Hegel and Shakespeare on Moral Imagination

9. Richard III, Hamlet, Macbeth, and Henry V: Conscience, Hypocrisy, Self-Deceit and the Tragedy of Ethical Life

Chapter 9 Richard III, Hamlet, Macbeth, and Henry V Conscience, Hypocrisy, Self-Deceit and the Tragedy of Ethical Life Prince Harry (Hal): “What wouldst you think of me if I should weep?” Poins: “I would think thee a most princely hypocrite.” —Henry IV Part 21 “Th’abuse of greatness is when it disjoins / Remorse from power.” —Brutus, Julius Caesar2 Introduction This chapter follows upon the last two chapters and brings their arguments to a conclusion. We have been developing an argument about the nature of Henry V’s evil. So far, we have looked at his stance of virtue, investigated Hegel’s account of crime and evil, and used that to retrace the developments of the sovereign self from Richard II through to Henry V. This chapter begins by delving further into the problem of evil. We investigate conscience, the good, and the evil of hypocrisy. Then we look at three other princes’ relationship to these. We conclude with our final assessment of Henry V. 201 202 Hegel and Shakespeare on Moral Imagination Part I. Hegel on Conscience, the Good and the Slip into Evil Evil’s Relation to Conscience and to the Good In Hegel’s view, evil cannot be thought separately from conscience and the good, for evil is a conscientious choice of selfish ends over good, universal ends. Conscience Hegel’s theory of conscience appears in a number of his works and it is dealt with differently in different places.3 In his view, conscience is historically specific : It is a feature of the modern, Germanic world, of Germanic inwardness of subjectivity and practices of communicating conscientious convictions in a spirit of mutual recognition.4 In the Philosophy of Right, Hegel distinguishes between formal and true conscience.5 Formal conscience is the basis of true conscience: It is self-certain, moral freedom. True conscience is the completion of formal conscience in the social life of the rational State: It is universalized, ethical freedom. Formal conscience risks slipping into doing only what the ego wants (i.e., slipping into particularity); true conscience knows and does the universal good. The former is abstract, the latter socially embodied. The former is the necessary condition of the latter, but not sufficient for it.6 In the transition from morality to ethical life, we move from formal conscience to true conscience by negating the negation within formal conscience (i.e., we negate merely egoistic (negative) freedom in favor of ethical freedom). The Good Hegel believes that “True conscience is the disposition to will what is absolutely good.”7 In Kant’s moral philosophy, the highest good is the creation of a good will.8 In Hegel’s ethical philosophy, the highest good is the rational State. True conscience is the disposition to will (within) the rational State. The rational State is the actualization of freedom as community. We discussed this last chapter. Here, let us look more closely at Hegel’s concept of the good. Hegel writes that “The good is the Idea as the unity of the concept of the will with the particular will.”9 This unity is not an abstraction: It is the embodiment of all the institutions that have been explained so far in the Philosophy of Right. Those previous moments are sublated into the good, i.e., they are negated and yet preserved in their essence: In this unity, abstract right, welfare, the subjectivity of knowing and the contingency of external fact, have their independent 203 Richard III, Hamlet, Macbeth, and Henry V self-subsistence superseded, though at the same time they are still contained and retained within it in their essence. The good is thus freedom realized, the absolute end and aim of the world.10 Individuals in the State are the actualization of the State as rational ethical order. According to Hegel, this means that in the State, the social spirit has achieved a “second nature.” It is the mind acting as mind for the first time: . . . when individuals are simply identified with the actual order, ethical life (das Sittliche) appears as their general mode of conduct, i.e. as custom (Sitte), while the habitual practice of ethical living appears as a second nature which, put in the place of the initial, purely natural will, is the soul of custom permeating it through and through, the significance and the actuality of its existence. It is mind living and present as a world, and...