"All property or rather all substantial determinations, which relate to
my personal individuality and which enter into the general constitution
of my self-consciousness, as for example, my personality proper, my
freedom of volition in general, my morality, my religion are
_inalienable_ and the right to them is _imprescriptible_."
"That that which the mind is _per se_ and by its very definition should
also become an actual existence and _pro se_, that consequently it
should be a person, capable of holding property, possessed of morality
and religion--all this is involved in the idea of the mind itself, which
as the _causa sui_, in other words, as a free cause, is a substance,
_cujus natura non potest concipi nisi existens_. (Spinoza, Eth. S. 1.
def. 1.)."
"This very notion, that it should be what it is _through itself alone_
and as the self-concentration or endless self-retrosusception out of its
mere natural and immediate existence contains also the possibility of
the opposition between what it is only _per se_ (i. e. substantially)
and not _pro se_ (i. e. subjectively, in reality) and _vice versa_
between what is only _pro se_ and not also _per se_ (which in the Will
is the bad, the vicious);--and hence too the _possibility_ of the
_alienation_ of one's personality and of one's substantial existence,
whether this alienation be effected implicitly and unconsciously or
explicitly and expressly. Examples of the alienation of personality are
slavery, vassalage, disability to hold property, the unfree possession
of the same, &c., &c."
"Instances of the abalienation of intelligent rationality, of individual
and social morality and of religion occur in the beliefs and practices
of superstition, in ceding to another the power and the authority of
making rules and prescriptions for my actions (as when one allows
himself to be made a tool for criminal purposes), or of determining what
I am to regard as the law and duty of conscience, religious truth, &c."
"The right to such inalienable possessions is imprescriptible, _and the
act by which I become seized of my personality and of my substantial
being, by which I make myself an accountable, a moral and a religious
agent, removes these determinations from the control of all merely
external circumstances and relations, which alone could give them the
capacity of becoming the property of another_. With this abnegation of
the external, _all questions of time and all claims based upon previous
consent or acquiescence fall to the ground_. This act of rational
self-recovery, whereby I constitute myself an existing idea, a person of
legal and moral responsibility, _subverts the previous relation and puts
an end to the injustice which I myself and the other party have done to
my comprehension and to my reason, by treating and suffering to be
treated the endless existence of self-consciousness as an external and
an alienable object_."[2]
[2] I emphasize this important clause for the particular
benefit of those who in my personal history have had the absurd
expectation that I should continue to entertain a respectful
deference to a certain phase of religionism, which upon a careful
and rational examination I found to be worthless and which is
repugnant to my taste and better judgment, and of others who with
equal absurdity are in the habit of exacting ecclesiastical tests (I
will not say religious, for such men show by their very conduct that
their enlightenment in matters of the religion of the heart is very
imperfect) for academic appointments;--as if the science and the
culture of the nineteenth century were still to be the handmaid of
the church, as they were in the Middle Age; _as if Philosophy and
the Liberal Arts could ever thrive and flourish in the suffocating
atmosphere of the idols of the cave, the idols of the tribe, and the
idols of the market-place!_
"This return to myself discloses also the contradiction (the absurdity)
of my having ceded to another my legal responsibility, my morality and
my religion at a time when I could not yet be said to possess them
rationally, and which as soon as I become seized and possessed of them,
can essentially be mine alone and can not be said to have any outward
existence."
"It follows from the very nature of the case, that the slave has an
absolute right to make himself free; that if any one has hired himself
for any crime, such as robbery, murder, &c. this contract is of itself
null and void and that every one is at full liberty to break it."
"The same may be said of _all religious submission to a priest, who sets
up for my father confessor_ (_step-father_, &c.); for a matter of such
purely internal interest must be settled by every man himself and alone.
A religiosity, a part of which is deposited in the hands of another is
tantamount to none at all; for the Spirit is one, and it is he that is
required to dwell in the heart of man; the union of the _per_ and _pro
se_ must belong to every individual apart."
Transcriber's Notes:
Passages in italics are indicated by _underscores_.
Passages in small caps are replaced by either Title case or ALL CAPS,
depending on how the words were used.
Punctuation was not corrected except for the quotation mark on page 20,
and the parenthesis on page 30, as cited below. Likewise,
inconsistencies in hyphenation have not been corrected.
Each instance of the oe ligature was replaced with "oe".
On page 6, "necessaay" was replaced with "necessary".
On page 8, "of" was inserted between "city" and "New York".
On page 10, "the" was inserted before "City of".
On page 12, "catastrophies" was replaced with "catastrophes", and
"pretentions" was replaced with "pretensions".
On page 15, "the the" was replaced with "the".
On page 16, "hemsy" was replaced with "hemisy".
On page 19, "destoyed" was replaced with "destroyed".
On page 20, The quotation mark after "You are a dead man!" was moved to
after "Dead, dead, dead, dead!", and an extra quotation mark was deleted
after "certain popular preacher."
On page 24, "aad" was replaced with "and".
On page 27, "af" was replaced with "of".
On page 30, "all this in involved" was replaced with "all this is
involved", and an open parentheses was placed before "i. e.
subjectively,".