PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION.

The changed form in which Hegel’s lectures on the Philosophy of History are reissued suggests the necessity of some explanation regarding the relationship of this second edition both to the original materials from which the work was compiled and to their first publication.

The late Professor Gans, the editor of the Philosophy of History, displayed a talented skill in transforming lectures into a book; in doing so, he followed for the most part Hegel’s latest versions of the course because they were the most popular and appeared most adapted to his goal.

He succeeded in presenting the lectures much as they were delivered in the winter of 1830–31; and this result might be regarded as perfectly satisfactory if Hegel’s various versions of the course had been more uniform and consistent—if, indeed, they had not rather been of such a nature as to complement each other. For however great Hegel’s power may have been in condensing the wide extent of the observable world through Thought, it was impossible for him entirely to master and to present the immense material of history in a uniform shape during the course of one semester. In the first delivery in the winter of 1822–23, he was chiefly occupied with unfolding the philosophical Idea In Hegel’s philosophy, the "Idea" is the realization of absolute reason within the world. and showing how this constitutes the real core of history and the driving soul of World-Historical Peoples Hegel used this term for nations that, at a specific point in time, embody the progress of the human spirit.. In proceeding to treat China and India, he wished—as he said himself—only to show by example how philosophy ought to understand the character of a nation; and this could be done more easily in the case of the stationary nations of the East than in that of peoples who have a genuine original: "bona fide" history and a historical development of character. A warm preference made him linger long with the Greeks, for whom he always felt a youthful enthusiasm; and after a brief consideration of the Roman world, he finally endeavored to condense the Medieval period and the Modern era into a few lectures. Time was short, and when—as in the Christian world—the Thought Referring to the rational purpose or "Idea" behind historical events. no longer lies concealed among the multitude of phenomena, but announces itself and is obviously present in history, the philosopher is free to shorten his discus-