The Ego and his Own by Max Stirner (most read books txt) 📕

seeks for

the idea, say, till it has brought out the "rational State," in which I am

then obliged to be suited; in man (anthropology), till it "has found man."

The thinker is distinguished from the believer only by believing much more

than the latter, who on his part thinks of much less as signified by his faith

(creed). The thinker has a thousand tenets of faith where the believer gets

along with few; but the former brings coherence into his tenets, and takes

the coherence in turn for the scale to estimate their worth by. If one or the

other does not fit into his budget, he throws it out.

The thinkers run parallel to the believers in their pronouncements. Instead of

"If it is from God you will not root it out," the word is "If it is from the

truth, is true, etc."; instead of "Give God the glory" -- "Give truth the

glory." But it is very much the same to me whether God or the truth wins;

first and foremost I want to win.

Aside from this, how is an "unlimited freedom" to be thinkable inside of the

State or society? The State may well protect one against another, but yet it

must not let itself be endangered by an unmeasured freedom, a so-called

unbridledness. Thus in "freedom of instruction" the State declares only this

-- that it is suited with every one who instructs as the State (or, speaking

more comprehensibly, the political power) would have it. The point for the

competitors is this "as the State would have it." If the clergy, e. g., does

not will as the State does, then it itself excludes itself from competition

(vid. France). The limit that is necessarily drawn in the State for any and

all competition is called "the oversight and superintendence of the State." In

bidding freedom of instruction keep within the due bounds, the State at the

same time fixes the scope of freedom of thought; because, as a rule, people do

not think farther than their teachers have thought.

Hear Minister Guizot: "The great difficulty of today is the *guiding and

dominating of the mind*. Formerly the church fulfilled this mission; now it is

not adequate to it. It is from the university that this great service must be

expected, and the university will not fail to perform it. We, the

government, have the duty of supporting it therein. The charter calls for

the freedom of thought and that of conscience."(115) So, in favor of freedom

of thought and conscience, the minister demands "the guiding and dominating of

the mind."

Catholicism haled the examinee before the forum of ecclesiasticism,

Protestantism before that of biblical Christianity. It would be but little

bettered if one haled him before that of reason, as Ruge, e. g., wants

to.(116) Whether the church, the Bible, or reason (to which, moreover, Luther

and Huss already appealed) is the sacred authority makes no difference in

essentials.

The "question of our time" does not become soluble even when one puts it thus:

Is anything general authorized, or only the individual? Is the generality (*e.

g.* State, law, custom, morality, etc.) authorized, or individuality? It

becomes soluble for the first time when one no longer asks after an

"authorization" at all, and does not carry on a mere fight against

"privileges." -- A "rational" freedom of teaching, which recognizes only the

conscience of reason,"(117)does not bring us to the goal; we require an

egoistic freedom of teaching rather, a freedom of teaching for all ownness,

wherein I become audible and can announce myself unchecked. That I make

myself "audible",(118) this alone is "reason,"(119) be I ever so irrational;

in my making myself heard, and so hearing myself, others as well as I myself

enjoy me, and at the same time consume me.

What would be gained if, as formerly the orthodox I, the loyal I, the moral I,

etc., was free, now the rational I should become free? Would this be the

freedom of me?

If I am free as "rational I," then the rational in me, or reason, is free; and

this freedom of reason, or freedom of the thought, was the ideal of the

Christian world from of old. They wanted to make thinking -- and, as

aforesaid, faith is also thinking, as thinking is faith -- free; the thinkers,

i.e. the believers as well as the rational, were to be free; for the rest

freedom was impossible. But the freedom of thinkers is the "freedom of the

children of God," and at the same time the most merciless --hierarchy or

dominion of the thought; for I succumb to the thought. If thoughts are free,

I am their slave; I have no power over them, and am dominated by them. But I

want to have the thought, want to be full of thoughts, but at the same time I

want to be thoughtless, and, instead of freedom of thought, I preserve for

myself thoughtlessness.

