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turns out that the cognition of what consciousness knows while knowing itself requires still further circumstances. The exposition of those circumstances lies in what follows. (PoS. p.101.) That is, there is nothing behind the “curtain” (Vorhang), neither that which sees nor that which can be seen. It is not difficult to conclude that we (wir) are both the ones we observe and the ones who are observed. That the two are the same is therefore self-evident from this. Translated: Let us say I am Narcissus seeing an image of myself. I am the seer (Narcissus), that is what is seen (Narcissus’ image). These are the two different extremes. The mediator is the phenomenon appearing in my vision, in this case the surface of the water. Narcissus sees the other, which is not he but another, but he does not understand that it is his other. Hegel thinks a little differently than Pseudo Kierkegaard. He describes how the two extremes (Extreme in German as well), Narcissus and the image, are united. The cognizer thinks that there is some curtain between the two (Narcissus/image) that separates the two and also hides, which separates and does not allow complete penetration. But the curtain does not cover, or rather does so until we draw it aside, until we do not want to look behind it, because in that case it is revealed that there is nothing to see behind the curtain (nichts zu sehen ist) unless we ourselves step behind it (dahintergehen) in order to see and also to have something that can be seen there (das gesehen werden kann). (PdG. pp.135-136.) How often he gave his lips in vain to the deceptive pool, how often, trying to embrace the neck he could see, he plunged his arms into the water, but could not catch himself within them! What he has seen he does not understand, but what he sees he is on fire for, and the same error both seduces and deceives his eyes. (Ovid 2000. III. 399-431)
