Let us put aside phraseology and discuss the inner meaning of every
thought; by comparisons and deductions let us illuminate the situation.
In this way I will describe our system, both from our own point of view
and from that of the GOYS.[2]
It must be remembered that people with base instincts are more numerous
than those with noble ones; therefore, the best results in governing
are achieved through violence and intimidation and not through academic
discussion. Every man seeks power; every one would like to become a
dictator if he possibly could; and rare indeed are those who would not
sacrifice the common good in order to attain personal advantage.
What has restrained the wild beasts we call men?
What has influenced them heretofore?
In the early stages of social life they submitted to brute and blind
force; afterwards—to the Law, which is the same force but disguised. I
deduce from this that according to the laws of nature, right lies in
might.
Political freedom is not a fact but an idea. One must know how to employ
this idea when it becomes necessary to attract popular forces to one’s
party by mental allurement if it plans to crush the party in power. The
task is made easier if the opponent himself has contradicted the idea of
freedom, the so-called liberalism, and for the sake of the idea yields
his power. It is precisely here that the triumph of our theory becomes
apparent: the relinquished reins of power are, according to the laws of
nature, immediately seized by a new hand because the blind force of the
people cannot remain without a leader even for one day, and the new power
merely replaces the old, weakened by liberalism.
In our day the _power of gold_ has replaced liberal rulers. There
was a time when faith ruled. The idea of freedom cannot be realized
because no one knows how to make reasonable use of it. Give the people
self-government for a short time and it will become corrupted. From that
very moment strife begins and soon develops into social struggles, as a
result of which states are set aflame and their authority is reduced to
ashes.
Whether the state is exhausted by internal convulsions, or whether civil
wars deliver it into the hands of external enemies, in either case it
can be regarded as hopelessly lost: it is in our power. The despotism of
capital, which is entirely in our hands, holds out to it a straw which
the state must grasp, although against its will, or otherwise fall into
the abyss.
To him who, because of his liberal inclinations, would contend that
arguments of this kind are immoral, I would propound the question: If a
state has two enemies, and if against the external enemy it is permitted
and it is not considered immoral to use all methods of warfare, and as a
protective measure not to acquaint the enemy with the plans of attack,
such as night attacks or attacks with superior forces, then why should
the same methods be regarded as immoral when applied to a worse foe, a
transgressor against social order and prosperity?
How can a sound and logical mind hope successfully to guide the masses by
means of reasonable persuasion or by arguments if there is a possibility
of contradiction, even though unreasonable, but which may appear more
attractive to the superficially thinking masses? Guided entirely by
shallow passions, superstitions, customs, traditions, and sentimental
theories, the people in and of the mob become embroiled in party
dissensions which prevent all possibility of an agreement, even though
it be on a basis of perfectly sound reasoning. Every decision of the mob
depends upon the accidental or prearranged majority, which, owing to
its ignorance of political secrets, pronounces absurd decisions, thus
introducing the seeds of anarchy into the government.
Politics have nothing in common with morals. The ruler guided by morality
is not a skilled politician, and consequently he is not firm on his
throne. He who desires to rule must resort to cunning and hypocrisy. The
great popular qualities—honesty and frankness—become vices in politics,
as they dethrone more surely and more certainly than the most powerful
enemy. These qualities must be the attributes of GOY countries; but we by
no means should be guided by them.
Our right lies in might. The word “right” is an abstract idea,
unsusceptible of proof. This word means nothing more than: Give me what I
desire so that I may have evidence that I am stronger than you.
Where does right begin? Where does it end?
In a state with a poorly organized government and where the laws are
insignificant, and the ruler has lost his dignity as the result of the
accumulation of liberal rights, I find a new right, namely, the right of
might to destroy all existing order and institutions, to lay hands on the
law, to alter all institutions, and to become the ruler of those who have
voluntarily, liberally renounced for our benefit the rights to their own
power.
With the present instability of all authority our power will be more
unassailable than any other, because it will be invisible until it is so
well rooted that no cunning can undermine it.
From temporary evil to which we are now obliged to have recourse will
emerge the good of an unshakable government, which will reinstate the
orderly functioning of the mechanism of popular existence now interrupted
by liberalism. The end justifies the means. In laying our plans we must
turn our attention not so much to the good and moral as to the necessary
and useful. Before us lies a plan in which a strategic line is shown,
from which we must not deviate on pain of risking the collapse of many
centuries of work.
In working out an expedient plan of action it is necessary to take into
consideration the meanness, vacillation, changeability of the mob, its
inability to appreciate and respect the conditions of its own existence
and of its own well-being. It is necessary to realize that the power of
the masses is blind, unreasoning, and void of discrimination, prone to
listen to right and left. The blind man cannot guide the blind without
bringing them to the abyss; consequently, members of the crowd, upstarts
from the people, even were they men of genius but incompetent in
politics, cannot step forward as leaders of the mob without ruining the
entire nation.
