also from the sort of musical and suggestive rhythm which appears in certain pretentious and meaningless phrases. There are pages of Hegel which have in the field of thought the same effect that the sonnets of Mallarmé have in the field of poetry. They are instruments of evocation and of indefinite, sentimental suggestiveness—and they are nothing more. That does not lessen their value; it may even increase it. But verbal narcotics and hypnotic formulas are not to be imposed on us as truths.
The sentimental states most readily produced by the books of Hegel are pride, mystic ecstasy, and the sense of motion. The sense of motion certainly pervades Hegelian philosophy, and despite deficiencies in logical expression has certainly contributed to its popularity. The thinkers of Hegel's day were a little weary of static systems, of fixed and motionless metaphysics, of the cold classifications and distinctions of traditional philosophy, and they felt the need of a start, a run, a crack of the whip. The philosophy of Hegel, even in the manner of its utterance, brought this sense of motion, of change, of development. The Hegelian world is rather a promenade for the Idea than a stationary piece of furniture full of drawers and pigeonholes.
Men were beginning just then to acquire that love of motion and speed which has today reached the point of frenzy; and we have Hegel to thank
