It is evident, on looking at Hegel's mode of reasoning on such subjects, that his views approach towards those of Aristotle and the Aristotelians; according to which motions were divided into natural and unnatural;—the celestial motions were circular and uniform in their nature;—and the like. Perhaps it may be worth while to show how completely Hegel adheres to these ancient views, by an extract from the additions to the Articles on Celestial Motions, made in the last edition of the Encyclopædia. He says (w),
"The motion of the heavenly bodies is not a being pulled this way and that, as is imagined (by the Newtonians). They go along, as the ancients said, like blessed gods. The celestial conformity is not such a one as has the principle of rest or motion external to itself. It is not right to say because a stone is inert, and the whole earth consists of stones, and the other heavenly bodies are of the same nature as the earth, therefore the heavenly bodies are inert. This conclusion makes the properties of the whole the same as those of the part. Impulse, Pressure, Resistance, Friction, Pulling, and the like, are valid only for other than celestial matter."
There can be no doubt that this is a very different doctrine from that of Newton.
I will only add to these specimens of Hegel's physics, a specimen of the logic by which he refutes the Newtonian argument which has just been adduced; namely, that the celestial bodies are matter, and that matter, as we see in terrestrial matter, is inert. He says (x),
"Doubtless both are matter, as a good thought and a bad thought are both thoughts; but the bad one is not therefore good, because it is a thought."
APPENDIX TO THE MEMOIR ON HEGEL'S CRITICISM OF NEWTON'S PRINCIPIA.
Hegel. Encyclopædia (2nd Ed. 1827), Part XI. p. 250.
C. Absolute Mechanics.
§ 269.
Gravitation is the true and determinate conception of material Corporeity, which (Conception) is realized to the Idea (zur Idee). General Corporeity is separable essentially into particular Bodies, and connects itself with the Element of Individuality or subjectivity, as apparent (phenomenal) presence in the Motion, which by this means is immediately a system of several Bodies.