Chapter 41 C. Idea I. Life (Das Leben)

§216 The idea of ​​immediacy is life.The concept is realized in the body as the soul, and the soul is the universality directly connected with itself by means of the externality of the body.The body is likewise a specialization of the soul, so that it does not signify any difference other than the conceptual determinations present in it.Finally, the individuality of the body as infinite negativity is the dialectic of its objectivity existing externally to each other, which returns to subjectivity from semblance of independent existence. Therefore, all the organs and limbs in the body serve as ends and means for each other at different times.Therefore, life is both the initial specialization and the result of the unity of being-for-itself that reaches negation, so life in its body is only combined with itself as a dialectical process.So life is essentially living, and in its immediacy, this living individual.In the scope of human life, the characteristic of finitude is that because of the immediacy of ideas, soul and body are separable, which constitutes the death of living beings.But these two sides of the Idea, soul and body, are distinct constituents only when the living being dies.

Note: The organs and members of the body are what they are only because of their unity, and because they are connected with it.For example, if a hand is cut off from the body, although it can still be called a hand in name, it is no longer a hand in essence.Aristotle already said this.From an intellectual point of view, people often regard life as a mysterious or even mysterious thing.This is enough to show that the intellect or the understanding itself admits its finiteness and emptiness.In fact, not only is life not inconceivable, it can even be said that in life, we can see the concept itself, or to be more precise, we can see the direct idea that exists as a concept.This also reveals the flaws of life at the same time.The defect of life is that concept and reality have not yet reached a true mutual agreement.The concept of life is the soul, and the soul has the body as its reality or realization.The soul seems to be absorbed in its body, in which case the soul is sentient, but has not yet attained free conscious existence.The process of life's progress then consists in overcoming the immediacy which still binds itself, and this process is itself threefold, and the result of its development is the Idea in the form of judgment, that is, the Idea as cognition.

§217 A living thing is a corollary, [that is, a contradictory unity containing three components], and in this unity, each link itself forms a system and a corollary [or unity] (see §198, §201, §207, respectively). Festival).They are active processes of inference, [or progression], and within the subjective unity of living things only a process.Therefore, a living thing is a process of combining itself with itself, and this combining process itself has gone through three processes. §218 (1) The first process is the process of motion of a living thing within itself. In the process it divides itself, and it takes its body as its object, its inorganic nature.This inanimateness, as a relative externality, differentiates into the differences and antagonisms of its various moments, and these different opposite elements compete with each other, become assimilated with each other, and maintain themselves in the process of constantly generating themselves.But this activity of the faculties of the limbs of a living thing is only an activity of the living subject, and the products of this activity must be returned to the activity of the subject, so that in this internal process only the active The subject of life, in other words, is only the subject itself regenerating.

Note: The internal processes of living things themselves can be divided into three forms in nature, namely, sensitivity, aversion and reproduction.As a sensitive, living thing is a direct and simple self-relationship, that is, the soul. The soul is pervasive and internal in its body, and the exterior of each part of the body has no truth at all for the soul.In the process of resentment the living thing shows itself divided, and in the stage of regeneration or multiplication it continually recovers itself from the inherent differences of its members and faculties.A living thing lasts its existence only by virtue of this process of constant renewal within itself.

§219 (2) But the judgment of the concept, in order to proceed freely, allows the objective inorganic body to become a whole independent of it, and makes the negative connection of the living thing to itself an immediate individuality, a relationship with Its own antithetical premise of inorganic nature.The self-negation of the living thing is a moment in its concept itself, which means that it is defective in comparison with its concept (which is at the same time a concrete universal).The dialectic of sublating the illusory object in itself is the agency of a self-assured living being, which thus maintains, develops, and objectifies itself in the process of rebelling against its inorganic nature.

Note: Animate things are opposed to an inorganic nature, which is the dominant force of the latter and assimilates it to enrich itself.The result obtained by such a process is not, as in chemical processes, merely a neutralized product, in which both opposite and independent aspects are equally sublated.The living thing, on the contrary, shows itself to dominate its opponent, who cannot resist its power. K. Inorganic nature conquered by living things endures this conquest precisely because inorganic nature is life in itself, and life is inorganic nature for itself.So the living thing in the other is only united with itself.When the soul leaves the body, the fundamental forces of objectivity come into play.These forces are, so to speak, constantly preparing the leap to begin their course in the organic body, where life is constantly struggling with the inorganic forces.

§220 (3) The living individual occupies the position of subject and concept in the first process, and assimilates its external objectivity in the second process, thus acquiring a real determinateness for itself, so it Now becomes the underlying species (Gattung), the universality of substantiality. The specialization of a "genus" is the connection between a living subject and another subject of the same kind, and judgment is the relationship between the "genus" and these specific "individuals" that are opposed to each other.This is the difference of sex (Geschlechtsdieeerenz).

§221 The development process of the "race" makes it a being-for-itself.Since life is still only the immediate idea, it splits into two aspects: on the one hand, what was at first assumed to be immediacy now appears as an intermediary, produced. On the other hand, the living individuality, because of its original immediacy, is in a negative relation to the universal, and is submerged in this higher force of the universal. Note: The living thing dies, because life is a contradiction: it is a species in itself, a universal, but immediately exists only as an individual.In death the species manifests itself as the power over the immediate individual.In the case of the animal, the process of the species is the culmination of its vitality.But living beings do not achieve being for themselves within their kind, but submit to the power of the kind.In the process of the species, the immediate living thing mediates itself and raises itself beyond its immediacy, but only in order to sink back into it again and again.So life is at first only a process of infinite progress towards bad without end.But conceptually, the process of life achieves the result of sublating and overcoming the immediacy of the ideas still bound in the form of life.

§222 But the Idea of ​​life must therefore be liberated not only from any particular immediate individuality, but from this first general immediacy.In this way it can reach itself, its truth. Thus it can come to exist for itself as a free species.The death of the mere immediate individual life is the advancement of the spirit.