THE EGO AND ITS OWN
THE EGO AND ITS OWNThe Ego and Its Own throws down a challenge to thousands of years of religious, philosophical and political depreciation of the individual: Away with every concern that is not altogether my concern! You think that 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 is ¾ unique, as I am. Nothing is more to me than myself.
Stirner mercilessly criticizes all doctrines and beliefs that demand the interests of the individual be subordinated to those of State, Humanity, Society, or some other fiction. He exposes the bondage of the individual to fixed ideas. He declares his hostility to every creed that would crush or deny individuality. Stirner's affirmation of an amoralistic egoism, his celebration of the unique individual, has provoked cries of horror from moralists of Right and Left, religious and secular. They have denounced him as a nihilist par excellence, and have held him up as an awful example to those who would live beyond good and evil.
Our contemporary political saviors are not restrained for one moment by the moralities they profess from eliminating those individuals who step out of line and threaten the success of their schemes for redeeming the world. Indeed, those who claim to love humanity are usually sentimental butchers.
This book, described as the most revolutionary ever written, is at once a historical document and a timeless classic. Highly recommended.
