Page:Lectures on the Philosophy of Religion volume 2.djvu/204

 ought to be in keeping with this something which is inward and right. It can go well with Man only according to his works, and he must not only conduct himself morally in a general way, respect the laws of his country, and sacrifice himself for his country, happen what may, but there arises a definite demand that it should also go well with whoever does right.

An essential point here is that real existence, definite Being in an external form, be made to correspond with, brought into subjection to, and determined in accordance with, what is inner and right. This essential condition enters here in consequence of, and on the basis of, the fundamental relation of God to the natural finite world.

There is here an end, and one which must be carried out, namely, this difference, which must at the same time come to be in a state of harmony, so as to show that natural existence governs itself, and bears witness to what is essential, to what is spiritual. So far as Man is concerned, he must be determined, governed, by what is truly inward, by right-doing.

In this way the well-being of Man is divinely guaranteed, but it is so guaranteed only in so far as it is in conformity with the Divine, the moral, divine law. This is the band of necessity, which, however, is no longer blind, as we shall see it is in other religions, where it is only the empty indeterminate necessity from which the Notion is absent, so that the Concrete is outside of it. The gods, the moral Powers, are subject to necessity, but the necessity is not characterised by the presence in it of what is moral and right.

Here necessity is concrete, in the sense that what has essential Being, Being in and for itself, gives laws, wills the Right, the Good, and as a consequence of this, this Being has an affirmative definite Being which is adequate to it, an existence which is a state of well-being or welfare. It is this kind of harmony of which Man is conscious in this sphere of thought.