Page:Lectures on the Philosophy of Religion volume 2.djvu/185

 is the subjectivity which thinks, and, being thinking subjectivity, it exists only for thought.

(a.) God is defined as absolute power, which is wisdom. Power in its form as wisdom is, to begin with, reflected into itself as subject. This reflection into self, this self-determination of power, is the self-determination which is entirely abstract and universal, which does not yet particularise itself within itself, the determinate character being only determinateness in general. It is owing to this subjectivity which makes no distinction within itself that God is defined as One. Within this One all particularity has vanished. It is implied in this that natural things, the things which have a determinate particular character and constitute the world, have no longer any valid independent existence in their condition of immediacy. Independence is represented by One only. All else is merely something posited, dependent for its being on something else, something which is kept from existing by the One, for the One is abstract subjectivity, and all else is unsubstantial as compared with it.

(b.) The next point is the determination of the end followed out by the absolute Power. From one point of view, God is Himself His end. He is wisdom. And it is, to begin with, required of this determination that it be equal to the power. It is itself, however, merely a general end, or, to put it otherwise, wisdom is merely abstract, is merely called wisdom.

(c.) The determinateness, however, must not remain merely a determination within the Notion, but receive the form of reality also. This form is, to begin with, an immediate one. The end of God is, in fact, merely the first reality, and accordingly is a wholly single or individual end. The next step is that the end, the determinateness, should on its part be raised to the condition of concrete universality. We certainly have here pure subjectivity on the one side, but the determinateness is not yet equalised with it. This first end is thus limited,