If the style of this book is found unattractive, it will show that I
have done my work ill and not represented the author truly; but, if it
is found odd, I beg that I may not bear all the blame. I have simply
tried to reproduce the author's own mixture of colloquialisms and
technicalities, and his preference for the precise expression of his
thought rather than the word conventionally expected.
One especial feature of the style, however, gives the reason why this
preface should exist. It is characteristic of Stirner's writing that the
thread of thought is carried on largely by the repetition of the same
word in a modified form or sense. That connection of ideas which has
guided popular instinct in the formation of words is made to suggest the
line of thought which the writer wishes to follow. If this echoing of
words is missed, the bearing of the statements on each other is in a
measure lost; and, where the ideas are very new, one cannot afford to
throw away any help in following their connection. Therefore, where a
useful echo (and there are few useless ones in the book) could not be
reproduced in English, I have generally called attention to it in a
note. My notes are distinguished from the author's by being enclosed in
brackets.
One or two of such coincidences of language, occurring in words which
are prominent throughout the book, should be borne constantly in mind as
a sort of _Keri perpetuum_: for instance, the identity in the original
of the words "spirit" and "mind," and of the phrases "supreme being" and
"highest essence." In such cases I have repeated the note where it
seemed that such repetition might be absolutely necessary, but have
trusted the reader to carry it in his head where a failure of his memory
would not be ruinous or likely.
For the same reason,--that is, in order not to miss any indication of
the drift of the thought,--I have followed the original in the very
liberal use of italics, and in the occasional eccentric use of a
punctuation mark, as I might not have done in translating a work of a
different nature.
I have set my face as a flint against the temptation to add notes that
were not part of the translation. There is no telling how much I might
have enlarged the book if I had put a note at every sentence which
deserved to have its truth brought out by fuller elucidation,--or even
at every one which I thought needed correction. It might have been
within my province, if I had been able, to explain all the allusions to
contemporary events, but I doubt whether any one could do that properly
without having access to the files of three or four well-chosen German
newspapers of Stirner's time. The allusions are clear enough, without
names and dates, to give a vivid picture of certain aspects of German
life then. The tone of some of them is explained by the fact that the
book was published under censorship.
I have usually preferred, for the sake of the connection, to translate
Biblical quotations somewhat as they stand in the German, rather than
conform them altogether to the English Bible. I am sometimes quite as
near the original Greek as if I had followed the current translation.
Where German books are referred to, the pages cited are those of the
German editions even when (usually because of some allusions in the
text) the titles of the books are translated.