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49^ HEGEL. boy is " becoming" a youth he is, and at the same time is not, a youth. Being and not-being are so mediated and sublated in becoming that they are no longer contradict- ory. In a similar way it is further shown that quality and quantity are reciprocally dependent and united in measure (which may be popularly illustrated thus: progressively dim- inishing heat becomes cold, distances cannot be measured in bushels) ; that essence and phenomenon are mutually inseparable, inasmuch as the latter is always the appear- ance of an essence, and the former is essence only as it manifests itself in the phenomenon, etc. The significance of the Hegelian logic depends less on its ingenious and valuable explanations of particulars than on the fundamental idea, that the categories do not form an unordered heap, but a great organically connected whole, in which each member occupies its determinate position, and is related to every other by gradations of kinship and sub- ordination. This purpose to construct 2^. globus of the pure concepts was itself a mighty feat, which is assured of the continued admiration of posterity notwithstanding the failure in execution. He who shall one day take it up again will draw many a lesson from Hegel's unsuccessful attempt. Before all, the connections between the concepts are too manifold and complex for the monotonous transi- tions of this dialectic method (which Chalybaeus wittily called articular disease) to be capable of doing them justice. Again, the productive force of . thought must not be neglected, and to it, rather than to the mobility of the categories themselves, the matter of the transition from one to the other must be transferred. (b) The Philosophy of Nature shows the Idea in its other- being. Out of the realm of logical shades, wherein the souls of all reality dwell, we move into the sphere of external, sen- suous existence, in which the concepts take on material form. Why does the Idea externalize itself? In order to become actual. But the actuality of nature is imperfect, unsuited to the Idea, and only the precondition of a better actuality, the actuality of spirit, which has been the aim from the beginning: reason becomes nature in order to become spirit; the Idea goes forth from itself in order — enriched — to