On the Nature of Totalitarianism: An Essay in Understanding (TS)	The Difficulties of Understanding (TS, 1953)	Understanding and Politics (Partisan Review 20, 1953)
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On the Nature of Totalitarianism1	The Difficulties of Understanding1	[absent]
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An Essay in Understanding	[absent]	[absent]
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I	[absent]	[absent]
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Many people say that one cannot fight totalitarianism without understanding it. From this they conclude that in view of the complex structure of this phenomenon, only organized research, that is the combined efforts of the historical, econmical, social and psychological sciences, can produce understanding.	[absent]	[absent]
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This, I think, is as wrong as it sounds plausible. Inform ation contained in every newspaper in the free world and experience suffered every day in the totalitarian world are enough for the fight against totalitarianism although neither of which by itself promotes any true understanding of its nature. Understanding, on the other hand, will never be the product of questionaires, interviews, statistics and their scientific evaluation.	[absent]	[absent]
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[absent]	Es ist schwer, die Wahrheit zu sagen, denn es gibt zwar nur ein, aber sie ist lebendig und hat daher ein lebendig wechselndes Gesicht. Franz Kafka	[absent]
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[absent]	[absent]	Understanding and Politics
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[absent]	[absent]	Many people say that one cannot fight totalitarianism without understanding it. Fortunately this is not true; if it were our case would be hopeless. Understanding, as distinguished from correct information and scientific knowledge, is a complicated process which never produces unequivocal results. It is an unending activity by which, in constant change and variation, we come to terms with, reconcile ourselves to reality, that is, try to be at home in the world.
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[absent]	Many people say that one cannot fight totalitarianism without understanding it. This, fortunately is not true; otherwise our case would be hopeless. Understanding, as distinguished from correct information and scientific knowledge, is a complicated process which never produces unequivocal results. It is an unending activity by which, in constant change and variation, we come to terms with, reconcile ourselves to reality, that is try to be at home in the world.1 The fact that reconciliation is inherent in understanding has given rise to the popular misrepresentation of2 tout comprendre c’est tout pardonner. Yet, forgiving has so little to do with understanding that it is neither its condition nor its consequence. Forgiving,--certainly among3 the greatest human capacities and perhaps the boldest of human actions insofar as it tries the seeming4 impossible, the undoing of5 what has been done, and succeeds in making a new beginning where everything seemed to have come to an end,--is one6 action and culminates in one7 act. Understanding is unending and therefore cannot produce end-results; it is the specifically human way of being alive insofar as8 every single person needs to be reconciled to a world into which he has been9 born as10 a stranger and in which, to the extent of his distinct uniqueness, he always remains a stranger. Understanding begins with birth and ends with death. To the extent that the rise of totalitarian governments is the central event of our world, the understanding of11 totalitarianism does12 not mean13 to condone anything, but to reconcile ourselves to a world in which these things have been14 possible at all.	The fact that reconciliation is inherent in understanding has given rise to the popular misrepresentation tout comprendre c’est tout pardonner. Yet, forgiving has so little to do with understanding that it is neither its condition nor its consequence. Forgiving (certainly one of3 the greatest human capacities and perhaps the boldest of human actions insofar as it tries the seemingly4 impossible, to undo5 what has been done, and succeeds in making a new beginning where everything seemed to have come to an end) is a single6 action and culminates in a single7 act. Understanding is unending and therefore cannot produce end-results; it is the specifically human way of being alive, for8 every single person needs to be reconciled to a world into which he was9 born a stranger and in which, to the extent of his distinct uniqueness, he always remains a stranger. Understanding begins with birth and ends with death. To the extent that the rise of totalitarian governments is the central event of our world, to understand11 totalitarianism is12 not to condone anything, but to reconcile ourselves to a world in which these things are14 possible at all.
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[absent]	[absent]	Many well-meaning people want to cut this process short in order to educate others and elevate public opinion. They think that books can be weapons and that one can fight with words. But weapons and fighting belong to the activity of violence and violence, as distinguished from power, is mute; violence begins where speech ends. Words used for the purpose of fighting lose their quality of speech; they become clichés. The extent to which chlichés have crept into our everyday language and discussions may well indicate the degree to which we have not only deprived ourselves of the faculty of speech, but are ready to use more effective means of violence than bad books (and only bad books can be good weapons) with which to settle our arguments.
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[absent]	Many well-meaning people want to short-cut this process in order to educate others and to improve public opinion.1 The result of such attempts is indoctrination. As an attempt at understanding3 it transcends the comparatively solid realm of facts and figures, from whose infinity it seeks to escape; as a short-cut of4 the transcending process itself, which is arbitrarily interrupted by pronouncing some of its5 statements as though they had the reliability of facts and figures, it destroys the activity of understanding altogether. Indoctrination is dangerous because it springs primarily from a perversion of understanding, and not6 of knowledge7. The result of understanding is meaning, which we originate in the very process of living insofar as we try to understand8 what we do and what we suffer.	The result of all2 such attempts is indoctrination. As an attempt to understand3 it transcends the comparatively solid realm of facts and figures, from whose infinity it seeks to escape; as a short-cut in4 the transcending process itself, which is arbitrarily interrupted by pronouncing apodictic5 statements as though they had the reliability of facts and figures, it destroys the activity of understanding altogether. Indoctrination is dangerous because it springs primarily from a perversion not of knowledge but6 of understanding7. The result of understanding is meaning, which we originate in the very process of living insofar as we try to reconcile ourselves to8 what we do and what we suffer.
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[absent]	Indoctrination can help only1 the totalitarian fight against us2. The3 free world4 will not only do5 a very poor job in this field6 compared with totalitarian propaganda and education; by employing and training its own “experts”,7 who pretend to “understand” factual information in8 adding a pseudo-scientific9 “evaluation” to research results, it can only further10 those elements of totalitarian thinking which exist today in all free societies.	Indoctrination can only further1 the totalitarian fight against understanding and, in any case, introduces the element of violence into the whole realm of politics2. A3 free country4 will make5 a very poor job of it6 compared with totalitarian propaganda and education; by employing and training its own “experts,”7 who pretend to “understand” factual information by8 adding a non-scientific9 “evaluation” to research results, it can only advance10 those elements of totalitarian thinking which exist today in all free societies.
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[absent]	This, however, is only1 one side of the matter. We cannot wait with2 our fight against totalitarianism until we have “understood” it, because we do not, and cannot expect to understand it definitely as long as it has not definitely been defeated. The understanding of political and historical matters, since they are profoundly and fundamentally human matters4, have5 something in common with the understanding of people: who somebody essentially is we can6 know only after he is dead. For mortals, the final and the8 eternal begins only after death.	This, however, is but1 one side of the matter. We cannot delay2 our fight against totalitarianism until we have “understood” it, because we do not, and cannot expect to understand it definitely as long as it has not definitely been defeated. The understanding of political and historical matters, since they are so3 profoundly and fundamentally human, has5 something in common with the understanding of people: who somebody essentially is, we6 know only after he is dead. (This is the truth of the ancient nemo ante mortem beatus esse dici potest.)7 For mortals, the final and eternal begins only after death.
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[absent]	The most obvious escape from this predicament is the equation of totalitarian government with some well-known evil of the past--such as aggressiveness, tyranny, conspiracy, et1. al.2 Here, it seems, we are on solid ground; for together with its evils, we think we have inherited the wisdom of the past to guide us through them. Yet,3 the trouble with the wisdom of the past is that it dies as it were in4 our hands as soon as we try to apply it honestly to the central political experiences of our own time. Everything we know of totalitarianism |3 --of its institutions, actions and policies--proves5 a horrible originality which no far-fetched historical parallels can alleviate and from whose impact we can escape6 only if we decide not to focus our attention on its very nature but let it run away into the interminate9 connections and similarities which certain tenets of totalitarian doctrine necessarily show with familiar theories of occidental thought, similarities which on one hand10 are inescapable because in11 the realm of pure theory and isolated concepts there can be nothing new under the sun, and which on the other disappear completely if12 one neglects the13 theoretical formulation14 and concentrates on its15 practical application. The originality of totalitarianism is horrible, not because something16 new came into the world, but because its very actions constitute a clear18 break with all our traditions and have caused a tangible explorsion of all19 our categories of political thought and all20 our standards for moral judgment21. In other words, the very event and phenomenon which we try, and must try to understand has deprived us of our traditional tools of understanding. Nowhere was this perplexing condition clearer revealed than in the abysmal failure of the Nuremberg Trials where one attempted to reduce the Nazi demographic policies to the criminal concepts of murder and persecution, with the result that the very enormity of the crimes, on one hand, made all conceivable punishment somewhat ridiculous, and that, on the other, even this punishment could never be accepted as “legal” because it presupposed together with the obedience to the command Thou Shalt Not Kill a possible range of murderous motives, that is of those qualities which cause a man to become a murderer and make him a murderer, which quite obviously were completely absent in the accused.22	The most obvious escape from this predicament is the equation of totalitarian government with some well-known evil of the past--such as aggressiveness, tyranny, conspiracy, etc1. Here, it seems, we are on solid ground; for together with its evils, we think we have inherited the wisdom of the past to guide us through them. But3 the trouble with the wisdom of the past is that it dies, so to speak, on4 our hands as soon as we try to apply it honestly to the central political experiences of our own time. Everything we know of totalitarianism demonstrates5 a horrible originality which no far-fetched historical parallels can alleviate. We can escape from its impact6 only if we decide not to focus our attention on its very nature,7 but to8 let it run away into the interminable9 connections and similarities which certain tenets of totalitarian doctrine necessarily show with familiar theories of occidental thought. Such similarities10 are inescapable. In11 the realm of pure theory and isolated concepts there can be nothing new under the sun; but such similarities disappear completely as soon as12 one neglects theoretical formulations14 and concentrates on their15 practical application. The originality of totalitarianism is horrible, not because some16 new “idea”17 came into the world, but because its very actions constitute a break with all our traditions; they have clearly exploded19 our categories of political thought and our standards for moral judgement21.
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[absent]	Understanding, while it cannot be expected to provide any1 results which are specifically helpful or inspiring in the fight against totalitarianism, must accompany this fight insofar as2 it is more than a mere fight for survival. Insofar as |4 as4 totalitarian movements have sprung up in the midst of the5 non-totalitarian world (demonstrably6 crystallizing elements whose origin could be7 found in it and traced back into its traditions)8, since9 totalitarian governments have not been imported from the moon, the process of understanding is clearly, and perhaps primarily, also a process of self-understanding. For while we only11 know, but do not yet understand, what it is12 we are fighting against, we know and understand even less what we are fighting for. And the resignation, so characteristic of Europe during the last war and so precisely formulated by an English poet “13that we who lived by noble dreams defend the bad against the worse”,16 will no longer be sufficient17. In this sense, the activity of understanding is necessary; while it can never inspire the fight directly19 or provide otherwise missing objectives, it alone can make it meaningful and prepare a new resourcefulness of the human mind and the human20 heart which perhaps will come into free play only after the battle is won.	Understanding, while it cannot be expected to provide results which are specifically helpful or inspiring in the fight against totalitarianism, must accompany this fight if2 it is to be3 more than a mere fight for survival. Insofar as totalitarian movements have sprung up in the non-totalitarian world (crystallizing elements found in that world8, for9 totalitarian governments have not been imported from the moon)10, the process of understanding is clearly, and perhaps primarily, also a process of self-understanding. For while we merely11 know, but do not yet understand, what we are fighting against, we know and understand even less what we are fighting for. And the resignation, so characteristic of Europe during the last war and so precisely formulated by an English poet who said13 that “14we who lived by noble dreams/15defend the bad against the worse,”16 will no longer suffice17. In this sense, the activity of understanding is necessary; while it can never directly18 inspire the fight or provide otherwise missing objectives, it alone can make it meaningful and prepare a new resourcefulness of the human mind and heart which perhaps will come into free play only after the battle is won.
