第5章 Letter IV(2)

I admit that in a one-sided estimate from the point of view of morality this difference vanishes,for the reason is satisfied if her law prevails unconditionally.But when the survey taken is complete and embraces the whole man (anthropology),where the form is considered together with the substance,and a living feeling has a voice,the difference will become far more evident.No doubt the reason demands unity,and nature variety,and both legislations take man in hand.The law of the former is stamped upon him by an incorruptible consciousness,that of the latter by an ineradicable feeling.Consequently education will always appear deficient when the moral feeling can only be maintained with the sacrifice of what is natural;and a political administration will always be very imperfect when it is only able to bring about unity by suppressing variety.The state ought not only to respect the objective and generic but also the subjective and specific in individuals;and while diffusing the unseen world of morals,it must not depopulate the kingdom of appearance,the external world of matter.

When the mechanical artist places his hand on the formless block,to give it a form according to his intention,he has not any scruples in doing violence to it.For the nature on which he works does not deserve any respect in itself,and he does not value the whole for its parts,but the parts on account of the whole.When the child of the fine arts sets his hand to the same block,he has no scruples either in doing violence to it,he only avoids showing this violence.He does not respect the matter in which he works,and more than the mechanical artist;but he seeks by an apparent consideration for it to deceive the eye which takes this matter under its protection.The political and educating artist follows a very different course,while making man at once his material and his end.In this case the aim or end meets in the material,and it is only because the whole serves the parts that the parts adapt themselves to the end.The political artist has to treat his material man with a very different kind of respect from that shown by the artist of fine art to his work.He must spare man's peculiarity and personality,not to produce a deceptive effect on the senses,but objectively and out of consideration for his inner being.

But the state is an organisation which fashions itself through itself and for itself,and for this reason it can only be realised when the parts have been accorded to the idea of the whole.The state serves the purpose of a representative,both to pure ideal and to objective humanity,in the breast of its citizens,accordingly it will have to observe the same relation to its citizens in which they are placed to it,and it will only respect their subjective humanity in the same degree that it is ennobled to an objective existence.If the internal man is one with himself,he will be able to rescue his peculiarity,even in the greatest generalisation of his conduct,and the state will only become the exponent of his fine instinct,the clearer formula of his internal legislation.But if the subjective man is in conflict with the objective and contradicts him in the character of the people,so that only the oppression of the former can give the victory to the latter,then the state will take up the severe aspect of the law against the citizen,and in order not to fall a sacrifice,it will have to crush under foot such a hostile individuality,without any compromise.

Now man can be opposed to himself in a twofold manner:either as a savage,when his feelings rule over his principles;or as a barbarian,when his principles destroy his feelings.The savage despises art,and acknowledges nature as his despotic ruler;the barbarian laughs at nature,and dishonours it,but he often proceeds in a more contemptible way than the savage,to be the slave of his senses.The cultivated man makes of nature his friend,and honours its friendship,while only bridling its caprice.

Consequently,when reason brings her moral unity into physical society,she must not injure the manifold in nature.When nature strives to maintain her manifold character in the moral structure of society,this must not create any breach in moral unity;the victorious form is equally remote from uniformity and confusion.Therefore,totality of character must be found in the people which is capable and worthy to exchange the state of necessity for that of freedom.