All Things Are Nothing to Me By Max Stirner

I've set my cause on nothing
[Ich hab’ mein’ Sach’ auf nichts gestellt]

What is not supposed to be my concern [Sache] ! First and foremost, the good cause [Sache], then God’s cause, the cause of mankind, of truth, of freedom, of humanity, of justice; further, the cause of my people, my prince, my fatherland; finally, even the cause of Mind, and a thousand other causes. Only my cause is never to be my concern. “Shame on the egoist who thinks only of himself!”
Let us look and see, then, how they manage their concerns – they for whose cause we are to labour, devote ourselves, and grow enthusiastic.

You have much profound information to give about God, and have for thousands of years “searched the depths of the Godhead,” and looked into its heart, so that you can doubtless tell us how God himself attends to “God’s cause,” which we are called to serve. And you do not conceal the Lord’s doings, either. Now, what is his cause? Has he, as is demanded of us, made an alien cause, the cause of truth or love, his own? You are shocked by this misunderstanding, and you instruct us that God’s cause is indeed the cause of truth and love, but that this cause cannot be called alien to him, because God is himself truth and love; you are shocked by the assumption that God could be like us poor worms in furthering an alien cause as his own. “Should God take up the cause of truth if he were not himself truth?” He cares only for his cause, but, because he is all in all, therefore all is his cause! But we, we are not all in all, and our cause is altogether little and contemptible; therefore we must “serve a higher cause.” – Now it is clear, God cares only for what is his, busies himself only with himself, thinks only of himself, and has only himself before his eyes; woe to all that is not well pleasing to him. He serves no higher person, and satisfies only himself. His cause is – a purely egoistic cause.
How is it with mankind, whose cause we are to make our own? Is its cause that of another, and does mankind serve a higher cause? No, mankind looks only at itself, mankind will promote the interests of mankind only, mankind is its own cause. That it may develop, it causes nations and individuals to wear themselves out in its service, and, when they have accomplished what mankind needs, it throws them on the dung-heap of history in gratitude. Is not mankind’s cause – a purely egoistic cause?
I have no need to take up each thing that wants to throw its cause on us and show that it is occupied only with itself, not with us, only with its good, not with ours. Look at the rest for yourselves. Do truth, freedom, humanity, justice, desire anything else than that you grow enthusiastic and serve them?

They all have an admirable time of it when they receive zealous homage. Just observe the nation that is defended by devoted patriots. The patriots fall in bloody battle or in the fight with hunger and want; what does the nation care for that? By the manure of their corpses the nation comes to “its bloom"! The individuals have died “for the great cause of the nation,” and the nation sends some words of thanks after them and – has the profit of it. I call that a paying kind of egoism.
But only look at that Sultan who cares so lovingly for his people. Is he not pure unselfishness itself, and does he not hourly sacrifice himself for his people? Oh, yes, for “his people.” Just try it; show yourself not as his, but as your own; for breaking away from his egoism you will take a trip to jail. The Sultan has set his cause on nothing but himself; he is to himself all in all, he is to himself the only one, and tolerates nobody who would dare not to be one of “his people.”
And will you not learn by these brilliant examples that the egoist gets on best? I for my part take a lesson from them, and propose, instead of further unselfishly serving those great egoists, rather to be the egoist myself.

God and mankind have concerned themselves for nothing, for nothing but themselves. Let me then likewise concern myself for myself, who am equally with God the nothing of all others, who am my all, who am the only one [Der Einzige].
If God, if mankind, as you affirm, have substance enough in themselves to be all in all to themselves, then I feel that I shall still less lack that, and that I shall have no complaint to make of my “emptiness.” I am not nothing in the sense of emptiness, but I am the creative nothing [das schöpferiche Nichts], the nothing out of which I myself as creator create everything.
Away, then, with every concern that is not altogether my concern! You think at least the “good cause” must be my concern? What’s good, what’s bad? Why, I myself am my concern, and I am neither good nor bad. Neither has meaning for me. The divine is God’s concern; the human, man’s. My concern is neither the divine nor the human, not the true, good, just, free, etc., but solely what is mine [das Meinige] , and it is not a general one, but is – unique [einzig], as I am unique.
Nothing is more to me than myself!

