types of history and their scientific relevance (my translation): “This is not history itself, which would be presented as such, only a history of history and a judgment of the historical narratives and an investigation regarding their truth and credibility.”25 Hegel is referring to the then nascent historiographical science in France then Germany, among others.
The success of such historical writing depends on the perspicacity or precision (Scharfsinn) of the author, and Hegel notes that, in his times, French historians had made good inroads in the field26, albeit not applying these teachings to history per se but in larger critical treatises, while the contemporary German historiography focused on philology.
Hegel is rather severe about it, noting that philological claims have often given rise to excessively bold claims reposing on thing ground and against well established historical realities.27 Hegel seems to take aim at a form of intellectualism of his times, and particularly the latter’s lack of anchoring in empirical reality, an important point of Hegel’s wider critique to which we will come back later.
E. Conceptual history.
The fourth sub-type of reflective history is conceptual history (Begriffsgeschichte, verbatim in the Vorlesungen28, not to be confused with Reinhart Koselleck’s later concept of the same name) which, while abstracting (abstrahierend), adopts a general point of view — by way of an history of art, or of law, or of religion — and therefore offers the bridge towards the third main type of historical thinking, the philosophical one (see just below).29
Note that Hegel says that while conceptual history is abstract, it is getting closer to philosophical history because of its adoption of a “general” standpoint (i.e. thinking history in categories such as art, law etc.), hinting at Hegel’s distinction between philosophy and pure abstraction, a point I will return to later.
The above rapprochement — or bridge, per Hegel’s — of conceptual history to philosophical history per se, gets stronger when conceptual history adopts a more truthful (wahrhaft) point of view, i.e. when this point of view is not anymore a distant observation of facts, but identifies with the very soul (Seele) which informs such categories (art, law, etc.).30
III. The third type of history: the philosophical one.
This, in other words, is the philosophy of history per se, which Hegel is working to establish.
A. The paradox of philosophical history: history as reasonable.
Hegel first disambiguates what distinguishes the philosophy of history from the other types of history. And this distinction is highly paradoxical: while traditional history looks to stick as closely to the factuality of events as possible, thereby gaining in historical quality, the philosophy of history stands in apparent contradiction to this (and this requires a justification against the suspicion of excessive speculation)31 .
The reason for the above is that philosophy does not stop at the seemingly erratic unfolding of peoples, wars, events, kingdoms and so on, but ponders on the rational character of its evolution, and this conviction is borne by the fundamental philosophical premise that Reason governs the world, and that, in turn, world history is reasonable as a result.32
But while reason can be a presupposition for historical science, it needs to be demonstrated by philosophy.33 Hegel views reason as an all-encompassing whole, which he sums up into substance, infinite power and infinite content (the latter understood as raw material for use) in addition to the activity (Betätigung) of this content:
- Substance (Substanz) is through and in which all reality has its own being and existence;34
- Infinite power (unendliche Macht): because reason is not limited to the realm of ideas or the “ought” of the world, or only existing in the minds of a few individuals (Hegelian great men, a point which will be exposed in subsequent articles);35
- Infinite content (unendlicher Inhalt): the material it is and which it processes in the meantime.36
This Hegelian conception of reason is complex and somewhat counterintuitive and requires clarification if one is tounderstand Hegel’s broader philosophical-historical framework.
B. Reason as real, not abstraction.
For Hegel, reason is everything but an abstraction.
Reason should not be understood as or limited to a lifeless concept, for its very content includes the Real (including physical matter). Hegel illustrates this, among others, with physical laws which govern the world in a rational way37 while directly participating and ordering it.
The other fundamental point of Hegel’s understanding of reason is that it literally works itself out, i.e. acts upon itself. This is why reason is not a Platonic type of concept, in abstracto, but the reality, and a reality in action (my translation): “It [reason] lives off itself, but is itself also the material which it processes.”38
Reason, for Hegel, must therefore be understood as form, content and action.
The role of reason in history illustrates this. Reason, in history, is the activity and the appearance or production (Hervorbringung, that is more literally to bring to the front, to appear, to break forth) from the interiority into a world historical appearance.39 But this “appearance” (one might think of it as a phenomenon or event) does not only happen in the physical universe (des natürlichen Universums) but also the spiritual one.
There is therefore with Hegel a complex movement of Reason unfolding: reason is working through the material of history and through itself, and appears or emerges into a visible, “physical” form but also a spiritual one. And, consequently, this is why history appears in retrospect as a most rational form.40
As a short aside, Hegel notes that the Ancient Greeks (Anaxagoras) had first affirmed the possibility of a rational universe and rational history from their empirical observations such as astronomical regularities. The key difference with Hegel though is that the organizing principle (which the Greeks called the νοῦς, intellect) resides at the center, while Anaxogaras left the ultimate causes the remit of material elements, not the intellect itself, to Socrates’s great disappointment.41 In other words, Anaxagoras left the intellect as abstract principle, rather than seeing nature as self-development informed by the workings of reason.42
C. The task of the philosophy of history.
Once Hegel’s premises are accepted, i.e. that reason governs the world and that world history is reasonable, it falls to the philosopher of history to uncover its mechanisms and actualization.