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In order to fight totalitarianism one need understand only one thing, that it1 is the most radical denial of freedom. Yet2, this denial it has in common with all tyrannies3 and it is of no primary importance for its nature. Whoever5 cannot be mobilized on the6 grounds of freedom,7 will not be mobilized at all. Even the “moral” approach, the outcry against crimes unprecedented in history and not foreseen in the Ten Commandments, will remain of little avail. The very existence of totalitarian movements in the non-totalitarian world, that is the appeal totalitarianism exerts on those who have all the information and are being warned day-in9 and day-out, bears eloquent witness to the breakdown of the whole structure of morality, the whole body of commands and prohibitions which traditionally translated and embodied10 the fundamental ideas of freedom and justice into terms of social relationships and political institutions11.	Knowledge and understanding are not the same, but they are interrelated. Understanding1 is based on knowledge and knowledge cannot proceed without a preliminary2, inarticulate understanding. Preliminary understanding denounces totalitarianism as tyranny3 and has decided that our fight against4 it is a fight for freedom. True is that whoever5 cannot be mobilized on these6 grounds,7 will probably8 not be mobilized at all. But the denial of freedom, albeit in a more radical form, totalitarian government has in common with a great many forms of government, and, for the understanding of its nature, it is not of primary importance. Preliminary understanding, however, no matter how rudimentary9 and even irrelevant it may ultimately prove to be, will certainly do more to prevent people from joining a totalitarian movement than the most reliable information,10 the most perceptive political analysis or the most comprehensive accumulated knowledge11.	Knowledge and understanding are not the same, but they are interrelated. Understanding1 is based on knowledge and knowledge cannot proceed without a preliminary2, inarticulate understanding. Preliminary understanding denounces totalitarianism as tyranny3 and has decided that our fight against4 it is a fight for freedom. It is true that whoever5 cannot be mobilized on these6 grounds will probably8 not be mobilized at all. But many other forms of government have denied freedom, albeit never so radically as the totalitarian regimes, so that this denial is not the primary key to understanding it. Preliminary understanding, however, no matter how rudimentary9 and even irrelevant it may ultimately prove to be, will certainly more effectively prevent people from joining a totalitarian movement than the most reliable information,10 the most perceptive political analysis, or the most comprehensive accumulated knowledge11.
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[absent]	Understanding precedes and succeeds knowledge. Preliminary understanding which is at the basis of all knowledge, and true understanding which transcends it, have this in common with |5 each other that3 they, and they alone, can4 make knowledge meaning ful. Historical dexcription5 and political analysis can never prove that there is such a thing at all6 as the nature or the essence of totalitarian government, just as7 there is the8 nature of9 monarchical, republican, tyrannical or despotic government. This specific nature is taken for granted by the preliminary understanding on which the sciences base themselves, and this preliminary understanding permeates as a matter of course, but not of10 critical insight, their whole terminology and vocabulary. True understanding always returns to the judgments11 and prejudices which preceded and guided the strictly scientific inquiry. The sciences can only illuminate, but neither prove nor disprove the uncritical preliminary understanding from which they start. If the scientist misguided by the very labors14 of inquiries15 begins to pose as an expert in politics and to despise that16 popular understanding from which he started, he loses immediately the Ariadne thread of common sense which alone will guide him securely through the labyrinth of his own results. If, on the other hand, the scholar wants to transcend his own knowledge--and there is no other way to make this17 knowledge meaningful but such a transcending18--he must become very humble again and listen closely to popular language in which words like totalitarianism are daily used as political clih cliches21 and misused as catchwords in order to reestablish23 contact between knowledge and understanding.	Understanding precedes and succeeds knowledge. Preliminary understanding,1 which is at the basis of all knowledge, and true understanding,2 which transcends it, have this in common:3 they make knowledge meaningful. Historical description5 and political analysis can never prove that there is such a thing as the nature or the essence of totalitarian government, simply because7 there is a8 nature to9 monarchical, republican, tyrannical or despotic government. This specific nature is taken for granted by the preliminary understanding on which the sciences base themselves, and this preliminary understanding permeates as a matter of course, but not with10 critical insight, their whole terminology and vocabulary. True understanding always returns to the judgements11 and prejudices which preceded and guided the strictly scientific inquiry. The sciences can only illuminate, but neither prove nor disprove,12 the uncritical preliminary understanding from which they start. If the scientist,13 misguided by the very labor14 of his inquiry,15 begins to pose as an expert in politics and to despise the16 popular understanding from which he started, he loses immediately the Ariadne thread of common sense which alone will guide him securely through the labyrinth of his own results. If, on the other hand, the scholar wants to transcend his own knowledge--and there is no other way to make knowledge meaningful except by transcending it18--he must become very humble again and listen closely to the19 popular language,20 in which words like totalitarianism are daily used as political clichés21 and misused as catchwords,22 in order to re-establish23 contact between knowledge and understanding.
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[absent]	The popular use of the word totalitarianism for the purpose of denouncing some supreme political evil is not much older that1 about five years. Up to the end of World War II and even during the first post-war ywars4, the catchword for political evil was imperialism. As such, it was generally used to denote aggressiveness in foreign politics; this identification was so thorough that the two words could easily be exchaged5 for each6 other. In much the same way7, totalitarianism is used today to denote lust for power, will to dominate, terror and9 and a so-called monolithic state structure. The change itself |6 is noteworthy; imperialism10 remained a popular catchword long after the rise of Bolshevism, Fascism and Nazism; people,11 obviously,12 had not yet caught up with events or did not believe that these new movements would eventually dominate the whole historical period. Not even the13 war with a totalitarian power, but only the actual downfall of imperialism,14 which was accepted after the liquidation of the British Empire and the reception of India into the British Commonwealth, marked the moment when15 the new event16, totalitarianism, was admitted to have17 taken the place of imperialism as the central political issue of a new18 era.	The popular use of the word totalitarianism for the purpose of denouncing some supreme political evil is not much more than1 about five years old2. Up to the end of World War II,3 and even during the first postwar years4, the catchword for political evil was imperialism. As such, it was generally used to denote aggressiveness in foreign politics; this identification was so thorough that the two words could easily be exchanged one5 for the6 other. Similarly7, totalitarianism is used today to denote lust for power, the8 will to dominate, terror,9 and a so-called monolithic state structure. The change itself is noteworthy. Imperialism10 remained a popular catchword long after the rise of Bolshevism, Fascism and Nazism; obviously people12 had not yet caught up with events or did not believe that these new movements would eventually dominate the whole historical period. Not even a13 war with a totalitarian power, but only the actual downfall of imperialism (14which was accepted after the liquidation of the British Empire and the reception of India into the British Commonwealth) could admit that15 the new phenomenon16, totalitarianism, had17 taken the place of imperialism as the central political issue of the18 era.
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[absent]	Yet while popular language thus recognizes a new event by accepting a new word, it invariably uses such concepts as synonyms for some others1 signifying old and familiar evils --aggressiveness and lust for conquest in the case of imperialism, terror and lust for power in the case of totalitarianism. The choice of the new word indicates that everybody knows that something new and decisive has happened, while its ensuing use, the identification with2 the new and specific phenomenon with something familiar and rather general, indicates the popular3 unwillingness to admit that anything out of the ordinary has happened at all. It is as though with the first step, finding a new name for a new force which will determine the course of our political destinies, we orient ourselves toward new and specific conditions, whereas with the second step--4as it were on second thought--6we regret our boldness and console ourselves that nothing worse or less familiar will take place than general human sinfulness.	Yet while popular language thus recognizes a new event by accepting a new word, it invariably uses such concepts as synonyms for other1 signifying old and familiar evils--aggressiveness and lust for conquest in the case of imperialism, terror and lust for power in the case of totalitarianism. The choice of the new word indicates that everybody knows that something new and decisive has happened, while its ensuing use, the identification of2 the new and specific phenomenon with something familiar and rather general, indicates unwillingness to admit that anything out of the ordinary has happened at all. It is as though with the first step, finding a new name for a new force which will determine the course of our political destinies, we orient ourselves toward new and specific conditions, whereas with the second step (and,4 as it were,5 on second thought)6 we regret our boldness and console ourselves that nothing worse or less familiar will take place than general human sinfulness.