Critique on the Four Year Undergraduate Program of Delhi University

The student referendum, with all its magnanimity of participation has made one fact crystal clear that the FYUP has been the bane of existence for the first ear students since its institutionalization and so a whopping 10,519 students voted against FYUP out of 11,556 which constitutes roughly 91% of the total votes. If we critically analyze the issue of FYUP, strip it naked and examine its private parts, we might find something very unwanted, hideous, grotesque, and outright repulsive. I won’t waste the ink in my pen and the matter in my hawking vile comments on FYUP, its course structure, its financial burden caused by the additional courses especially on those who pay double the rent of college hostel by staying at paying guest accommodation just because DU is not able to provide ample housing facilities to all its students, its worthless foundation courses or the anarchy it has created with the introduction of the applied and foundation courses and the irregularities in both infrastructure and time table.

I will go knee-deep into this muck of FYUP and discuss the orifice from where the grime of filth is ebbing out. Getting to the root base of this problem, we can as well put aside the Vice Chancellor’s claim of broadening the higher education horizon on a more ‘international’ basis as the Guardian; a British newspaper cites the FYUP as ‘a broken attempt at Americanization of India’s higher education system.

The fact of the matter is that this Four Year Program, in the long run, will actually deteriorate the reputation of the University so much so that the individual colleges would want total autonomy to save themselves from the embarrassment of the dissent in higher education and so the most prestigious Ivy League University in India would fall asunder paving way for privatization of the biggest and most booming sector, education. There is also the question raised on the newly issued books for foundation courses which are all published through private publishing houses even though DU is a central govt. university and so the books for the foundation courses could have been published availing subsidy by the NCERT but the VC and his lackeys brought the whole notion of privatization even in this context and entered into a coalition with the book mafia ensuring more money goes into their own pockets.

If we look more and more comprehensively into the apparent realities of FYUP and develop a critique, there are no bounds to the monetary profit that the VC and the DU administration gains through the implementation of the FYUP along with the foundation courses and all that a student gains is misery, bad education and an unsecure future, all thanks to the visionary and the avant-garde thinking of the most respected Mr. Dinesh Singh who very cunningly had avoided much student agitation by including the Congress student-hand in the students’ union panel judging the FYUP that would obviously support what the Party says with a blind eye to safeguard their own interest and make their own future political career while the future of DU with a dawn of this kind of corporate takeover is much like the state of Sanskrit Tols and Perso-Arabic Madrassas at the sawn of East India Company with its notion of ‘enlightenment’ which was imposed in that era and is imposed mow. In the end, things will fall apart if the students fail to see beyond the ‘Fucha fests’ and college parties and just look at the bare facts that would affect every single student of Delhi University at all possible levels with a painful sting if we fail to unite against the demise of the education provided in our University because finally we are the ones who will be at the receiving end of the FYUP after four years and I take it that all of us wouldn’t want to end up on the wrong side thinking we made a wrong choice and ended up in the wrong path because a revolt in our university will change the course of education of the whole nation as there has been much talk of establishing FYUP as the general norm for every single govt. university in India. It is time to fight for our right to a proper education and a prosperous future that is becoming and fit enough for the status of Delhi University. The time calls for us to struggle to study!

Figt for Freedom!

The three Pillars of Soviet Communism

Warning to the People By Auguste Blanqui

What reef menaces tomorrow’s revolution?

The reef that broke that of yesterday: the deplorable popularity of bourgeois disguised as tribunes of the people.

A dismal list! Sinister names written in blood on the paving stones of democratic Europe.

The provisional government killed the Revolution. It is upon its head that the responsibility for all these disasters, for the blood of so many thousands of victims must fall.

Reaction is doing nothing but its job in cutting democracy’s throat.

The crime is that of the traitors the trusting people accepted as guides, but who instead gave them reaction.

Miserable government! Despite screams and prayers, it decrees the 45 centime tax that causes the desperate countryside to rise up; it keeps in place the royalist headquarters, the royalist magistrates, the royalist laws. Treason!

It runs down the workers of Paris; April 15 it imprisons those of Limoges; it guns down those of Rouen on the 27th; it sets loose all its executioners; it deceives and tracks down all sincere republicans. Treason! Treason!

