Page:Lectures on the Philosophy of Religion volume 2.djvu/329

 are in a condition of contradiction, are, though present here in an unspiritual form, the moments out of which, when united according to their true nature, arises the essential characteristic of the Religion of Spirit.

The Roman world forms the supremely important point of transition to the Christian religion, the indispensable middle term. It is that side of the Idea represented by reality, and, together with this, its potentially determinate character, which are developed at this stage of the religious spirit. At first we saw this reality held firm in immediate unity with the universal. Now, by giving itself a definite character, it has come out of the universal and detached itself from it, and has thus come to be completely realised externality, concrete individuality, and has consequently reached, in this its alienation carried to the furthest point, totality in itself. What now remains to be done, and what is necessary is, that this particularity or individuality, this determinate determinateness should be taken back again into the universal, so that it may reach its true determination, strip off the externality from itself, and consequently that the Idea as such may get its complete determination in itself.

The religion of external conformity to end or utility, viewed according to its inner signification, constitutes the closing stage of the finite religions. What is implied in finite reality is just that the notion of God should be or exist, that it should be posited, i.e., that this notion or conception should be the truth for self-consciousness, and accordingly should be realised in self-consciousness, in its subjective aspect.

It is the notion or conception as thus posited which must develop itself on its own account until it reaches totality, for only then is it capable of being taken up into universality. It was this advance of determinateness to the stage of totality accordingly which took place in the Roman world, for here the determinateness is something