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[absent]	Popular language, as it expresses preliminary understanding thus starts the process of true understanding with a2 discovery which3 must always remain its actual content4 if it does5 not want6 to lose itself in the clouds of mere speculation, and7 a danger which will8 always remain9 present. It has been10 the common uncritical understanding of the people which12 more than anything else induced a whole generation of historians, |7 economists and political scientists to devote their best efforts to the investigation of the causes and consequences of imperialism, and, at the same time, misrepresent it as “Empire building” after15 Assyrian or Egyptian or Roman fashion and misunderstand its underlying motives as “lust for conquest”,16 describing Cecil Rhodes as a second Napoleon and Napoleon as a second Julius Cesar17. Totalitarianism, similarly, has become a current topic of study only since preliminary understanding recognized it as the central issue and the most significant danger of the time; and again18, the current interpretations even on the highest scholarly level let themselves be guided further by the design of preliminary understanding and19 equate totalitarian domination with tyranny or one-party dictatorship, if20 they do not explain the whole thing away by reducing it to historical or21 social or psychological causes which can be22 relevant only for one country, Germany or Russia. It is evident that such methods do not help any effort at understanding because it makes disappear into23 a welter of familiarities and plausibilities whatever is unfamiliar and24 in need25 of being understood26.	Popular language, as it expresses preliminary understanding,1 thus starts the process of true understanding. Its2 discovery must always remain the content of true understanding4 if it is5 not to lose itself in the clouds of mere speculation,--7a danger always present. It was10 the common uncritical understanding on the part11 of the people more than anything else that13 induced a whole generation of historians, economists and political scientists to devote their best efforts to the investigation of the causes and consequences of imperialism, and, at the same time, to14 misrepresent it as “empire-building” in the15 Assyrian or Egyptian or Roman fashion and misunderstand its underlying motives as “lust for conquest,”16 describing Cecil Rhodes as a second Napoleon and Napoleon as a second Julius Caesar17. Totalitarianism, similarly, has become a current topic of study only since preliminary understanding recognized it as the central issue and the most significant danger of the time. Again18, the current interpretations even on the highest scholarly level let themselves be guided further by the design of preliminary understanding: they19 equate totalitarian domination with tyranny or one-party dictatorship, when20 they do not explain the whole thing away by reducing it to historical,21 social or psychological causes relevant only for one country, Germany or Russia. It is evident that such methods do not advance efforts to understand because they submerge whatever is unfamiliar and needs to be understood in23 a welter of familiarities and plausibilities. It lies, as Nietzsche once remarked,24 in the province25 of the development of science to “dissolve the ‘known’ into the unknown:--but science wants to do the opposite and is inspired by the instinct to reduce the unknown to something which is known26.”27
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Many people doubt that this breakdown is a reality. They think some accident has happened after which one’s duty is to restore the old order, appeal to the old knowledge of right and wrong, mobilize the old instincts for order and safety. Whoever thinks and tells differently, they call “prophets of doom” whose gloominess threatens to darken the sun which rises over good and evil from eternity to eternity.	[absent]	[absent]
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The fact of the matter is that the “prophets of doom”, that is the historical pssimists of the late nineteenth and early twentieth century from Burckhard to Spengler, have been put out of business by the actuality of catastrophes whose size and horror nobody ever foresaw and predicted. Certain developments, on the other hand, apparently could and have been predicted though these predictions do hardly ever occur in the nineteenth century but are found in the eighteenth century and were overlooked because nothing seemed to justify them. It is worthwhile, for instance, to learn what Kant, in 1793, had to say about the “balance of power system” as solution of the conflicts rising from the European nation state system: “The so-called balance of powers in Europe is like Swift’s house which had been built in so perfect harmony with all laws of equilibrium that, when a bird sat down on it, it immediately collapsed--a mere phantasm.” Well, it was not a mere phantasm but it did collapse exactly as Kant had predicted; in the words of a modern historian: “The iron test of the balance of power lies in the very thing it is designed to stave off--war.” (Hajo Holborn, The Political Collapse of Europe, 1951.)	[absent]	[absent]
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More sweeping in outlook and yet closer to reality is another eighteenth century author who is usually not counted among the “prophets of doom” and who is as serene, as sober, and even less disturbed (the French Revolution had not yet taken place) than Kant. There is hardly any event of any importance in our present history that would not fit into the scheme of Montesquieu’s apprehensions.	[absent]	[absent]
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[absent]	True understanding is distinguished from public opinion in both its popular and scientific form by its refusal to let go the original intuition of preliminary understanding. Preliminary understanding that coins new words or suddenly endows already used words with a new and wider significance is prompted by the universal need for orientation in the world and indicates therefore always the precise moment when this world is really and deeply changed through a new event. Orientation is also one of the decisive motives for all scientific effort, and it is therefore only natural that preliminary understanding and science should remain so closely bound together. True understanding which is always a quest for meaning goes beyond both and therefore leads us back to what preliminary understanding saw and knew in the beginning.	[absent]
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[absent]	Yet, has not the task of understanding become hopeless if it is true that we are confronted with something which has exploded1 our categories of thought and our2 standards of judgment3? How can we measure any4 length if we do not have a yardstick, how could we count things without the notion of numbers? Maybe it is preposterous even to think that anything could5 ever happen which our categories are not equipped to understand. Maybe we should resign ourselves to the preliminary understanding, which at once ranges the new among the old, and with the scientific approach, which follows it and deduces methodically the unprecedented from precedents, even though their6 description of the new phenomena may be demonstrably at variance with the reality. Is not understanding so closely related to and interrelated with judging that one must describe the action of7 both as the subsumption of something particular under a universal rule which according to Kant is the very definition of judgment10 whose absence he so magnificently defined as “stupidity”,11 an “infirmity beyond remedy”? (Critique of Pure Reason, 2nd edition, note on p. 173)12	Yet, has not the task of understanding become hopeless if it is true that we are confronted with something which has destroyed1 our categories of thought and standards of judgement3? How can we measure length if we do not have a yardstick, how could we count things without the notion of numbers? Maybe it is preposterous even to think that anything can5 ever happen which our categories are not equipped to understand. Maybe we should resign ourselves to the preliminary understanding, which at once ranges the new among the old, and with the scientific approach, which follows it and deduces methodically the unprecedented from precedents, even though such a6 description of the new phenomena may be demonstrably at variance with the reality. Is not understanding so closely related to and interrelated with judging that one must describe both as the subsumption (8of something particular under a universal rule)9 which according to Kant is the very definition of judgement,10 whose absence he so magnificently defined as “stupidity,”11 an “infirmity beyond remedy”?
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[absent]	These questions are all the more pertinent as they are not restricted to our perplexity in understanding totalitarianism. The meaninglessness which has invaded the modern world is to a large extent due to our inability to understand meaningfully and judge securely. The1 paradox of the modern situation seems to be that our need to transcend preliminary understanding and the strictly scientific approach springs from the fact that we lost our tools of understanding. Our quest for meaning is at the same time prompted and frustrated through3 our inability to originate meaning. Kant’s definition of stupidity is by no means besides4 the point. Since the beginning of this century, the growth of meaninglessness has permanently5 been accompanied by an increasing6 loss of common sense. In many respects, this has appeared simply as growing stupidity of people7. We do not8 know of any9 civilization before us10 in which people would be11 gullible enough to form their buying habits in accordance with the maxim that “self-praise is the highest recommendation”12, which is13 the ruling maxim14 of all advertising. Nor is it very15 likely that any century before us would16 |9 have been persuaded to take a therapy seriously18 which is said to help only if the sick person pays19 a considerable amount20 of money to those who administer it--unless, of course,21 there exists a primitive society where the handing over of money itself possesses magical power.	These questions are all the more pertinent as they are not restricted to our perplexity in understanding totalitarianism. The paradox of the modern situation seems to be that our need to transcend preliminary understanding and the strictly scientific approach springs from the fact that we have2 lost our tools of understanding. Our quest for meaning is at the same time prompted and frustrated by3 our inability to originate meaning. Kant’s definition of stupidity is by no means beside4 the point. Since the beginning of this century, the growth of meaninglessness has been accompanied by loss of common sense. In many respects, this has appeared simply as an increasing stupidity7. We know of no9 civilization before ours10 in which people were11 gullible enough to form their buying habits in accordance with the maxim that “self-praise is the highest recommendation,”13 the assumption14 of all advertising. Nor is it likely that any century before ours could16 have been persuaded to take seriously17 a therapy which is said to help only if the patients pay19 a lot20 of money to those who administer it--except21 there exists a primitive society where the handing over of money itself possesses magical power.
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[absent]	[absent]	What has happened to the clever little rules of self-interest has happened on a much larger scale to all the spheres of ordinary life which, because they are ordinary, need to be regulated by customs. Totalitarian phenomena which can no longer be understood in terms of common sense and which defy all rules of “normal,” that is chiefly utilitarian judgment, are only the most spectacular instances of the breakdown of our common inherited wisdom. From the point of view of common sense, we did not need the rise of totalitarianism to show us that we are living in a topsy-turvy world, a world where we cannot find our way by abiding by the rules of what once was common sense. In this situation, stupidity in the Kantian sense has become the infirmity of everybody, and therefore can no longer be regarded as “beyond remedy.” Stupidity has become as common as common sense was before; and this does not mean that it is a symptom of mass society or that “intelligent” people are exempt from it. The only difference is that stupidity remains blissfully inarticulate among the non-intellectuals and becomes unbearably offensive among “intelligent” people. Within the intelligentsia, one may even say that the more intelligent an individual happens to be, the more irritating is the stupidity which he has in common with all.
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[absent]	What has happened to1 the little clever rules of self-interest2, has happened on a much larger scale3 to all4 the spheres5 of ordinary life which, because they are ordinary6, need to be regulated7 by customs. That these customs, together with their rules8 of behavior which quite literally constitute the morality, the mores, of any given civilization, were9 the only elements that prevented a moral and spiritual breakdown of occidental culture had been recognized as early as the eighteenth century and by no less an authority than Montesquieu11. He certainly cannot be counted among the prophets of doom; yet12 his cold and sober courage has hardly been matched by any of the famous historical pessimist13 of the nineteenth century.	It seems like historical justice that Paul Valéry,1 the most lucid mind among the French2, the classical people of bon sens, was the first3 to detect4 the bankruptcy5 of common sense in the modern world where the most commonly accepted ideas have been “attacked6, refuted, surprised and dissolved7 by facts” and where therefore we witness a “kind8 of insolvency of imagination and bankruptcy of understanding.” Much more surprising is that as early as9 the eighteenth century Montesquieu was convinced that10 only customs--which, being mores, quite literally constitute the morality of every civilization--prevented a spectacular moral and spiritual breakdown of occidental culture11. He certainly cannot be counted among the prophets of doom, but12 his cold and sober courage has hardly been matched by any of the famous historical pessimists13 of the nineteenth century.
