2. Philosophy - Stefano Franchi

70
T HE END OF PHILOSOPHY
else will substitute it. If philosophy’s progression reaches its end this does not, cannot mean
that philosophy goes away but rather that philosophy has finally reached its fullness, its fi-
nal state of completion (Vollendung or rather, Vollkommenheit) in which it will persist. The
end of philosophy must be a terminus that achieves philosophy’s goal and keeps it in there,
in that place where everything does come together. The line must not be a line or rather
must be a line that reaches the end by reaching no end, a line that will not encounter a limit
but will nonetheless end its course. In other words, philosophical progress must achieve in-
finity without going on ad infinitum. This can only be done if the straight line turns back
into itself and revert into a circle, or even a circle or circles, since each single step of phi-
losophy’s overall development can be considered, in turn, as consisting of many steps:
This series [of formations of the spirit] is not to be envisaged as a straight
line, but as a circle returning into itself. This circle has for its circumference
a great number of circles; one development is always a movement through
many developments; the entirety of this series is a succession of developments
retiring into itself; and each particular development is one stage in the
whole. In development there is an advance, not into the abstract infinite, but
returning back into itself. (80, my emphasis).
The circle points to philosophy completing its course and reaching true (vs. Abstract) in-
finity, leaving nothing behind. The circle stresses the total closure of both philosophy and
the Idea. Nothing is left outside, so to speak, since the circle has no boundary. Only at the
end of its development, that is, at the closure of the circle, truth is finally attained. Or rather,
more than of a circle—whose image may suggest a plane circumscribing it—we should
think of a sphere on whose unbounded surface philosophy, and us with it, roam freely with-
out ever encountering a limit.