If the point is to have myself understood and to make communications, then

assuredly I can make use only of human means, which are at my command

because I am at the same time man. And really I have thoughts only as man;

as I, I am at the same time thoughtless.(120) He who cannot get rid of a

thought is so far only man, is a thrall of language, this human

institution, this treasury of human thoughts. Language or "the word"

tyrannizes hardest over us, because it brings up against us a whole army of

fixed ideas. Just observe yourself in the act of reflection, right now, and

you will find how you make progress only by becoming thoughtless and

speechless every moment. You are not thoughtless and speechless merely in

(say) sleep, but even in the deepest reflection; yes, precisely then most so.

And only by this thoughtlessness, this unrecognized "freedom of thought" or

freedom from the thought, are you your own. Only from it do you arrive at

putting language to use as your property.

If thinking is not my thinking, it is merely a spun-out thought; it is slave

work, or the work of a "servant obeying at the word." For not a thought, but

I, am the beginning for my thinking, and therefore I am its goal too, even as

its whole course is only a course of my self-enjoyment; for absolute or free

thinking, on the other hand, thinking itself is the beginning, and it plagues

itself with propounding this beginning as the extremest "abstraction" (e. g.

as being). This very abstraction, or this thought, is then spun out further.

Absolute thinking is the affair of the human spirit, and this is a holy

spirit. Hence this thinking is an affair of the parsons, who have "a sense for

it," a sense for the "highest interests of mankind," for "the spirit."

To the believer, truths are a settled thing, a fact; to the freethinker, a

thing that is still to be settled. Be absolute thinking ever so unbelieving,

its incredulity has its limits, and there does remain a belief in the truth,

in the spirit, in the idea and its final victory: this thinking does not sin

against the holy spirit. But all thinking that does not sin against the holy

spirit is belief in spirits or ghosts.

I can as little renounce thinking as feeling, the spirit's activity as little

as the activity of the senses. As feeling is our sense for things, so thinking

is our sense for essences (thoughts). Essences have their existence in

everything sensuous, especially in the word. The power of words follows that

of things: first one is coerced by the rod, afterward by conviction. The might

of things overcomes our courage, our spirit; against the power of a

conviction, and so of the word, even the rack and the sword lose their

overpoweringness and force. The men of conviction are the priestly men, who

resist every enticement of Satan.

Christianity took away from the things of this world only their

irresistibleness, made us independent of them. In like manner I raise myself

above truths and their power: as I am supersensual, so I am supertrue. *Before

me* truths are as common and as indifferent as things; they do not carry me

away, and do not inspire me with enthusiasm. There exists not even one truth,

not right, not freedom, humanity, etc., that has stability before me, and to

which I subject myself. They are words, nothing but words, as to the

Christian nothing but "vain things." In words and truths (every word is a

truth, as Hegel asserts that one cannot tell a lie) there is no salvation

for me, as little as there is for the Christian in things and vanities. As the

riches of this world do not make me happy, so neither do its truths. It is now

no longer Satan, but the spirit, that plays the story of the temptation; and

he does not seduce by the things of this world, but by its thoughts, by the

"glitter of the idea."

Along with worldly goods, all sacred goods too must be put away as no longer

valuable.

Truths are phrases, ways of speaking, words (lógos); brought into connection,

or into an articulate series, they form logic, science, philosophy.

For thinking and speaking I need truths and words, as I do foods for eating;

without them I cannot think nor speak. Truths are men's thoughts, set down in

words and therefore just as extant as other things, although extant only for

the mind or for thinking. They are human institutions and human creatures,

and, even if they are given out for divine revelations, there still remains in

them the quality of alienness for me; yes, as my own creatures they are

already alienated from me after the act of creation.

The Christian man is the man with faith in thinking, who believes in the

supreme dominion of thoughts and wants to bring thoughts, so-called

"principles," to dominion. Many a one does indeed test the thoughts, and

chooses none of them for his master without criticism, but in this he is like

the dog who sniffs at people to smell out "his master"; he is always aiming at

the ruling thought. The Christian may reform and revolt an infinite deal,

may demolish the ruling concepts of centuries; he will always aspire to a new

"principle" or new master again, always set up a higher or "deeper" truth

again, always call forth a cult again, always proclaim a spirit called to

dominion, lay down a law for all.

If there is even one truth only to which man has to devote his life and his

powers because he is man, then he is subjected to a rule, dominion, law; he is

a servingman. It is supposed that, e. g. man, humanity, liberty, etc., are

such truths.

On the other hand, one can say thus: Whether you will further occupy yourself

with thinking depends