29
The life of peoples, according to Montesquieu, are1 ruled by laws and customs and the difference between them is2 that “the3 laws rule rather the4 actions of the citizen and that the5 customs rule rather6 the actions of man.” (Esprit des Lois, Book xix, ch. 16)7 Laws establish the realm of public,8 political life and customs establish the realm of society. The downfall of nations begins with the decay10 of the law11, be it that12 the laws are being13 abused by those who are14 in power or that the authority15, i.e.16 the very source17 of the law18 becomes doubtful and questionable. In both cases,19 laws are no longer held valid and the nation living under it has lost,20 with its “belief” in the law21, the realm of22 political public action and of23 the responsibility24 of the citizen25. What still remains,27 and incidentally explains the longevity of political bodies whose lifeblood, as it were,29 has ebbed away,30 are the customs and traditions of society. As31 long as they are intact, men as private individuals instinctively32 continue to behave according to certain patterns of morality, even though33 this morality has lost its fundament34. However, tradition35 can be trusted37 to prevent38 the worst only for39 a limited time40. Every incident can destroy customs which have41 no longer a fundament in law42, every contingency must threaten a society which43 is no longer guaranteed by citizens44.	The life of peoples, according to Montesquieu, are1 ruled by laws and by customs; they are distinguished in2 that “the3 laws rule rather4 actions of the citizen and the5 customs rule rather6 the actions of man.” (Esprit des Lois, Book XiX, ch. 16)7 Laws establish the realm of public,8 political life,9 and customs establish the realm of society. The downfall of nations begins with the undermining10 of lawfulness11, be it that12 the laws are being13 abused by the government14 in power or that the authority15, i.e.16 the very source17 of the law,18 becomes doubtful and questionable. In both instances,19 laws are no longer held valid and the result is that the nation, together20 with its “belief” in its own laws21, loses its capacity for responsible22 political action; the people cease to be citizens in23 the full sense24 of the word25. What then26 still remains (27and incidentally explains the frequent28 longevity of political bodies whose lifeblood has ebbed away)30 are the customs and traditions of society. As31 long as they are intact, men as private individuals continue to behave according to certain patterns of morality. But33 this morality has lost its fundament34. |9a Totalitarian phenomena which35 can no longer36 be understood in terms of common sense and which defy all rules of “normal”, that is chiefly utilitarian judgment, are only the most spectactular instance of the breakdown of the traditional accumulated wisdom common37 to us all. From38 the point of view of common sense, we did not need the rise of totalitarianism to show us that we are living in39 a topsy-turvy world, that is a world where one cannot find one’s way by abiding to the rules of common sense40. In this situation, stupidity in the Kantian sense has become the infirmity of everybody, and therefore can41 no longer be regarded as “beyond remedy”. Stupidity has become as common as common sense was previously; and this does not mean that it is a symptom of the mass-society or that “intelligent” people are exempt from it42, the only difference being that stupidity remains inarticulate (and therefore43 is less offensive) among the non-intellectuals44. Within the intelligentsia, one may even say that the more “intelligent” an individual happens to be, the more irrtating becomes the stupidity which he has in common with all.45	The life of peoples, according to Montesquieu, is1 ruled by laws and customs; the two are distinguished in2 that “laws govern the4 actions of the citizen and customs govern6 the actions of man.” Laws establish the realm of public political life,9 and customs establish the realm of society. The downfall of nations begins with the undermining10 of lawfulness11, whether12 the laws are abused by the government14 in power, or16 the authority17 of their source18 becomes doubtful and questionable. In both instances19 laws are no longer held valid. The result is that the nation, together20 with its “belief” in its own laws21, loses its capacity for responsible22 political action; the people cease to be citizens in23 the full sense24 of the word25. What then26 still remains (27and incidentally explains the frequent28 longevity of political bodies whose lifeblood has ebbed away)30 are the customs and traditions of society. So31 long as they are intact, men as private individuals continue to behave according to certain patterns of morality. But33 this morality has lost its foundation34. Tradition35 can be trusted37 to prevent38 the worst for only39 a limited time40. Every incident can destroy customs and morality which41 no longer have their foundation in lawfulness42, every contingency must threaten a society which43 is no longer guaranteed by citizens44.
30
[absent]	Tradition can be trusted to prevent the worst only for a limited time. Every incident can destroy the customs and a morality which have no longer their fundament in lawfulness, every contingency must threaten a society which is no longer guaranteed by citizens.	[absent]
31
For his own time and its immediate prospects, Montesquieu has the following1 to say: “The majority of the nations of Europe are still ruled by customs. But if |4 through a long misuse2 of power, if through some large conquest, despotism would3 establish itself at a given point, there would be neither customs nor climate which could4 resist; and in this beautiful part of the world, human nature5 would suffer, at least for a time, the insults which have been inflicted on it in the three others.” (Esprit des Lois, Book vii, ch. 8)6	For his own time and its immediate prospects, Montesquieu had the following1 to say: “The majority of the nations of Europe are still ruled by customs. But if through a long misuse2 of power, if through some large conquest, despotism would3 establish itself at a given point, there would be neither customs nor climate which could4 resist; and in this beautiful part of the world, human natures5 would suffer, at least for a time, the insults which have been inflicted on it in the three others.” (ibidem, Book VII, ch. 8) In this passage, Montesquieu outlines the political dangers to a political body which is held together by customs and traditions only, that is by the mere binding force of morality. The dangers could appear from within, as misuse of power, or from without, as agression; the factor which eventually would bring the downfall of customs about in the beginning 19th century, he could not foresee; it came from that radical change of the modern world which we call the industrial revolution; this, certainly, is the greatest revolution in the shortest span of time mankind has ever witnessed; it changed in a few decades our whole globe more radically than the whole three thousand years of recorded history before it. Reconsidering Montesquieu fears which were voiced almost 100 years before this revolution had taken place in its whole magnitude, it is tempting, even though perhaps a bit idle, to reflect on the probable course of European civilization without the impact of this one, all-overriding factor. One conclusion seems inescapable: the great change took place within a political framework whose fundaments were no longer secure and overtook therefore a society which, although it was still able to understand and to judge, was no longer in a position to give account of its categories of understanding and standards of judgment if these should be challenged seriously. In other words, Montesquieu fears, |11 which sound so strange in the eighteenth and would sound so commonplace in the nineteenth century, may at least give us a hint for the explanation--not of totalitarianism or any other specific modern event but--of the disturbing fact that our great tradition has remained so peculiarly silent, so obviously wanting in productive replies, when challenged by the “moral” and political questions of our own time. The very sources from which such answers should have flown had dried up even before the debris of the caved in framework, within which understanding and judging could orient themselves, had buried them.6	For his own time and its immediate prospects, Montesquieu had this1 to say: “The majority of the nations of Europe are still ruled by customs. But if through a long abuse2 of power, if through some large conquest, despotism should3 establish itself at a given point, there would be neither customs nor climate to4 resist; and in this beautiful part of the world, human nature5 would suffer, at least for a time, the insults which have been inflicted on it in the three others.” In this passage, Montesquieu outlines the political dangers to a political body which is held together only by customs and traditions, that is by the mere binding force of morality. The dangers could appear from within, as misuse of power, or from without, as aggression. The factor which would eventually bring about the downfall of customs in the early nineteenth century, he could not foresee. It came from that radical change in the world which we call the industrial revolution, certainly the greatest revolution in the shortest span of time mankind has ever witnessed; in a few decades it changed our whole globe more radically than all the three thousand years of recorded history before it. Reconsidering Montesquieu’s fears, which were voiced almost 100 years before this revolution developed its full force, it is tempting to reflect on the probable course of European civilization without the impact of this one, all-overriding factor. One conclusion seems inescapable: the great change took place within a political framework whose foundations were no longer secure and therefore overtook a society which, although it was still able to understand and to judge, could no longer give an account of its categories of understanding and standards of judgement when they were seriously challenged. In other words, Montesquieu’s fears which sound so strange in the eighteenth century and would have sounded so commonplace in the nineteenth, may at least give us a hint of the explanation, not of totalitarianism or any other specific modern event, but of the disturbing fact that our great tradition has remained so peculiarly silent, so obviously wanting in productive replies, when challenged by the “moral” and political questions of our own time. The very sources from which such answers should have sprung had dried up. The very framework within which understanding and judging could arise is gone.6
32
This1, it seems, is bad and accurate enough; it is not the end of Montesquieu’s apprehensions. He had given too much thought to2 the evil of tyranny on one side, to the conditions of human freedom on3 the other, not to be driven to some ultimate conclusions. He fears for even4 more than the welfare of the European peoples or5 the continued existence of political liberties6; his main fear which he puts at the head of his whole work (into its preface)7 concerns human nature itself.8 “Man, this flexible being, who bends himself in society to the thoughts and impressions9 of others, is equally capable of knowing his own nature when it is shown to him as he is of losing it to the point where he has no sentiment of its anymore11 (d’en perdre12 jusqu’au sentiment) if he is being robbed of it.”	However1, Montesquieu’s fears go even farther, and therefore came even closer to our present perplexity, than2 the above quoted passage would indicate. His main fear, which he puts at3 the head of his whole work (into its preface), concerns4 more than the welfare of the European nations and5 the continued existence of political freedom6; it7 concerns human nature itself:8 “Man, this flexible being, who bends himself in society to the thoughts and expressions9 of others, is equally capable of knowing his own nature when it is shown to him as he is of losing it to the point where he has no sentiment of it any more11 (d’en predre12 jusqu’au sentiment) if he is being robbed of it.” To us, who are confronted with the very realistic totalitarian attempt at robbing man of his nature under the pretetx of changing it, the courage of these words is like the boldness of youth which may risk in imagination everything because nothing has happened as yet to supply the dangers outlined in the realm of the imaginary with their horrible concreteness. What is envisaged here is more than the loss of the capacity for political action, which is, as we shall see later, the central condition of tyranny, and more than the growth of meaninglessness and the loss of common sense (and common sense is only that part of our mind and that portion of the wisdom in any given civilization which we all have in common); it is the loss of the quest for meaning and need for understanding. We know how very close to this condition of meaninglessness which is no longer experienced as such totalitarian terror combined with training in ideological thinking hans |12 has brought the people under its domination.13	However1, Montesquieu’s fears go even further, and therefore come even closer to our present perplexity, than2 the above quoted passage would indicate. His main fear, which he puts at3 the head of his whole work, concerns4 more than the welfare of the European nations and5 the continued existence of political freedom6; it7 concerns human nature itself:8 “Man, this flexible being, who bends himself in society to the thoughts and expressions9 of others, is equally as10 capable of knowing his own nature when it is shown to him as he is of losing it to the point where he has no sentiment of it any more11 (d’en perdre12 jusqu’au sentiment) if he is being robbed of it.” To us, who are confronted with the very realistic totalitarian attempt to rob man of his nature under the pretext of changing it, the courage of these words is like the boldness of youth which may risk everything in imagination because nothing has yet happened to give to the imagined dangers their horrible concreteness. What is envisaged here is more than loss of the capacity for political action, which is the central condition of tyranny, and more than growth of meaninglessness and loss of common sense (and common sense is only that part of our mind and that portion of inherited wisdom which all men have in common in any given civilization); it is the loss of the quest for meaning and need for understanding. We know how very close the people under totalitarian domination have been brought to this condition of meaninglessness, by means of terror combined with training in ideological thinking, although they no longer experience it as such.13
33
