only as something unique, whereas beings are here this and here that, here the one and not the other. Beings always have their equal. Being, however, is incomparable. Therefore it cannot be said that being is, in the sense of the aforementioned commonality, the same in all beings. Rather, being, as the unique, is always the Same. As this sameness, it does not exclude differences. What is in itself and everywhere the same need not, according to its essence, remain merely monotonous. There are various modes of the same being, but there is no various being in the sense that being could break up into the something multiple and numerous.
From the development of the Western doctrine of the being of beings (metaphysics) a much-cited proposition has emerged, above all in its scholastic form: omne ens est unum. (Every being is one.) To what extent this proposition goes back to Greek thinking about beings, and in what respect it presents a transformation of the same, cannot be discussed here. Only this is to be remembered: that Greek thinking equates beings, τὸ ὄν, early on with τὸ ἕν, the one, and indeed already in pre-Platonic thinking being is distinguished by "unity." Until today, "philosophy" has neglected to reflect at all upon what the ancient thinkers mean with this ἕν. Above all, it does not ask why, at the inception of Western thought, "unity" is so decisively attributed to beings as their essential feature.
The later proposition of scholastic philosophy, omne ens est unum, may not be equated with the guideword that has sprung from our reflection: Being is uniqueness. For the former proposition deals with beings (ens), not with being as such, and says in truth that beings are always manifold. The proposition means: Every being is always one andas one it is respectively one to another. Therefore each being is always the other to each respective one. Omne ens est unum, we can also "translate" by the proposition: Beings are manifold. But the proposition "Being is uniqueness" is spoken from a completely different viewpoint. This seems to be endangered by the Nothing, and certainly insofar as the Nothing is in any way a third vis-a-vis beings and being, so that the proposition "Being is the unique over against beings" becomes untenable, but also insofar as the Nothing is in a certain way the other to being.
(In this way Hegel thinks the relation of "being" and "nothing,"