And to do this, Hegel is adamant that one needs to take history as it is, for the rationality of history cannot be assumed. Methodologically, this means to root philosophical-historical thinking in empirical analysis, and secondly, to avoid the traditional historian trap, that of aprioristic fabrication (a priori Erdichtung).43 Rather, the philosopher must approach historical truthfully.44 Hegel believes that even well-intended historians can still err, because they bring their own categories into historical thinking45, while the philosopher avoids this pitfall: for, according to Hegel, for the one who sees the world and history as reasonable, is in return seen rationally by it, in a movement of reciprocal determination (Wechselbestimmung).46 Hegel to conclude on this task (my translation): “What we have to do seriously, consists in recognizing the ways of providence, the instruments and phenomena of history, and relate them to an overarching principle.”47
IV. Conclusion and bridge to part II: a leap of faith?
As should be clear from the above, Hegel’s main concern resides with the philosophy of history: making philosophical sense of history requires a different or radically newer form of understanding and perspective, harnessing reason to elucidate the paths of history.
Hegel’s most notable contribution is a definition of the philosophy of history, by clarifying its premises, principles, mechanisms and how it distinguishes itself from historical thinking per se, and, more generally, the different perspectives one can take on a discipline, hereby history.
The above presentation, particularly the section on the philosophy of history, may leave the attentive reader with a remaining doubt: is Hegel’s core affirmation, that the world is governed by reason, fully convincing? And why would reason be what Hegel says it is, and, even assuming so, why, in the end, should history assumed to be so reasonable?
This question bridges to the next article (part II), where we will tackle Hegel’s philosophical keystone and overarching premise: the existence of God as ultimate principle and end.
© 2026 Collwyn Redslob. All rights reserved.
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Appendix — Hegel’s summary table about historical types
Bibliography
Hegel, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich. Vorlesungen über die Philosophie der Geschichte. Werke in 20 Bänden, Band 12. Edited by Eva Moldenhauer and Karl Markus Michel. 14th ed. Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp Verlag, 2021.
Vorlesungen Uber die Philosophie der Geschichte, Suhrkamp Verlag. Frankfurt Am Main. 14, Auflage, 2021. p. 11: “Was die erste [Geschichte] betrifft, so meine ich dabei, um durch Nennung von Namen sogleich ein bestimmtes Bild zu geben, z. B. Herodot, Thukydides und andere ähnliche Geschichtschreiber,…”
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VPG p.12: “man betrachte Herodot, Thukydides, Guicciardini)”
VPG p.14: “Friedrich der Große (histoire de mon temps) macht hiervon eine rühmliche Ausnahme.”
VPG 14: “aber oft sind es auch wahre historische Meisterwerke, wie die des Kardinals von Retz;”
VPG, p.12: “Es sind kurze Zeiträume, individuelle Gestaltungen von Menschen und Begebenheiten.”
VPG, p.12: “was gegenwärtig und lebendig in ihrer Umgebung ist, ist ihr wesentlicher Stoff…”
VPG, p.13: “Im Altertum waren diese Geschichtschreiber notwendig große Kapitäne und Staatsmänner;”
VPG, p.14: “diese zeigen ein größeres geschichtliches Feld”
VPG., p.14: “Hoch gestellt müssen eigentlich solche Männer sein.”
VPG, p.12: “Der Inhalt solcher Geschichten kann daher nicht von großem äußeren Umfange sein.”
VPG, p.12: “Er hat es nicht mit Reflexionen zu tun, denn er lebt im Geiste der Sache und ist noch nicht über sie hinaus.”
VPG, p.12: “der Geist des Verfassers und der Geist der Handlungen, von denen er erzählt, ist einer und derselbe.”
VPG, p.17: “Nichts ist in dieser Rücksicht schaler als die oft wiederkehrende Berufung auf griechische und römische Beispiele, wie diese in der Revolutionszeit bei den Franzosen so häufig vorgekommen ist.”
VPG, p.14: “Es ist die Geschichte, deren Darstellung, nicht in Beziehung auf die Zeit, sondern rücksichtlich des Geistes über die Gegenwart hinaus ist.”
VPG, p.14:“Man verlangt überhaupt die Übersicht der ganzen Geschichte eines Volkes oder eines Landes oder der Welt, kurz das, was wir allgemeine Geschichte schreiben nennen.”