[absent]	Noteworthy in1 our context is2 the peculiar and ingenious substitute3 of stringent logicality for common sense4 which is characteristic of totalitarian thinking. Logicality is not identical with ideological reasoning but indicates the totalitarian transformation of the respective ideologies. If it was the peculiarity of the ideologies to treat some7 scientific hypothesis, such as8 the survival of the fittest in biology or the survival of the most progressive class in history, as an “idea” which the whole course of happenings10, then it is the peculiarity of their totalitarian transformation to pervert the “idea” into a premise in the logical sense, that is into some self-evident statement from which everything else can be deduced in stringent logical consistency. (Here truth becomes indeed what some logicians pretend it to be11, namely consistency, except that this equation actually implies the negation of the existence of truth insofar as truth is always supposed to reveal something, whereas consistency is only a mode of fitting statements together and as such lacks the power of revelation.)13 The new logical movement in philosophy which grew out of pragmatism has a frightening affinity with the totalitarian transformation of the pragmatic elements, inherent in all ideologies, into logicality which severes17 its bounds with18 reality and experience altogether although, of19 course, totalitarianism proceeds in a cruder fashion, which,20 unfortunately, by the same token is also more effective.) The chief political distinction between common sense and logic is that common sense presupposes a world22 common to us all23 into which we fit and where we can live together because we possess one sense which controls and adjusts all strictly particular sense data to those of all others, whereas logic and all self-evidence from which logical reasoning proceeds can claim a reliability altogether independent from25 the world and the existence of other people. It has often be26 observed that the validity of the statement:27 2+2 equals28 4 is independent of the human condition, it is equall30[gap] valid for God and man. In other words, wherever common sense fails |13 us in our need for understanding, we are all too likely to accept logicality as its substitute, because the capacity of32 logical reasoning itself is common to us all. But this common human capacity which functions even under condition34 of complete separation from world and experience and which is strictly “within” us, without any bond to something “given, is unable to understand anything and left to itself utterly sterile. Only under conditions where the common realm between men is destroyed and the only reliability left consists in the meaningless tautologies of the self-evident, can this capacity become “productive”,38 develop its own lines of thought whose chief political characteristic is that it39 always carries40 with it41 a compulsory power of persuasion. To equate thought and understanding with these logical operations means to level down the capacity for thought, which for thousands of years has been deemed to be the highest capacity of man, to its lowest common denominator where no differences of42 actual existence count any longer, not even the qualitative difference between the essence of God and men.	In1 our context,2 the peculiar and ingenious replacement3 of common sense with stringent logicality4 which is characteristic of totalitarian thinking is particularly noteworthy5. Logicality is not identical with ideological reasoning,6 but indicates the totalitarian transformation of the respective ideologies. If it was the peculiarity of the ideologies to treat a7 scientific hypothesis, like8 the survival of the fittest in biology or the survival of the most progressive class in history, as an “idea” which could be applied to9 the whole course of events10, then it is the peculiarity of their totalitarian transformation to pervert the “idea” into a premise in the logical sense, that is into some self-evident statement from which everything else can be deduced in stringent logical consistency. (Here truth becomes indeed what some logicians pretend it is11, namely consistency, except that this equation actually implies the negation of the existence of truth insofar as truth is always supposed to reveal something, whereas consistency is only a mode of fitting statements together,12 and as such lacks the power of revelation. The new logical movement in philosophy,14 which grew out of pragmatism,15 has a frightening affinity with the totalitarian transformation of the pragmatic elements, inherent in all ideologies, into logicality,16 which severs17 its ties to18 reality and experience altogether. Of19 course, totalitarianism proceeds in a cruder fashion, which unfortunately, by the same token,21 is also more effective.) The chief political distinction between common sense and logic is that common sense presupposes a common world23 into which we all24 fit and where we can live together because we possess one sense which controls and adjusts all strictly particular sense data to those of all others, whereas logic and all self-evidence from which logical reasoning proceeds can claim a reliability altogether independent of25 the world and the existence of other people. It has often been26 observed that the validity of the statement 2+2=284 is independent of the human condition, that29 it is equally30 valid for God and man. In other words, wherever common sense, the political sense par excellence,31 fails us in our need for understanding, we are all too likely to accept logicality as its substitute, because the capacity for32 logical reasoning itself is also33 common to us all. But this common human capacity which functions even under conditions34 of complete separation from world and experience and which is strictly “within” us, without any bond to something “given,”35 is unable to understand anything and,36 left to itself,37 utterly sterile. Only under conditions where the common realm between men is destroyed and the only reliability left consists in the meaningless tautologies of the self-evident, can this capacity become “productive,”38 develop its own lines of thought whose chief political characteristic is that they39 always carry40 with them41 a compulsory power of persuasion. To equate thought and understanding with these logical operations means to level down the capacity for thought, which for thousands of years has been deemed to be the highest capacity of man, to its lowest common denominator where no differences in42 actual existence count any longer, not even the qualitative difference between the essence of God and men.
34
Maybe we, who are confronted with the very realistic attempt at total domination which is nothing else but the attempt at robbing man of his very nature, can no longer afford the cold courage of Montesquieu’s fear. To us, it looks like the boldness of youth which will risk in imagination everything because nothing as yet has happened to fill in with concrete experience the forms of pure and radical thought. But if we have a chance to save anything from the conflagration in which we are caught, then certainly only those essentials which are even more basic than the fundaments of law and the texture of tradition and morality which is woven around them. These essentials can be no more than that Freedom is the quintessence of the human condition and that Justice is the quintessence of man’s social condition, or, in other words, that Freedom is the essence of the human |5 individual and Justice the essence of men’s living together. And that both can disappear from the earth only with the physical disappearance of the human race.	[absent]	[absent]
35
The fight against totalitarianism itself needs not more than a steady flow of reliable information; and the less evaluation is added to the facts, the better they will serve all propaganda purposes. If from these facts an appeal emerges, the appeal to Freedom and Justice, to mobilize people for the fight, then the appeal will not be a piece of abstract rhetorics. Facts must be enough; they can only lose their weight and their poignancy through evaluation or through being used for moral preaching. There exists no longer any accepted morality upon which sermons could be based and there exists not yet any law which would permit for non-arbitrary evaluations. [metamark ———————— #]	[absent]	[absent]
36
For practical political purposes it becomes necessary to transcend the limitations of facts and information and to develop some comprehension for the elements whose crystallization brought about totalitarianism only when the fight is over and victory is won. For these elements do not cease to exist with the defeat of one or all totalitarian governments. It were, for instance, the very elements of Nazism that made the Nazis’ victory in Europe not only possible but so shamefully easy. Had the extra-European powers of the whole world, which needed six years to defeat Hitler-Germany, grasped these elements, they would not have supported the restoration of the status quo in Europe-- complete with the old political, class- and party-systems which, as though nothing has happened, continue to disintegrate and prepare the soil for totalitarian movements-- and they would have given their full attention to the continued growth of the refugee population and the spread of statelessness.	[absent]	[absent]
37
It seems quite doubtful that even this kind of grasping knowledge, which is not yet understanding and does not deal with the essence of totalitarianism, can be produced by organized research. The chances are that the relevant data get buried in an avalanche of statistics or observations on one hand and evaluation on the other, none of which tells us anything about historical conditions and political aspirations. Only the sources themselves talk, documents, speeches, reports and the like, and that is material which is accessible to everybody and need not be organized and institutionalized. These sources talk sense to the historians and the political scientists; they become unintelligible only if asked to yield information about the super-ego, the father-image, the wrong way of swaddling or if approached with fixed stereotypes such as the lower middle classes, the bureaucracy, the intellectuals, and so forth. Obviously, the categories of the social sciences, stereotyped as they may have become, are more likely to produce some insights than those of the psychologists if only because they are abstracted |7 from the real world and not from a dream world. In actual fact, unfortunately, it makes little difference. Since the father-image invaded the social and the lower-middle-classes the psychological sciences, the differences between them have tended to be negligible.	[absent]	[absent]
38
The elements of totalitarianism form its origins if by origins we do1 not understand “causes”. Causality, i.e. the factor2 of determination3 of a process4 of events in5 which always one event causes and6 can be explained7 by another8, is psobably9 an altogether alien and falsifying category in the realm of10 historical and political sciences. Elements by themselves never cause anything. They become origins11 of events if12 and when they suddenly crystallize into fixed and definite forms. Then, and13 only then,14 can we trace their16 history backwards17. The event illuminates its own past, but18 it can never be deduced from it.	What is frightening in the rise of totalitarianism to the quest for meaning and the need for understanding is1 not that this is something new, but that this has exploded our categories2 of thought and our standards3 of judgment. Newness is the realm4 of the historian who, in distinction from the natural scientist who is concerned with ever recurring happenings, deals with events5 which always occur only once. This newness6 can be manipulated if the historian insists on causality and pretends to be able to explain events7 by a chain of causes which eventually led up to it. He then8, indeed, poses as the “prophet turned backward” and all that separates him from the gifts of real prophecy seems to be the deplorable physical limitations of the human brain that unfortunately can contain and combine correctly all causes operating at the same time. Causality, however, is9 an altogether alien and falsifying category in the realm of the10 historical sciences. Not only does the actual meaning of every event always transcend any number11 of past “causes” which we may assign to it (one has only to think of the grotesque disparity between “cause”12 and effect” in an event such as the first World War), this past itself comes into being13 only with the event itself; only when something irrevocably has happened14 can we even try to15 trace its16 history backward17. The event illuminates its own past, it can never be deduced from it.	For those engaged in the quest for meaning and understanding, what is frightening in the rise of totalitarianism is1 not that it is something new, but that it has brought to light the ruin of our categories2 of thought and standards3 of judgement. Newness is the realm4 of the historian who, unlike the natural scientist concerned with ever-recurring happenings, deals with events5 which always occur only once. This newness6 can be manipulated if the historian insists on causality and pretends to be able to explain events7 by a chain of causes which eventually led up to it. He then8, indeed, poses as the “prophet turned backward” and all that separates him from the gifts of real prophecy seems to be the deplorable physical limitations of the human brain, which unfortunately cannot contain and combine correctly all causes operating at the same time. Causality, however, is9 an altogether alien and falsifying category in the historical sciences. Not only does the actual meaning of every event always transcend any number11 of past “causes” which we may assign to it (one has only to think of the grotesque disparity between “cause”12 and “effect” in an event like the First World War); this past itself comes into being13 only with the event itself. Only when something irrevocable has happened14 can we even try to15 trace its16 history backward17. The event illuminates its own past, it can never be deduced from it.
39
It is the light of the event itself which permits us to distinguish its own concrete elements (out of an infinite number of abstract possibilities), and it is still this same light that must guide us backwards into the always dim and equivocal past of these elements themselves. In this sense, it is legitimate to talk of the origins of totalitarianism, or any other event in history.	[absent]	[absent]
40
[absent]	Whenever an event occurs that is great enough to illuminate its own past, historiy1 comes into being. Only then does the chaotic maze of past happenings emerge as a story which can be told, which2 has a beginning and an end. (Herodotus is not merely the first historiographer; “history exists since Herodotus”--in the words of Karl Reinhard, “Herodots Persergeschichten” in Von Werken und Formen, 1948--, that is, the Greek past became history through the light shed on it by the Persian wars.)3 What the illuminating event reveals is a beginning in the past which hitherto had4 been hidden; to the eye of the historian, the illuminating event cannot but appear as an end of this newly discovered beginning. Only when in future history a new event occurs will this “end” reveal itself as beginning to the eye of future historians. And the eye of the historian is only the scientifically trained gaze of human understanding; we can understand an event only as the end and the culmination of everything that happened before, as “fulfillment of the times”; only in action will we proceed, as a matter of course, from the changed set of circumstances that the event has created, that is, treat it as a beginning.	Whenever an event occurs that is great enough to illuminate its own past, history1 comes into being. Only then does the chaotic maze of past happenings emerge as a story which can be told, because it2 has a beginning and an end. What the illuminating event reveals is a beginning in the past which had hitherto4 been hidden; to the eye of the historian, the illuminating event cannot but appear as an end of this newly discovered beginning. Only when in future history a new event occurs will this “end” reveal itself as a5 beginning to the eye of future historians. And the eye of the historian is only the scientifically trained gaze of human understanding; we can understand an event only as the end and the culmination of everything that happened before, as “fulfillment of the times”; only in action will we proceed, as a matter of course, from the changed set of circumstances that the event has created, that is, treat it as a beginning.
