conception of development; but the attainment of a definite result。 The goal of attainment we
determined at the outset: it is Spirit in its pleteness; in its essential nature; i。e。; Freedom。 This
is the fundamental object; and therefore also the leading principle of the development; — that
whereby it receives meaning and importance (as in the Roman history; Rome is the object —
consequently that which directs our consideration of the facts related); as; conversely; the
phenomena of the process have resulted from this principle alone; and only as referred to it;
possess a sense and value。 There are many considerable periods in History in which this
development seems to have been intermitted; in which we might rather say; the whole enormous
gain of previous culture appears to have been entirely lost; after which; unhappily; a new
mencement has been necessary; made in the hope of recovering — by the assistance of some
remains saved from the wreck of a former civilisation and by dint of a renewed incalculable
expenditure of strength and time; — one of the regions which had been an ancient possession of
that civilisation。 We behold also continued processes of growth; structures and systems of culture
in particular spheres; rich in kind; and well developed in every direction。 The merely formal and
indeterminate view of development in general can neither assign to one form of expansion
superiority over the other; nor render prehensible the object of that decay of older periods of
growth; but must regard such occurrences; — or; to speak more particularly; the retrocessions
they exhibit; — as external contingencies; and can only judge of particular modes of development
from indeterminate points of view; which — since the development as such; is all in all — are
relative and not absolute goals of attainment。
§ 63
Universal History exhibits the gradation in the development of that principle whose substantial
purport is the consciousness of Freedom。 The analysis of the successive grades; in their abstract
form; belongs to Logic; in their concrete aspect to the Philosophy of Spirit。 Here it is sufficient to
state that the first step in the process presents that immersion of Spirit in Nature which has been
already referred to; the second shows it as advancing to the consciousness of its freedom。 But this
initial separation from Nature is imperfect and partial; since it is derived immediately from the
merely natural state; is consequently related to it; and is still encumbered with it as an essentially
connected element。 The third step is the elevation of the soul from this still limited and special form
of freedom to its pure universal form; that state in which the spiritual essence attains the
consciousness and feeli
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