Vorlesungen über die Philosophie der Religion, published posthumously.
Although Hegel no longer refers to the ancient character of the state with the same romantic fervor that characterized his early youth, his theory of the state nevertheless assumes an antique character. Actual morality appears in the life of the family, political society and the state, and not only forms an antithesis to abstract and objective right, but also to "morality", to subjective conscience in its isolation from the historical forms of society. The good exists in moral association and does no depend upon individual caprice and contingency. The moral world reveals the activity of something which is superior to the consciousness of the individual. The individual can only realize the highest type of development by a life in and for society. "The moral substance" is the mind which governs the family, the political society, and above all the state. The state is the complete actuality of the moral idea: the fact that the state exists is the witness of God's course in the world. The constitution of the state is a necessary consequence of its nature, and individual construction is here quite as much out of place as individual criticism. The modern state as a matter of fact is an organization of liberty; but this does not imply that the individual can participate in the government according to his individual caprice. The wise shall rule. Governmental authority belongs to the enlightened, the scientifically educated bureaucracy. The fact that the systematic development of the Hegelian philosophy of right shows a striking correspondence with the constitution of Prussia at that time (as far as it may by called a constitution) is not to be explained as a mere accommodation, but it was rather a consequence of Hegel's realism. Hegel