41
Whoever in the historical sciences believes in causality in true earnest,2 denies by3 the same token the very existebce of events which always suddenly and unpredictably change4 the whole physiognomy6 of a given era. Since there would be no history at all without events, but only7 the dead monotony of sameness unfolded in time, he denies actually the subject matter of his own science. Even worse is that causality in8 history implies that knowledge of9 the past should enable us to foretell the future10 and that all that separates us from the gifts of prophecy11 us the deplorable physical limitations12 of the human brain. Belief in13 causality, in other words, is the historian’s |8 way of denying human freedom which, in terms of the political and historical sciences, is the human capacity of making a new beginning15.	Whoever in the historical sciences believes in causality in true earnest,2 denies actually3 the subject matter of his own science. Such a belief can be concealed in4 the application of general categories to the5 whole course6 of happenings, such as challenge and response, or in the search for general trends which supposedly are7 the “deeper” stratum from which events spring and whose accessory symptoms they are. Such generalizations and categorizations extinguish the “natural” light8 history itself offers and, by9 the same token, destroy the actual story, its unique distinction10 and its eternal meaning, that each historical period has to tell11 us. Within the framework12 of preconceived categories, whose crudest is13 causality, events14 in the sense of something irrevocably new can never happen; history without events becomes the dead monotony of sameness, unfolded in time,--Lucretius’ Eadem sunt omnia semper15 .	Whoever in the historical sciences honestly1 believes in causality actually2 denies the subject matter of his own science. Such a belief can be concealed in4 the application of general categories to the5 whole course6 of happenings, such as challenge and response, or in the search for general trends which supposedly are7 the “deeper” strata from which events spring and whose accessory symptoms they are. Such generalizations and categorizations extinguish the “natural” light8 history itself offers and, by9 the same token, destroy the actual story, with its unique distinction10 and its eternal meaning, that each historical period has to tell11 us. Within the framework12 of preconceived categories the crudest of which is13 causality, events14 in the sense of something irrevocably new can never happen; history without events becomes the dead monotony of sameness, unfolded in time--Lucretius’ eadem sunt omnia semper15.
42
Initium ergo ut esset, creatus est homo, ante quem nullus fuit: “Man, before whom nobody was, was created that there be a beginning” sais Augustine[gap] (De civ. book XII, ch. xx) According to him, who rightly might be called the father of all Western philosophy of history, man has not only the capacity of beginning but is this beginning himself. Since every event happens within the history of a being through whom beginning came into the universe and who is beginning himself, events are always and at the same time the end of something which had begun before and the beginning of something new. An event belongs to the past, marks an end, insofar as elements with their origins in the past are gathered together in its sudden crystallization; but an event belongs to the future, marks a beginning, insofar as this crystallization itself can never be deduced from its elements themselves but is caused invariably by some factor which lies in the realm of human freedom. The so-called chain of happenings--a chain of events is, strictly speaking, a contradiction in terms--is interrupted every minute by the birth of a new human being which brings a new beginning into the world. Even the fulfilment or the doom of a whole period is a new beginning for those who are alive.	[absent]	[absent]
43
This is also the reason why we know of no historical event for which we could not imagine one or more alternatives or which does not depend upon a great number of coincidences. There is no necessity in history which all causal historiography consciously or unconsciously presupposes. What really exists is the irrevocability of the events themselves whose poignant effectiveness in the field of political action does not come from the fact that certain elements of the past have received their final, definite form, but that something inescapably new was born. From this irrevocability we can escape only through submission to the mechanic sequence of mere time in which no meaning exists and nothing ever happens.	[absent]	[absent]
44
One of the chief problems which the event by its very nature presents to the historian is that its significance seems always, not only different from, but so much greater than the significance of the elements which go into it and of the intentions which eventually cause the crystallization. Who could doubt that the historical significance of the first World War transcended latent elements of conflict which broke out in it as well as whatever good or evil the concerned statesmen may have intended. In this particular instance, the factor of freedom which eventually caused the crystallization of these elements and caused the war even dwarfs into ridicule. That the discrepancy between “causes and effect” should reach such proportions as to become eventually comical has become one of the hallmarks of modern history and politics--and is incidentally one of the main reasons why modern historians and ideologists have been so tempted by some notion of objective causality or some superstition in necessity, be this a necessity of doom or salvation. Yet some such discrepancy between objective elements and free human action on one side and the event--in its majestic irrevocability, originality and abundance of meaning--on the other is always present and permeats indeed our whole human reality.	[absent]	[absent]
45
Just as in our personal lives our worst fears and our most passionate1 hopes will never adequately prepare us for what actually happens even if nothing else happens but what we feared or hoped for--2because the moment the3 event takes place everything changes and we can never be prepared for the inexhaustible literalness of this “everything”--6 so each event in human history reveals an unexpected landscape of human deeds, sufferings and new possibilities which together transcend the sum total of all willed intentions as well as7 of all significance8 of its origins10. The event itself transcends all this because it tells us invariably something entirely12 new.	Just as in our personal lives our worst fears and our most passionate1 hopes will never adequately prepare us for what actually happens,2 because the moment even a foreseen3 event takes place,4 everything changes and we can never be prepared for the inexhaustible literalness of this “everything”,6 so each event in human history reveals an unexpected landscape of human deeds, sufferings and new possibilities which together transcend the sum total of all willed intentions and the significance7 of all origins. It is the task8 of the historian to detect this unexpected new with all9 its implications in any given period and to bring out the full power of its significance10. He must know that though his story has a beginning and an end, but the history of man is a story with many beginnings and no end.11 The end, in any strict and final sense of the word, could only be the disappearance of man from the earth. For whatever the historian calls an end, the end of a period or a tradition or a whole civilization, is a12 new beginning for those who are alive13. The fallacy of all prophecies of doom lies in the disregard of the this simple, but elementary fact.14	Just as in our personal lives our worst fears and best1 hopes will never adequately prepare us for what actually happens,2 because the moment even a foreseen3 event takes place,4 everything changes,5 and we can never be prepared for the inexhaustible literalness of this “everything,”6 so each event in human history reveals an unexpected landscape of human deeds, sufferings and new possibilities which together transcend the sum total of all willed intentions and the significance7 of all origins. It is the task8 of the historian to detect this unexpected new with all9 its implications in any given period and to bring out the full power of its significance10. He must know that though his story has a beginning and an end, it occurs within a larger frame, history itself. And History is a story which has many beginnings but no end.11 The end in any strict and final sense of the word, could only be the disappearance of man from the earth. For whatever the historian calls an end, the end of a period or a tradition or a whole civilization, is a12 new beginning for those who are alive13. The fallacy of all prophecies of doom lies in the disregard of this simple but fundamental fact.14
46
It is the task of the historian to detect in any given period this unexpected new in all its implications and to bring out the full power of its significance. He must know that his is not a story with a beginning and an end, but a story with |10 is not a story with a beginning and an end, but a story with many beginnings and no end. He must have a sense for reality, not necessarily in the sense of being practical and realistic, but in the sense of having experienced the very power of all things real which is the power of overcoming and surpassing all our expectations and calculations. And since this overpowering quality of reality, quite obviously, is connected with the fact that men, no matter how well or how badly they are integrated into the fellowship with their equals, always remain individuals whom some hazard or providence threw into the adventure of life on earth, he would do good to remember that always one man alone is confronted with, has to adjust to and tries to act into what all men together have done and suffered.	[absent]	[absent]
47
The task of the historian is to analyze and describe the new structure which emerges after the event takes place as well as its elements and origins. He does this with the help of the light which the event itself provides; but this does not mean that he must or can understand the nature of this light itself. The quest for the nature of totalitarianism is no longer a historical (and certainly not a sociological or psychological) undertaking; it is, strictly speaking, a question of the political sciences which, if they understand themselves, are the true guardians of the keys which open the doors to the problems and uncertainties of the philosophy of history.	[absent]	[absent]
48
The establishments of totalitarian governments, insofar as their techniques and structures are entirely unprecedented, is the central new event of our time. To understand its nature--which can be understood only after its origins and structures have been analyzed and described--is therefore almost identical with understanding the very heart of our own century. And this performance is probably only a little less difficult to achieve than the proverbial |11 jump over one’s own shadow. Its practical political value is even more doubtful than the efforts of the historians whose results can at least be used for long-range, though hardly for immediate, political purposes.	[absent]	[absent]
49
[absent]	To1 remain aware of this fact will be for the historian2 of no greater importance than to check what one might call3 the mental diseases inherent in his profession4. Since he is concerned with the past, that is with certain movements which could not even be grasped by the mind if they had not come to some kind of an end, he has only to generalize in order to see end (and doom) everywhere. It is only natural to6 him to see in history a story with many ends and no beginning; and this inclination becomes really dangerous only when--for whatever reasons7-- people begin to make a philosophy out of history as it presents itself to the professional eyes of the historian. Nearly all modern explications of the so-called “historicality” of man have been distorted by categories which, at best, are working hypotheses for the8 arranging of9 the material of the past.	For the historian, to1 remain aware of this fact will be of no greater importance than to check what the French would call his déformation professionelle4. Since he is concerned with the past, that is with certain movements which could not even be grasped by the mind if they had not come to some kind of an end, he has only to generalize in order to see an5 end (and doom) everywhere. It is only natural for6 him to see in history a story with many ends and no beginning; and this inclination becomes really dangerous only when--for whatever reason7--people begin to make a philosophy out of history as it presents itself to the professional eyes of the historian. Nearly all modern explications of the so-called “historicality” of man have been distorted by categories which, at best, are working hypotheses for arranging the material of the past.