VPG, p.14: “Hierbei ist die Verarbeitung des historischen Stoffes die Hauptsache, an den der Arbeiter mit seinem Geiste kommt, der verschieden ist von dem Geiste des Inhalts.”
VPG, pp.14–15: “Bei uns Deutschen ist die Reflexion und Gescheitheit dabei sehr mannigfach, jeder Geschichtschreiber hat hier seine eigne Art und Weise besonders sich in den Kopf gesetzt. Die Engländer und Franzosen wissen im allgemeinen, wie man Geschichte schreiben müsse, sie stehen mehr auf der Stufe allgemeiner und nationeller Bildung;”
VPG, p.15: “und der Geist, der aus dem Schriftsteller spricht, ist ein andrer als der Geist dieser Zeiten. So läßt Livius die alten Könige Roms, die Konsuln und Heerführer Reden halten, wie sie nur einem gewandten Advokaten der 4 Livianischen Zeit zukommen, und welche wieder aufs stärkste mit echten aus dem Altertum erhaltenen Sagen, z. B. der Fabel des Menenius Agrippa, kontrastieren.”
VPG, p.16: “Wenn Livius von den Kriegen mit den Volskern erzählt, so sagt er bisweilen kurz genug: Dieses Jahr ist mit den Volskern Krieg geführt worden.”
VPG, p.17: “Ob nun solche Reflexionen wirklich interessant und belebend seien, das kommt auf den eignen Geist des Schriftstellers an.”
VPG, p.17: “Es ist hier auch besonders der moralischen Reflexionen Erwähnung zu tun und der durch die Geschichte zu gewinnenden moralischen Belehrung, auf welche hin dieselbe oft bearbeitet wurde.”
VPG, p.17: “Wenn auch zu sagen ist, daß Beispiele des Guten das Gemüt erheben und beim moralischen Unterricht der Kinder, um ihnen das Vortreffliche eindringlich zu machen…”
VPG, p.17: “Was die Erfahrung aber und die Geschichte lehren, ist dieses, daß Völker und Regierungen niemals etwas aus der Geschichte gelernt und nach Lehren, die aus derselben zu ziehen gewesen wären, gehandelt haben.”
VPG, p.17: “Jede Zeit hat so eigentümliche Umstände, ist ein so individueller Zustand, daß in ihm aus ihm selbst entschieden werden muß und allein entschieden werden kann. Im Gedränge der Weltbegebenheiten hilft nicht ein allgemeiner Grundsatz, nicht das Erinnern an ähnliche Verhältnisse, denn so etwas, wie eine fahle Erinnerung, hat keine Kraft gegen die Lebendigkeit und Freiheit der Gegenwart.”
VPG, p.18: “Es ist nicht die Geschichte selbst, welche hier vorgetragen wird, sondern eine Geschichte der Geschichte und eine Beurteilung der geschichtlichen Erzählungen und Untersuchung ihrer Wahrheit und Glaubwürdigkeit.”
VPG, p.18: “Die Franzosen haben hierin viel Gründliches und Besonnenes geliefert.”
VPG, pp.18–9: “Diese höhere Kritik hat dann die Berechtigung abgeben sollen, allen möglichen unhistorischen Ausgeburten einer eitlen Einbildungskraft Eingang zu verschaffen. Dies ist die andre Weise, Gegenwart in der Geschichte zu gewinnen, indem man subjektive Einfälle an die Stelle geschichtlicher Daten setzt, — Einfälle, die für um so vortrefflicher gelten, je kühner sie sind, das ist, auf je dürftigeren Umständchen sie beruhen und je mehr sie dem Entschiedensten in der Geschichte widersprechen. –
VPG, p.19: “In unserer Zeit ist diese Weise der Begriffsgeschichte mehr ausgebildet und hervorgehoben worden.”
VPG, p.19: “Sie ist zwar abstrahierend, bildet aber, weil sie allgemeine Gesichtspunkte (z. B. die Geschichte der Kunst, des Rechts, der Religion) nimmt, einen Übergang zur philosophischen Weltgeschichte.”
VPG, p.19: “Wenn nun die reflektierende Geschichte dazu gekommen ist, allgemeine Gesichtspunkte zu verfolgen, so ist zu bemerken, daß, wenn solche Gesichtspunkte wahrhafter Natur sind, sie nicht bloß der äußere Faden, eine äußere Ordnung, sondern die innere leitende Seele der Begebenheiten und Taten selbst sind.”