Only the person prepared from childhood to autocracy can understand the
words which are formed by political letters.
The people left to themselves, that is to upstarts from among them, are
ruined by party dissensions created by greed for power and honors, and
by the disorders resulting therefrom. Is it possible for the masses
of the people to direct the affairs of the state without rivalry, and
without interjecting personal interests? Are they capable of protecting
themselves against external enemies?—This is impossible, since a plan
divided into as many parts as there are minds in a mob loses its unity,
and consequently, becomes incomprehensible and unworkable.
Only an autocrat can outline great and clear plans which allocate in
an orderly manner all the parts of the mechanism of the government
machinery. From this it is concluded that the government which is the
most efficient for the benefit of a country must be concentrated in
the hands of one responsible person. Civilization cannot exist without
absolute despotism, for government is carried on not by the masses, but
by their leader, whoever he may be. A barbarous crowd shows its barbarism
on every occasion. The moment the mob grasps liberty in its hands it is
speedily changed to anarchy, which is in itself the height of barbarism.
Look at those beasts, steeped in alcohol, stupefied by wine, the
unlimited use of which is granted by liberty.
Surely you cannot allow our own people to come to this. The people of the
GOYS are stupefied by spirituous liquors; their youth is driven insane
through excessive study of the classics, and vice to which they have been
instigated by our agents—tutors, valets, governesses—in rich houses, by
clerks, and so forth, and by our women in the pleasure places of the
GOYS. Among the latter I include the so-called “society women,” their
volunteer followers in vice and luxury.
Our motto is Power and Hypocrisy. Only power can conquer in politics,
especially if it is concealed in talents which are necessary to
statesmen. Violence must be the principle; hypocrisy and cunning the
rule of those governments which do not wish to lay down their crowns at
the feet of the agents of some new power. This evil is the sole means
of attaining the goal of good. For this reason we must not hesitate at
bribery, fraud, and treason when these can help us to reach our end.
In politics it is necessary to seize the property of others without
hesitation if in so doing we attain submission and power.
Our government, following the line of peaceful conquest, has the right
to substitute for the horrors of war less noticeable and more efficient
executions, these being necessary to keep up terror, which induces blind
submission. A just but inexorable strictness is the greatest factor of
governmental power. We must follow a program of violence and hypocrisy,
not only for the sake of profit, but also as a duty and for the sake of
victory.
A doctrine based on calculation is as potent as the means employed by
it. That is why not only by these very means, but by the severity of our
doctrines, we shall triumph and shall enslave all governments under our
super-government.
Even in olden times we shouted among the people the words “Liberty,
Equality, and Fraternity.” These words have been repeated so many times
since by unconscious parrots, which, flocking from all sides to the bait,
have ruined the prosperity of the world and true individual freedom,
formerly so well protected from the pressure of the mob. The would-be
clever and intelligent GOYS did not discern the symbolism of the uttered
words; did not notice the contradiction in the meaning and the connection
between them; did not notice that there is no equality in nature; that
there can be no liberty, since nature herself has established inequality
of mind, character, and ability, as well as subjection to her laws. They
did not reason that the power of the mob is blind; that the upstarts
selected for government are just as blind in politics as is the mob
itself, whereas the initiated man, even though a fool, is capable of
ruling, while the uninitiated, although a genius, will understand nothing
of politics. All this has been overlooked by the GOYS.
Meanwhile dynastic government has been based upon this, that the father
passed to his son the knowledge of the course of political evolution,
so that nobody except the members of the dynasty could possess this
knowledge, and no one could disclose the secrets to the governed people.
In the course of time the meaning of the dynastic transmission of the
true understanding of politics has been lost, thus contributing to the
success of our cause.
In all parts of the world the words “Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity”
have brought whole legions into our ranks through our blind agents,
carrying our banners with delight. Meanwhile these words were worms which
ruined the prosperity of the GOYS, everywhere destroying peace, quiet,
and solidarity, undermining all the foundations of their states. You will
see subsequently that this aided our triumph, _for it also gave us, among
other things, the opportunity to grasp the trump card, the abolition of
privileges; in other words, the very essence of the aristocracy of the
GOYS, which was the only protection of peoples and countries against us_.
On the ruins of natural and hereditary aristocracy we built an
aristocracy of our intellectual class—the money aristocracy. We have
established this new aristocracy on the qualification of wealth, which is
dependent upon us, and also upon science, which is promoted by our wise
men.
Our triumph was also made easier because, through our connections with
people who were indispensable to us, we always played upon the most
sensitive chords of the human mind, namely, greed, and the insatiable
selfish desires of man. Each of these human weaknesses taken separately
is capable of killing initiative and of placing the will of the people at
the disposal of the buyer of their activities.
Abstract liberty offered the opportunity for convincing the masses that
government is nothing but the manager representing the owner of the
country, namely, the people, and that this manager can be discarded like
a pair of worn-out gloves.
The fact that the representatives of the nation can be deposed, delivers
them into our power and practically places their appointment in our hands.