To it alone belongs the terrible burden of all of the calamities that have all but wiped out the Revolution

Oh, these are the real guilty ones, the guiltiest among the guilty; those the deceived people saw as its sword and shield; those it acclaimed with enthusiasm, the judges of its future.

What a misfortune it would be for us if, on the forthcoming day of the people’s victory, the forgetful indulgence of the masses allows a single one of these men who forfeited their mandate to take power! That, for a second time, would be the end of the revolution.

Let the workers always have before their eyes this list of accursed names! And if even one should ever appear in a government that is a product of the insurrection, let them all cry out with one voice: treason!

Speeches, sermons, and programs would only be frauds and lies; the same jugglers will return to perform the same act, with the same bag of tricks; they would form the first link of a new, more furious chain of reaction!

Anathema on them, should they ever dare reappear!

Shame and pity on the imbecilic mass which would again fall into their net!

It’s not enough that the thieves of February be ejected for good from the Hotel de Ville; we must be protected against new traitors.

That government would be treasonous which, raised upon the proletarian bulwark, doesn’t instantly carry out:

1. The disarmament of the bourgeois guards,

2. The armament and organization of a national militia of all workers.

There are doubtless other indispensable measures, but they will grow naturally from this first act, which is the preliminary guarantee, the only pledge of security for the people.

There must remain not one rifle in the hands of the bourgeoisie. Without this, there is no salvation.

The diverse doctrines which today dispute among themselves for the sympathy of the masses can one day fulfil their promises of betterment and well being, on condition they not abandon the prey for its shadow.

Arms and organization, these are the decisive elements of progress, the serious method for putting an end to misery.

Who has iron, has bread.

We prostrate ourselves before the bayonets; they sweep up the disarmed crowd. France bristling with workers in arms means the advent of socialism.

In the presence of armed workers obstacles, resistances, and impossibilities will all disappear.

But for those workers who allow themselves to be amused by ridiculous strolls in the street, by the planting of liberty trees, by the mellifluous phrases of lawyers, there will first be holy water, then insults, and, finally, the gun. And misery forever.

Let the people choose!

How to Become a Good Communist

In order to become faithful and worthy pupils of the founders of Marxism-Leninism, we must engage in all round self-cultivation in the course of the great and protracted revolutionary struggles of the proletariat and the masses. We must engage in self-cultivation in the Marxist-Leninist theory; self cultivation in applying the Marxist-Leninist stand, view point and method to the study and handling of all problems; self-cultivation in proletarian ideology and morality; self-cultivation in upholding unity in the Party, practising criticism and self-criticism and observing discipline; self cultivation in developing the style of hard work and persistent struggle; self-cultivation in building close ties with the masses; self cultivation in various branches of scientific knowledge, etc. We are all members of the Communist Party and therefore we must all without exception carry on self-cultivation in these respects. However, since Party members differ from one another in political consciousness, experience of struggle, field of work, cultural level and in the conditions in which they work, it is natural that comrades should differ to some extent in the various aspects of self-cultivation to which they must pay special attention of which they must stress.

When Zeng Zi, in ancient times, said, "I reflect on myself three times a day,"¹ he was discussing self-examination. The Book of Odes in the famous lines, "As knife and file make smooth the bone, as jade is wrought by chisel and stone, ² referred to the need for help and criticism among friends. What all this shows is that very hard work and very earnest self-cultivation are essential if one is to make progress. But the "self-cultivation" perused by many people in the past was generally idealistic, formalistic, abstract and divorced from social practice. They exaggerated the role of subjective intentions, thinking that so long as they had "good will" in the abstract, they could transform reality, society and themselves. Of course this is absurd. Our self-cultivation cannot be done that way. We are revolutionary materialists; our self-cultivation cannot be separated from the revolutionary practices of the masses.

