Q0258

G. W. F. Hegel

A verified English rendering from the curated archive.

English

Self-consciousness attains its satisfaction only in another self-consciousness.
Thinker G. W. F. Hegel
School German Idealism
Source Phenomenology of Spirit IV.A
Theme Philosophy
Another quotation More from this thinker

Source context

This English passage is associated with Phenomenology of Spirit IV.A, within the tradition of German Idealism. The wording below is a verified rendering prepared for careful reading rather than a claim of unique translation authority.

A short reading

Read in the register of philosophy, the sentence asks the reader to test an assumption rather than to collect a slogan. In G. W. F. Hegel's wider work, similar claims are usually offered as prompts for judgment: what would have to be true for the sentence to hold, and what would follow if it did?

How to cite this quotation

APA: G. W. F. Hegel. (n.d.). Self-consciousness attains its satisfaction only in another self-consciousness. In Philosophy Blind Box. https://www.philosophydef.com/quotes/q0258

MLA: G. W. F. Hegel. “Self-consciousness attains its satisfaction only in another self-consciousness..” Philosophy Blind Box, https://www.philosophydef.com/quotes/q0258.

Chicago: G. W. F. Hegel. “Self-consciousness attains its satisfaction only in another self-consciousness..” Philosophy Blind Box. Accessed 2026. https://www.philosophydef.com/quotes/q0258.

Same thinker

More from G. W. F. Hegel

  1. The owl of Minerva spreads its wings only with the falling of the dusk.
  2. The true is the whole.
  3. What is rational is actual; and what is actual is rational.
  4. The true is thus the Bacchanalian revel in which no member is not drunk.

All quotations by G. W. F. Hegel

Same theme

More on philosophy

  1. It is through wonder that people both now begin and first began to philosophize.
  2. A person's character is their destiny.
  3. What is opposed brings together; from what differs comes the finest harmony.
  4. Death is nothing to us: for what has been dissolved has no sensation, and what has no sensation is nothing to us.
  5. Pleasure is the beginning and end of the happy life — not the pleasures of profligates, but freedom from pain in the body and from disturbance in the soul.

Browse the philosophy theme