Page:Lectures on the Philosophy of Religion volume 2.djvu/232

 The Transition to the Stage which follows.

Speaking generally, we, as a matter of fact, find that here we are in the region of free subjectivity, but still the essential characteristic which belongs to free subjectivity has not yet been fully carried right through the totality of the religious consciousness in the Religion of Sublimity. God was characterised for Thought as substantial Power, and as the Creator, but in this character He is, to begin with, merely the Lord of His creatures. Power is thus the cause which differentiates itself, but it is something which merely puts forth its authority over, exercises its lordship over, that in which it thus differentiates itself.

A further stage of progress accordingly is reached, when it is seen that this “Other” is something free—free from external restraint, and God becomes the God of free men, who, even while rendering Him obedience, are actually free in their relation to Him. This standpoint, if we look at it in an abstract way, contains within it the following moments: God is a free, absolute Spirit, and manifests Himself by setting His “Other” over against Himself. What is thus posited by Him is His image, for the subject creates only itself, and that which it becomes by self-determination is again nothing else than itself. But in order that it may be really determined, or get a specific nature as Spirit, it must negate this “Other,” and return to itself, for then only when it knows itself in the “Other” is it free. But if God knows Himself in the “Other,” it follows that the “Other” has an actual independent existence, is for itself, and knows itself to be free.

This represents the release of the “Other” as being now something free and independent. Thus freedom is found first of all in the subject, and God is still characterised as Power, which is for itself, has real existence, and releases the subject. The differentiation or further