For us it is most important to never divorce ourselves from the current revolutionary struggle of the masses, but to identify ourselves with it, in order to study, sum up and apply the revolutionary experience of the past. This means that we must cultivate and temper ourselves in revolutionary practice and that in turn our self-cultivation and tempering are undertaken solely for the sake of the people and of revolutionary practice. It means that we must modestly learn the Marxist-Leninist stand, viewpoint and method, learn from the noble proletarian quality of the founders of Marxism-Leninism and apply all this in our practice, in our words and deeds, our daily life and work, constantly correcting or eliminating anything in our ideology contrary to it and strengthening our own proletarian communist ideology and character. It means that we should listen modestly to the opinions and criticisms of our Party comrades and of the masses, make a careful study of the practical problems in our life and work, carefully sum up and draw lessons from our experience in work, and that, in the light of all this, we should ascertain whether our understanding of Marxism-Leninism and our use of the Marxist-Leninist method are correct and check up on our shortcomings and mistakes so as to overcome them and improve our work. Furthermore, on the basis of new experience we should ascertain whether there are any individual conclusions or aspects of Marxism-Leninism that need supplementing, enriching and developing. In short, we must integrate the universal truth of Marxism- Leninism with the concrete practice of the revolution.

This is the method of self-cultivation for us communists. It is entirely different from those methods of self-cultivation which are idealistic and divorced from the revolutionary practice of the masses.
In order to persevere in this Marxist-Leninist method of cultivation, we must resolutely oppose and thoroughly eradicate one of the worst vices bequeathed to us by the old society in the field of education and study, namely, the separation of theory from practice. In the old society many people who studied thought it unnecessary, or even impossible to act upon what they had learned, and though they wrote and spoke abundantly of justice and morality, in fact they were out and out scoundrels. Although the Kuomintang reactionaries memorize the "Three People's Principles"³ and recite Sun Yat-sen's Testament,⁴ in actual fact they bleed the people white with taxes, practice corruption and slaughter, oppress the masses, are opposed to "those nations who treat us as equals", and go as far as to compromise with or surrender to the national enemy. An old ixucai⁵ once told me that of all the teachings of Confucius he was able to observe only this one, "For him no food can ever be too dainty and no minced meat too fine"⁵ and that he could not observe the rest and had never intended to. Since that is what these people are like, why do they run schools and study the "teachings of the sages"? They are after advancement and money, use the "teachings of the sages" to oppress the exploited, and deceive the people by paying lip service to justice and morality. This is typical of the attitude of the exploiting classes of the old society towards the sages they "worship". Needless to say, when we Communists study Marxism-Leninism an all that is best in our national heritage, we must never adopt such an attitude. What we learn we must practice. Being proletarian revolutionaries who are honest and pure in purpose, we cannot be untrue to ourselves, to the people, or to those who went before us. This is an outstanding characteristic as well as a great merit of Communists.
Is it possible that the old society's separation of theory from practice can have no influence on us? No, it is not! It is true that none of you students are studying Marxism-Leninism for the sake of advancement and money and or oppressing the exploited. Yet is it possible to maintain that none of you ever entertains the idea that your thoughts, words, deeds and life do not necessarily have to be guided by Marxist-Leninist principles or that you do not intend to put all the principles that you have learned into practice? Is it possible that none of you ever thinks of studying Marxism-Leninism or going deeper into the theory as a means of getting ahead in life, of showing off and becoming famous? I cannot guarantee that none of you thinks along these lines. That kind of thinking runs counter to Marxism-Leninism and to the basic Marxist-Leninist principle of the integration of theory and practice. Certainly we must study theory, but we must also practice what we learn. And it is for the sake of practice, of the Party, of the people, and of the victory of the revolution that we study theory.

Comrade Mao Zedong has said:

The great strength of Marxism-Leninism lies precisely in its integration with the concrete revolutionary practice of all countries. For the Chinese Communist Party, it is a matter of learning to apply the theory of Marxism-Leninism to the specific circumstances of China. For the Chinese Communists who are part of the great Chinese nation, flesh of its flesh and blood of its blood, any talk about Marxism in isolation from China's characteristics is merely Marxism in the abstract, Marxism in a vacuum. Hence to apply Marxism concretely in China so that its every manifestation has an indubitable Chinese character, i.e., to apply Marxism in the light of China's specific characteristics, becomes a problem which it is urgent for the whole Party to understand and solve. Foreign stereotypes must be abolished, there must be less singing of empty, abstract tunes, and dogmatism must be laid to rest; they must be replaced by the fresh, lively Chinese style and spirit which the common people of China love.

Our comrades must study the theory of Marxism-Leninism by following the method Comrade Mao Zedong speaks of here.

Workers of all Countrymen, Unite!