50
[absent]	Fortunately,1 the situation of the political sciences which in the highest sense are called upon to pursue the quest for |16 meaning and to answer the need for true understanding of political data, is quite different. The great consequence which the concept of beginning and origin has for all strictly political questions comes from the simple fact that political action, like all action, is essentially always the beginning of something new; as such, it is, in terms of political science, the very essence of human freedom. The central position which the concept of beginning and origin must have in all political thought has been lost only since the historical sciences have been permitted to supply their methods and categories to the field of politics. It was indicated, as a matter of course, for Greek thought in the fact that the Greek word Arche3 means both:4 beginning and rule, and it is still fully alive, though generally overlooked by modern interpreters, in Machiavelli’s theory of political power according to which the act of foundation itself, that is the conscious beginning of something new, requires and justifies the use of violence. In its full significance, however, this was discovered by the one great thinker who lived in a period who resembled6 in some respects more7 our own than any other of9 recorded history and who,11 in any case,12 wrote under the full impact of a catastrophic end, which perhaps resembles the end to which we have come. Augustine, in his Civitas Dei (book XII13, ch. XX)14 said: Initium ergo ut esset, creatus est homo, ante quem nullus fuit. (That there might be a beginning, man was created before whom nobody was.) Here, man has not only the capacity of beginning, but is this beginning himself. If the creation of man coincides with the creation of a beginning in the universe (and what else does this mean but the creation of freedom?), then the birth of of all17 individual men, being new beginnings, re-affirm18 the origin-al character of man in such a way,19 that origin can never become entirely a thing of the past; while, on the other hadn20, the very fact of the memorable continuity of these beginnings in the sequence of generations guarantees a history which can never end because it is the history of a being21 whose essence is beginning.	Fortunately the situation of the political sciences,2 which in the highest sense are called upon to pursue the quest for meaning and to answer the need for true understanding of political data, is quite different. The great consequence which the concept of beginning and origin has for all strictly political questions comes from the simple fact that political action, like all action, is essentially always the beginning of something new; as such, it is, in terms of political science, the very essence of human freedom. The central position which the concept of beginning and origin must have in all political thought has been lost only since the historical sciences have been permitted to supply their methods and categories to the field of politics. It was indicated, as a matter of course, for Greek thought in the fact that the Greek word arche3 means both beginning and rule, and it is still fully alive, though generally overlooked by modern interpreters, in Machiavelli’s theory of political power,5 according to which the act of foundation itself, that is the conscious beginning of something new, requires and justifies the use of violence. In its full significance, however, this was discovered by the one great thinker who lived in a period which6 in some respects resembled7 our own more8 than any other in9 recorded history,10 and who in any case wrote under the full impact of a catastrophic end, which perhaps resembles the end to which we have come. Augustine, in his Civitas Dei, said: Initium ergo ut esset, creatus est homo, ante quem nullus fuit. (“15That there might be a beginning, man was created before whom nobody was.”16) Here, man has not only the capacity of beginning, but is this beginning himself. If the creation of man coincides with the creation of a beginning in the universe (and what else does this mean but the creation of freedom?), then the birth of individual men, being new beginnings, re-affirms18 the origin-al character of man in such a way that origin can never become entirely a thing of the past; while, on the other hand20, the very fact of the memorable continuity of these beginnings in the sequence of generations guarantees a history which can never end because it is the history of beings21 whose essence is beginning.
51
[absent]	In the light of these reflections, our enterprise1 to understand something which has exploded2 our categories of thought and our standards of judgment3 appears less frightening. Even though we have lost our4 yardsticks by which to measure and our5 rules under which to subsume the particular, a being whose essence is beginning may have enough of origin within himself to understand without preconceived categories and to judge without without6 the set of customary rules which is morality. If the essence of all, and also7 of political action is to make a new beginning, then understanding in this sense would only be9 the other side of action, namely that form of cognition, in distinction to10 many others, by which acting men (and not men who are engaged to contemplate11 some progressive or doomed course of history) eventually can come to terms with what irrevocably happened and get12 reconciled with what unavoidably exists.	In the light of these reflections, our endeavoring1 to understand something which has ruined2 our categories of thought and our standards of judgement3 appears less frightening. Even though we have lost yardsticks by which to measure, and5 rules under which to subsume the particular, a being whose essence is beginning may have enough of origin within himself to understand without preconceived categories and to judge without the set of customary rules which is morality. If the essence of all, and in particular7 of political,8 action is to make a new beginning, then understanding becomes9 the other side of action, namely that form of cognition, in distinction from10 many others, by which acting men (and not men who are engaged in contemplating11 some progressive or doomed course of history) eventually can come to terms with what irrevocably happened and be12 reconciled with what unavoidably exists.
52
Understanding will1 articulate and confirm in the end only what we knew already2 in the beginning--that totalitarian governments deny human freedom radically. For true understanding, as distinguished from a great many3 other forms4 of cognition5, has this in common with6 true philosophy that7 it never avoids8 the circle which the logicians have called a9 “vicious circle10”, but that it insists, on the contrary, that the human mind turning11 around in circles does nothing less than engage itself in that12 interminable dialogue between itself and the essence of things and events by which alone it can come to terms with what happened and get reconciled with what exists13.	As such, understanding is a strange enterprise. In the end, it may do no more than1 articulate and confirm what preliminary understanding, which always consciously or unconsciously is directly engaged2 in action, knew to begin with. It will not shy away from this circle but on the contrary be aware that any3 other results would be so far removed from action,4 of which it is only the other side5, that they cannot possibly be6 true. Nor will7 it in the process itself avoid8 the circle which the logicians use to call9 “vicious” and may in this respect even resemble a little philosophy whose great thought always turn11 around in circles, engaging the human mind in nothing less than that12 interminable dialogue between itself and the essence of everything that is13.	As such, understanding is a strange enterprise. In the end, it may do no more than1 articulate and confirm what preliminary understanding, which always consciously or unconsciously is directly engaged2 in action, sensed to begin with. It will not shy away from this circle but on the contrary be aware that any3 other results would be so far removed from action,4 of which it is only the other side5, that they could not possibly be6 true. Nor will7 it in the process itself avoid8 the circle which the logicians call9 “vicious” and may in this respect even somewhat resemble philosophy whose great thoughts always turn11 around in circles, engaging the human mind in nothing less than an12 interminable dialogue between itself and the essence of everything that is13.
53
Understanding1, therefore, is a strange enterprise. The old prayer which Solomon2 addressed to God for the gift of an “understanding heart” as the greatest gift a man could receive or4 desire might still be true6. As far removed from sentimentality as it is from paperwork, the human heart is the only thing in the world that will take upon itself the burden of the interminable dialogue which never comes8 to an end9, which goes around in circles, and will not tire of it. The gift is divine10 because no other faculty of either thought or feeling and no combination of both, but only the faculty of understanding11 makes it bearable for us to live with other people, strangers for ever, in the same world and which13 makes it possible for them to bear with us. Only in the patient endurance of the non-vicious circle of understanding melt all complacencies and all notions of know-better away.14	In this sense1, the old prayer which King Solomon, who certainly knew something of political action,2 addressed to God for the gift of an “understanding heart” as one of3 the greatest gift a man could receive and4 desire,5 might still be true6. As far removed from sentimentality as it is from paperwork, the human heart is the only thing in the world that will take upon itself the burden which the divine gift7 of action, of being a beginning and therefore being able8 to make a beginning9, has placed upon us. Solomon, because he was a King, prayed for this particular gift10 because he knew that only an “understanding heart”, and neither |18 mere reflection nor mere feeling,11 makes it bearable for us to live with other people, strangers for ever, in the same world and makes it possible for them to bear with us.	In this sense1, the old prayer which King Solomon, who certainly knew something of political action,2 addressed to God for the gift of an “understanding heart” as the greatest gift a man could receive and4 desire,5 might still hold for us6. As far removed from sentimentality as it is from paperwork, the human heart is the only thing in the world that will take upon itself the burden which the divine gift7 of action, of being a beginning and therefore being able8 to make a beginning9, has placed upon us. Solomon prayed for this particular gift10 because he was a King and knew that only an “understanding heart,” and not mere reflection nor mere feeling,11 makes it bearable for us to live with other people, strangers forever, in the same world,12 and makes it possible for them to bear with us.
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If we want1 to translate the Biblical language into terms that are closer to our speech2 we may call the gift of the3 |12 “understanding4 heart” the faculty of Imagination,5 which-- far from imagining things as phantasy may indulge in--has6 the extraordinary power to penetrate into all darknesses, even7 the darkness8 of a human heart9, to pierce through all enchanting or frightening fassades with which everything that is real surrounds us, and which stubbornly revolves around an innermost kernel which it suspects10 of being what we usually11 and carelessly call an “essence12”, only for the sake of catching13 at least a glimpse of the always terrifying14 light of truth.	If we wish1 to translate the Biblical language into terms that are closer (though hardly more accurate) to our speech,2 we may call the gift of an3 “understandin4 heart” the faculty of imagination, in distinction from phantasy5 which dreams up something, imagination is concerned with the particular darkness of the human heart and6 the peculiar density which surrounds everything that is real. Whenever we talk of7 the “nature” or the “essence”8 of a thing9, we actually mean this innermost kernel of whose existence we can never be as sure as we are of darkness and density. True understanding does not tire10 of the interminable dialogue11 and the “vicious circles12”, because it trusts that understanding eventually will catch13 at least a glimpse of the always frightening14 light of truth.	If we wish1 to translate the Biblical language into terms that are closer to our speech (though hardly more accurate),2 we may call the gift of an3 “understanding4 heart” the faculty of imagination. In distinction from fantasy5 which dreams up something, imagination is concerned with the particular darkness of the human heart and6 the peculiar density which surrounds everything that is real. Whenever we talk of7 the “nature” or the “essence”8 of a thing9, we actually mean this innermost kernel of whose existence we can never be so sure as we are of darkness and density. True understanding does not tire10 of interminable dialogue11 and “vicious circles12” because it trusts that imagination eventually will catch13 at least a glimpse of the always frightening14 light of truth. To distinguish imagination from fancy and to mobilize its power does not mean that understanding of human affairs becomes “irrational.” Imagination, on the contrary, as Wordsworth said, “is but another name for ... clearest insight, amplitude of mind,/And Reason in her most exalted mood.”15
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Only imagination is capable of what we know as “putting1 things into2 their proper distance” and which actually means3 that we should be strong enough to remove those which are too close until4 we can see and understand them5 without bias and prejudice, strong enough6 to bridge the7 abysses of remoteness until we can see and understand those8 that are9 too far away as though they11 were our own affairs12. This removing13 some things and bridging the abysses to others is already14 part of the interminable dialogue15 for whose purposes direct experience establishes too immediate and too16 close a contact and mere knowledge erects an17 artificial barrier18.	Only imagination is capable of “putting1 things into2 their proper distance”; by this, we actually mean3 that we should be strong enough to remove that which is too close until4 we can see and understand it5 without bias and prejudice, and that we should be generous enough6 to bridge abysses of remoteness until we can see and understand everything8 that is9 too far away from us10 as though it11 were our own affair12. This removing13 some things and bridging the abysses to others is already14 part of the dialogue of understanding15 for whose purposes direct experience establishes too close a contact and mere knowledge erects artificial barriers18.	Imagination alone enables us to see1 things in2 their proper perspective, to put3 that which is too close at a certain distance so that4 we can see and understand it5 without bias and prejudice, to bridge abysses of remoteness until we can see and understand everything8 that is9 too far away from us10 as though it11 were our own affair12. This “distancing” of13 some things and bridging the abysses to others is part of the dialogue of understanding15 for whose purposes direct experience establishes too close a contact and mere knowledge erects artificial barriers18.
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Without imagination, and understanding1 which springs from it2, we never would3 be able to take our bearings in the world. It is the only inner compass we have. Contemporaries we are4 only so far as our understanding reaches. If we want to be at home on this earth even at the price of being at home in this century (and this matter permits of no choice)6, we shall have7 to attempt8 the interminable dialogue with its very nature9.	Without this kind of imagination,1 which actually is understanding2, we never would3 be able to take our bearings in the world. It is the only inner compass we have. Contemporaries we are4 only so far as our understanding reaches. If we want to be at home on this earth,5 even at the price of being at home in this century, we shall have7 to try at least8 the interminable dialogue with its nature9.	Without this kind of imagination,1 which actually is understanding2, we would never3 be able to take our bearings in the world. It is the only inner compass we have. We are contemporaries4 only so far as our understanding reaches. If we want to be at home on this earth,5 even at the price of being at home in this century, we must try7 to take part in8 the interminable dialogue with its essence9.
