The spirit is never at rest, but always engaged in progressive motion, giving itself new form.

Philosophy is by its nature something esoteric, neither made for the mob nor capable of being prepared for the mob.

To be independent of public opinion is the first formal condition of achieving anything great.

All the worth which the human being possesses all spiritual reality, he possesses only through the State... For Truth is the Unity of the universal and subjective Will; and the Universal is to be found in the State, in its laws, its universal and rational arrangements. The State is the Divine Idea as it exists on Earth. We have in it, therefore, the object of History in a more definite shape than before; that in which Freedom obtains objectivity...

We do not need to be shoemakers to know if our shoes fit, and just as little have we any need to be professionals to acquire knowledge of matters of universal interest.

Genuine tragedy is a case not of right against wrong but of right against right - two equally justified ethical principles embodied in people of unchangeable will.

I have the courage to be mistaken.