VPG, p.20: “Da die Geschichte nun aber bloß aufzufassen hat, was ist und gewesen ist, die Begebenheiten und Taten, und um so wahrer bleibt, je mehr sie sich an das Gegebene hält, so scheint mit diesem Treiben das Geschäft der Philosophie in Widerspruch zu stehen, und dieser Widerspruch und…”
VPG, p.20: “Der einzige Gedanke, den die Philosophie mitbringt, ist aber der einfache Gedanke der Vernunft, daß die Vernunft die Welt beherrsche, daß es also auch in der Weltgeschichte vernünftig zugegangen sei.”
VPG, p.20: “Diese Überzeugung und Einsicht ist eine Voraussetzung in Ansehung der Geschichte als solcher überhaupt; in der Philosophie selbst ist dies keine Voraussetzung. Durch die spekulative Erkenntnis in ihr wird es erwiesen…”
VPG, p.21: “Die Substanz ist sie, nämlich das, wodurch und worin alle Wirklichkeit ihr Sein und Bestehen hat”
VPG, p.21: “die unendliche Macht, indem die Vernunft nicht so ohnmächtig ist, es nur bis zum Ideal, bis zum Sollen zu bringen und nur außerhalb der Wirklichkeit, wer weiß wo, als etwas Besonderes in den Köpfen einiger Menschen vorhanden zu sein;”
VPG, p. 21: “der unendliche Inhalt, alle Wesenheit und Wahrheit, und ihr selbst ihr Stoff, den sie ihrer Tätigkeit zu verarbeiten gibt,”
VPG, p.23: “Die Bewegung des Sonnensystems erfolgt nach unveränderlichen Gesetzen: diese Gesetze sind die Vernunft desselben,”
VPG, p.21: “sie zehrt aus sich und ist sich selbst das Material, das sie verarbeitet;”
VPG, p.21: “so ist sie selbst dessen Betätigung und Hervorbringung aus dem Inneren in die Erscheinung, nicht nur des natürlichen Universums, sondern auch des geistigen, — in der Weltgeschichte.”
VPG, p.22: “Es hat sich also erst aus der Betrachtung der Weltgeschichte selbst zu ergeben, daß es vernünftig in ihr zugegangen sei, daß sie der vernünftige, notwendige Gang des Weltgeistes gewesen, des Geistes, dessen Natur zwar immer eine und dieselbe ist, der aber in dem Weltdasein diese seine eine Natur expliziert.”
VPG, p.24 (Hegel quotes from Phaidon, Steph., 97, 98): “»Ich freute mich desselben,« läßt Plato ihn sagen, »und hoffte einen Lehrer gefunden zu haben, der mir die Natur nach der Vernunft auslegen, in dem Besonderen seinen besonderen Zweck, in dem Ganzen den allgemeinen Zweck aufzeigen würde, ich hätte diese Hoffnung um vieles nicht aufgegeben. Aber wie sehr wurde ich getäuscht, als ich nun die Schriften des Anaxagoras selbst eifrig vornahm und fand, daß er nur äußerliche Ursachen, als Luft, Äther, Wasser und dergleichen, statt der Vernunft aufführt.«”
VPG, p. 24: “Man sieht, das Ungenügende, welches Sokrates an dem Prinzip des Anaxagoras fand, betrifft nicht das Prinzip selbst, sondern den Mangel an Anwendung desselben auf die konkrete Natur, daß diese nicht aus jenem Prinzip verstanden, begriffen ist, daß überhaupt jenes Prinzip abstrakt gehalten blieb, daß die Natur nicht als eine Entwicklung desselben, nicht als eine aus der Vernunft hervorgebrachte Organisation gefaßt ist.”
VPG, p.22: “Dies muß, wie gesagt, das Ergebnis der Geschichte sein. Die Geschichte aber haben wir zu nehmen, wie sie ist: wir haben historisch, empirisch zu verfahren; unter anderm müssen wir uns nicht durch die Historiker vom Fach verführen lassen, denn diese, namentlich Deutsche, welche eine große Autorität besitzen, machen das, was sie den Philosophen vorwerfen, nämlich apriorische Erdichtungen in der Geschichte.”
VPG, p.23: “Als die erste Bedingung könnten wir somit aussprechen, daß wir das Historische getreu auffassen;”
VPG, p.23: “Auch der gewöhnliche und mittelmäßige Geschichtsschreiber, der etwa meint und vorgibt, er verhalte sich nur aufnehmend, nur dem Gegebenen sich hingebend, ist nicht passiv mit seinem Denken und bringt seine Kategorien mit und sieht durch sie das Vorhandene;”
VPG, p. 23: “wer die Welt vernünftig ansieht, den sieht sie auch vernünftig an, beides ist in Wechselbestimmung.”
VPG, p.26: “Wir haben vielmehr Ernst damit zu machen, die Wege der Vorsehung, die Mittel und Erscheinungen in der Geschichte zu erkennen, und wir haben diese auf jenes allgemeine Prinzip zu beziehen.”
