he two elements which enter into the one
Absolute Idea as contradictories, and both together combine to form a
complete notion of bare production, or the _becoming_ of something out
of nothing,--the unfolding of real existence in its lowest form, that
is, of _nature_.

The "_Philosophy of Nature_" exhibits a series of necessary movements
which carry the idea forward in the ascending scale of sensible
existence. The laws of mechanics, chemistry, and physiology are resolved
into a series of oppositions. But the law which governs this development
requires the self-reconciliation of these opposites. The idea,
therefore, which in nature was unconscious and ignorant of itself,
returns upon itself, and becomes conscious of itself, that is, becomes
_mind_. The science of the regression or self-reflection of the idea, is
the "_Philosophy of Mind_."

The "_Philosophy of Mind_" is subdivided by Hegel into three parts.
There is, first, the subjective or individual mind (_psychology_); then
the objective or universal mind, as represented in society, the state,
and in history (_ethics, political philosophy,_ or _jurisprudence_, and
_philosophy of history_); and, finally, the union of the subjective and
objective mind, or _the absolute mind_. This last manifests itself again
under three forms, representing the three degrees of the
self-consciousness of the Spirit, as the eternal truth. These are,
first, _art_, or the representation of beauty (aesthetics); secondly,
_religion_, in the general acceptation of the term (philosophy of
religion); and, thirdly, _philosophy_ itself, as the purest and most
perfect form of the scientific knowledge of truth. All historical
religions, the Oriental, the Jewish, the Greek, the Roman, and the
Christian, are _the successive stages in the development or
self-actualization of God_.[49]

It is unnecessary to indicate to the reader that the philosophy of Hegel
is essentially pantheistic. "God is not a _person_, but personality
itself, _i.e._, the universal personality, which realizes itself in
every human consciousness, as so many separate thoughts of one eternal
mind. The idea we form of the absolute is, to Hegel, the absolute
itself, its essential existence being identical with our conception of
it. Apart from, and out of the world, there is no God; and so also,
apart from the universal consciousness of man, there is no Divine
consciousness or personality."[50]

[Footnote 49: See art. "Hegelian Ph