Max Stirner – Max Stirner-Preliminary Remarks on the Liebesstaat [Loving State]

The so-called Epistle of Baron von Stein is well known. From this the opinion has been formed that the later period of reaction alienated itself from the principles expressed in the epistle and turned to a different way of thinking, so that the liberalism of 1808, after a short period, sank into a sleep that has lasted until our own day. However, there is reason to doubt the alleged misapprehension of these principles, and it should also appear outwardly very conspicuous that the same powerful people who a few years earlier, under the most stormy of circumstances, had established a liberal view, should shortly afterwards have so easily abandoned it in order to take the opposite path. If it has at last been recognised that the long-held opinion, that the French Revolution had become unfaithful to itself through the overthrow of Napoleonic imperial rule, was based on a judgment and a superficial one at that, why should there not now be a similar connection between Stein’s liberalism and the later, so-called Reaction? Let us take a closer look at the epistle.

As is immediately apparent, Stein has two aims in common with the French Revolution, namely equality [Gleichheit] and freedom, and it only depends on how he determines one and the other. First of all, as far as equality is concerned, he recognises that the supremacy of those who were favoured for their own sake, the privileged, had to be broken, and that a complete centralization had to replace the rule of multiple masters. Hence the “hereditary subjugation”, which allowed many smaller lords to rule over the subjects of the one lord, the king, should come to an end; only the one power of subjection [Eine Erbunterthänigkeit] of all should remain and be strengthened precisely by the removal of the many lords. In the same way, the “police power” of individuals should disappear, so that one police force would watch over all subjects. The “patrimonial jurisdiction”, which belonged to a few privileged by old laws, was to be replaced by a monarchic justice, where the judges alone “depend on the supreme power”. Through this centralisation, the interests of all are drawn to one point, to the king: henceforth, one is subject only to him, without any other hereditary subservience to other subjects of the king. One is only under his police power; one receives legal judgement only from princely justice; one no longer depends on the will of the “higher-born”, but only on that of the “higher-placed” [höher Gestellten]. The doctrine of the rule of law as it is presented in the Epistle, therefore comes down to bringing all to the same level of subservience. In the future, no subject of the kingdom would at the same time be the subject of a subject [Unterthan eines Unterthanen]; the differences in the status of dependence would be balanced out, and one dependence would be the universal dependence.

It is impossible to confuse this principle of equality with that of the French Revolution. The latter demanded equality of citizens [Bürger], in the Epistle there is an equality of the subjects, an equality of subjection. A suitable expression of this difference is also found in the fact that the “National representation” is supposed to bring the “wishes” of the leveled [nivellirten] subjects before the throne, while in France the citizens, through their representatives, have a “will”, admittedly only as a citizens’ will, not itself a free one. The “subject” may only “wish” for Right [Recht].

Secondly, the Epistle does not want mere equality, it also wants the freedom of all. Hence the call: “See to it that each one,” (with this word the quality of subjects is expressed) “could develop its powers in a moral direction [moralische Richtung]”. In a moral direction? What does that mean? The physical direction cannot be thought of as the opposite, since the epistle wants to achieve a “physically and morally stronger generation.” It would also be difficult to exclude the intellectual direction from the moral one, since science was favoured as much as possible. The simplest contrast to the moral direction is the immoral direction. But a subject is immoral if he goes beyond the qualities of his subjection. A subject who in state life, in politics, assumed a “will” for himself instead of the “wish” would obviously be immoral; for the moral value of the subject consists solely in submissiveness: in obedience, not in self-determination. Thus the “moral direction” seems to declare itself incompatible with the “spontaneous direction”, the direction towards free will, towards independence and sovereignty of the will, and since the word “moral” points to the desire to be submissive, one will probably have wanted an awakening of the sense of duty, and this will have been the subject of a “desire to be submissive” which understands itself as this “free development of power”. “You are free when you do your duty!” That is the meaning of the moral direction. But what does the duty consist of? The Epistle expresses it clearly and firmly with the words that have become the motto: “In the Love of God, King and Fatherland!” Anyone who develops this love develops in a moral direction; thus moral direction was set as the definite goal of education. It was from the outset a moral or loyal education, an education of morality, to which, of course, religious education must also be added, because it, too, imprinting morality on God, is nothing other than a moral education. And indeed, one is morally free as soon as one fulfils one’s duty; conscience, this power of morality over immorality, the mistress of the moral man, tells the dutiful man that he has acted right: “my conscience [Gewissen] tells me so!” Conscience, of course, says nothing about whether the duty followed is really a duty; it only speaks when what is considered a duty is violated. Therefore, the Epistle recommends awakening the conscience. The mission is to inculcate a sense of duty “towards God, King and Fatherland”, to revive the religious sense of the people and to cultivate the education and instruction of the youth. – This is the freedom with which, according to the Epistle, the people are to be made happy: freedom in the fulfilment of duty, the moral freedom.

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