Eine Erklärung,
wie sie einer Schrift in einer Vorrede nach der Gewohnheit vorausgeschickt wird -
as is by custom sent in advance to a writing as a preface (pre-discourse)
über den Zweck, den der Verfasser sich in ihr vorgesetzt,
about the purpose the author has put in front of himself
sowie über die Veranlassungen und das Verhältnis, worin er sie zu anderen früheren oder gleichzeitigen Behandlungen desselben Gegenstandes zu stehen glaubt -,
as well as about the causes and the relationship in which he believes them to stand to other earlier or simultaneous treatments of the same subject -
scheint bei einer philosophischen Schrift nicht nur überflüssig,
does in a philosophical writing not only seem superfluous
sondern um der Natur der Sache willen sogar unpassend und zweckwidrig zu sein.
but, for the sake of the nature of the matter seems to be inappropriate and against the purpose.
A preface should expone intentions, tendencies, circumstances of the creation of the following work (which has been written earlier), in short: particularities which, by definition, are not part of the philosophical discourse which treats the universal, and not fixed thought (results), but movement. This seems to be true, is true, but then Hegel will play an interesting trick: it is true and false, as the preface is an impossible addition to the work, but also a necessary part of it.