Abstract

This exceedingly rich book can be understood as an attempt to grasp the nature of Hegel’s system, specifically the relationship obtaining between that system and its vaunted "transitions." This attempt is carried out through a study of Hegel’s account of Vorstellung and thought. The operational point d'appui of the study is what Clark identifies as the central paradox essentially inherent in his subject, which may be variously formulated as: how language can be the "other" of thought and yet sublated in thought; how pure thought can abide an other; how the Logic can from within itself develop its categories to absolute fulfillment and yet refer beyond itself to its fulfillment; how Hegel can be understood to have "completed" philosophy in the first quarter of the nineteenth century; how one makes sense of the notion of an essentially temporal eternality; how the Logic and the Phenomenology of Mind can each presuppose the other. The developing treatment of this paradox constitutes almost an object lesson in the "preserved" aspect of aufhebung—The or a methodological enactment of the second book of the Logic—for Clark wrestles with the tacky conceptual framework upon which rests the topic under investigation. The whole is deftly handled. Particularly inspired is the close analysis of the Theoretical Mind chapter of the Philosophy of Spirit and its bearing upon the Logic’s "Essence." This coupling, together with a treatment of the Philosophy of Religion constitutes one of the two foci of the book. What comes clear from this extended study is an appreciation of the fundamental difficulties connected with any philosophical explanation that has failed to resolve satisfactorily the relationship between ground and consequent and treats them either as being simply different or from the standpoint of a simply presumed totality. Clark’s considered position is that Hegel’s thought is paradoxical precisely in its intelligibility. Ultimately, he can only reiterate the paradox one final time: "The paradox of a Logic that is at once the whole and but a part of experience is thus a systematic expression of the need for reconciliation of a standpoint that is simply accomplished and a standpoint that is ever accomplishing itself." Now for the misgivings, which are for the most part issues of form. There is an obstinate problem of indistinctness running through the work. The recurrent summaries, both internal and thematic, the forecasts, the exhaustively particularized table of contents, are all tacit concessions to the existence of this problem. Seldom do positions come ringing through with conviction; often, notwithstanding the above-mentioned signposts, their origin, their precise connection to the text, is obscure. This is particularly true of the truncated final passages, where interpretation converts to criticism. In short, a fuller statement of significance might well have been supplied. A second problem, or at the least an annoying inconvenience, is the decision not to translate most of the abundant quotations from Hegel’s works into English. Some of the quotations are, for no apparent reason, in fact translated; and with well over 900 footnotes in a 200-page text anyway, translations would hardly constitute a stylistic blemish.—R. J. G.