Now Hegel’s argument was, fundamentally, the one I stated (and criticized) here in the preceding section—although Hegel presented it in a surpassingly vague, unclear, and specious form. Moreover, I contend that this identity philosophy (despite some ‘progressivist’ suggestions, and some mild expressions of sympathy with various ‘progressive’ movements which it contained) played a major role in the downfall of the liberal movement in Germany; a movement which, under the influence of Kant’s philosophy, had produced such important liberal thinkers as Schiller and Wilhelm von Humboldt, and such
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