57
II	[absent]	[absent]
58
As soon as we begin to understand the nature of totalitarianism, we cease to be concerned with either its elements or its historical development. Analysis and description in terms of the historical and the political sciences, based as they are on a preliminary understanding only, must have yielded enough results and covered enough ground to give the dialogue of understanding its concrete and specific content. What neither description nor analysis can prove is that there is such a thing at all as the nature or the essence of totalitarian government, just as there is the nature or essence of monarchical, or republican or despotic government. This specific nature is somehow taken for granted by the preliminary understanding on which description and analysis base themselves and which permeats as a matter of course, but not of critical insight, their wholexx terminology and vocabulary. Our effort to understand therefore somehow returns to the judgments and prejudices which preceded and guided the strictly scientific effort. Understanding, in other words, though it must be and remain aware of all research results which the historical and political sciences can possibly yield, does not despise the popular language in which words like totalitarianism are daily used as political cliches and misused as catchwords, but listens closely to and tries to establish some contact with it.	[absent]	[absent]
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The use of the word totalitarianism in popular language for the purpose of denouncing some supreme political evil is not much older than about five years. Up to the end of the second World War and during the first post-war years, the catchword for political evil was imperialism. As such it was generally used to denote aggressiveness in foreign politics and this identification was so thorough that the two words could easily be exchanged against each other. In much the same way, the word totalitarianism today |14 is used to denote lust for power, will to dominate, and brutal terror. The change itself is noteworthy; popular language used the word imperialism as a catchword as long as people felt that, Bolshevism, Fascism and Nazism notwithstanding, they were living in a period still dominated by the event and development of imperialism. Not the rise of totalitarianism in Russia and Germany during the thirties, not even the war with a totalitarian power, but the downfall of imperialism, which was identified with the liquidation of the British Empire and the acceptance of India into the British Commonwealth, marked the moment when the new event, totalitarianism, was admitted to have taken the place of imperialism as the central event of a new era.	[absent]	[absent]
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Yet, while popular language thus recognizes a new event by accepting a new word even to the point of misusing it, it invariably uses these words as synonyms for some others indicating old and well-known evils--aggressiveness and lust for conquest in the case of imperialism, terror and lust for power in the case of totalitarianism. Just as the choice of the new word indicates that everybody knows that something new and decisive has happened, this stereotyped identification of some new and very specific phenomenon with some well-known and very general evil indicates the unwillingness of everybody to admit that something has happened at all. Is is as though with the first step, finding a name for the new force which will hold our lives in abeyance, we orient ourselves mentally to new and specific conditions, whereas with the second step--as it were on second thought--we console ourselves that nothing worse or more alien is happening than general human sinfulness, as it always has been present and known.	[absent]	[absent]
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Popular language which expresses popular understanding thus presents to our effort of understanding at the same time its chief discovery and its greatest danger. It was |15 the common uncritical understanding of the people which more than anything else induced a whole generation of historians and political scientists to devote their most serious efforts to the investigation of the causes and consequences of imperialism and, at the same time, misrepresent it as “Empire-building” by comparing it with the Assyrian or Egyptian or Roman Empire or as “lust for conquest” by describing Cecil Rhodes in categories which are adequate for Napoleon. Something very similar is now happening to our understanding of totalitarianism. While most scholars agree with popular opinion that totalitarianism is the greatest and the most significant danger of this period, most of the current interpretations “explain” totalitarian rule by equating it with tyranny or by identifying it with all kinds of one-party dictatorships or by reducing it to historical and social causes which are relevant only for one country, Germany or Russia. It is evident that this method does not help our efforts to understand because it explains away whatever is in need of being understood.	[absent]	[absent]
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The same need for orientation in a world changed through a new event, that prompts popular understanding, is the guide of true understanding if we do not want to lose ourselves in the wildgrowing or well tended labyrinths of facts and figures erected by the unquenchable curiosity of scholars. True understanding is distinguished from public opinion, in both its popular and scientific forms, by its refusal to let go the original intuition. To put it into a very schematic and therefore necessarily inadequate way, it is as though, whenever we are confronted with something frighteningly new, our first impulse is to recognize it in a blind and uncontrolled reaction which however is strong enough to coin a new word ; our second impulse seems to be to regain control by denying that we saw something new at all and by pretending that something similar is already known to us ; only a third impulse can lead us back to what we saw and knew in the beginning. It is |16 here that the effort of understanding begins.	[absent]	[absent]
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These preliminary remarks seemed necessary to introduce, or to excuse, an approach to the nature of governments which, after being discovered by Plato and systematized by Aristoteles, was followed almost conventionally up to the eighteenth century. Montesquieu, in fact, was the last to inquire into the nature of government, that is to ask what makes it be what it is (“sa nature est ce qui le fait être tel”, book iii, ch. 1). To this traditional question which he answered in only slightly changed terms, Montesquieu added a second entirely original question by asking: what makes a government act how it acts, and thus discovered that each government has not only its “particular structure” but a particular “principle” which sets it into motion. These two questions have been discarded by the political sciences because they are in a way pre-scientific; they refer to a popular understanding which expresses itself in giving names only: this is a republic, this is a monarchy, this is a tyranny, and they start the dialogue of true understanding by asking what is it that makes it what we all know is a republic, a monarchy, a tyranny. Montesquieu, after giving to his first traditional question the traditional answer--that a republic is constitutional government with sovereign power in the hands of the people, a monarchy a lawful government with sovereign power in the hands of one man, and tyranny lawless government where power is exercised by one man according to his arbitrary will--, adds that the principle of all action in a republic is political virtue which, psychologically, he equates with love of equality; the principle of action in a monarchy is honor whose psychological expression is passion for distinction; and the acting principle in a tyranny is fear.	[absent]	[absent]
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There is one striking and strange aspect of Montesquieu’s traditional definition of the structure of government. He |17 whose chief claim to fame has been his articulate discovery of the division of powers into the executive, the legislative and the judiciary, defines governments as though power is necessarily sovereign and indivisible. Curiously enough, it was Kant, and not Montesquieu himself, who redefined the structure of governments according to Montesquieu’s own principles.	[absent]	[absent]
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Kant (in Zum ewigen Frieden) introduces a distinction between “forms of domination” (Formen der Beherrschung) and forms of government. The forms of domination are distinguished solely in accordance with the power criterion: all states in which the prince has the undivided sovereign power are autocracies; if power is in the hands of the nobility, the form of domination is an aristocracy; and if the people itself yields absolute power, domination comes about in the form of democracy. The point is that all these forms of domination (as the name domination already indicates) are strictly illegal. Constitutional or lawful government is being established by dividing power so that not the same man or the same body makes the laws, executes them and sits in judgment of his own actions. According to this new principle, which goes back to Montesquieu and which has found an unequivocal expression in the constitution of the United States, there are only two basic structures of government according to Kant: republican are all governments based on the division of powers, even if a prince is at the head of the state; despotic are all governments in which the powers of legislation, execution and judgment are not separated. Power in the concrete political sense is power needed and incorporated in the possession of the means of violence for execution; where, therefore, the executive power is not separated from and controlled by the powers of legislation and judgment, the source of law can no longer be reason and consideration, but becomes power itself. Despotic is the government for which the dictum of Might is Right is true, and this regardless of all other circumstances; a democracy ruled by majority decisions but unchecked by law is as despotic as an autocracy. It is true that even Kant’s distinction is no longer quite satisfactory. Its chief weakeness is that behind this relationship |18 between law and power lies the assumption that the source of law is human reason (in the sense still of the lumen naturale) and the source of power human will. Both assumptions are questionable on historical as well as philosophical grounds. We cannot discuss these difficulties here and we do not need to. For our purpose which is to find out the nature of a new and unprecedented form of government, it may even be wise to apply first the traditional--though no longer traditionally accepted--standards. In searching for the nature of totalitarian government, its structure in Montesquieu’s words, we shall use Kant’s distinction between forms of domination and forms of government, as well as between constitutional (in his words “republican”) and despotic government.	[absent]	[absent]
66
Of even greater relevance is Montesquieu’s second discovery that each form of government has its own innate principle that sets it into motion and guides all its actions. Not only was this moving principle much closer connected with immediate historical experience--honor obviously being the principle of medieval monarchy as it based itself on nobility and virtue the principle of the Roman Republic--; as a principle of motion it introduced history and historical process into the structures of government which, as the Greeks had originally discovered and defined them, were conceived as unmoved and unmovable structures. The only principle of change which up to Montesquieu’s discovery was connected with these forms of governments at all was the change to the worse, the change of perversion which either would transform an aristocracy (the government of the best) into an oligarchy (the government of a clique for the interest of the clique) or overturn a democracy which had degenrated i into mobrule (ochlocracy) into a tyranny.	[absent]	[absent]
67
Montesquieu’s moving and guiding principles--virtue, honor fear--are principles insofar as they rule both the actions of the government and the actions of the governed. Fear in a tyranny is not only the fear of the tyrant by his subjects but fear of the subjects by the tyrant as well. Fear, honor, virtue are not psychological motives but the criteria according to which all public life is being led and judged. Just as it is the pride of a citizen in a Republic not to be more in public matters than his fellow-citizens, so it is the pride of a subject in a monarchy to distinguish himself and be publicly honored. In establishing these rules, Montesquieu did not mean to say that all people have at all times to behave according to the rules of the government under which they happen to live, or that people in a republic do not know what honor, or people in a monarchy do not know what virtue is. Yet he does not talk about “ideal types” either. He analyzes the public life of citizens, not the private lives of people, and finds that this public life, that is the sphere where all act together concerning things which are of equal concern to each, is determined by certain rules and that if these rules are no longer obeyed and the specific criteria of behavior no longer held valid, the political institutions are no longer safe.	[absent]	[absent]
68
Underneath Montesquieu’s distinction between the nature or essence of government (that which makes it be what it is) and its moving or guiding principle (that which sets it into motion by making it act) lies another difference and problem which has plagued political thought since its beginning and which Montesquieu indicates, but does not solve, through his distinction between man insofar as he is the member of a given public order, that is a citizen, and man insofar as he is an individual. (In case of conquest, for instance, “the citizen may perish and man survive”--“le citoyen peut périr, et l’homme rester.” Book x, ch. 3) This problem is usually dealt with in modern political thought as the problem between public and private life, or the sphere of politics and the sphere of society; and its troublesome aspect is usually and conventionally found in a pretended double standard of morality.	[absent]	[absent]
69
In modern political thought, insofar as its central predicaments are dictated by Machiavelli’s discovery of power as the center of all political life and of power relations as the supreme laws for political actions, this problem has been complicated and overshadowed by the dilemma between legality as the center of domestic constitutional government and arbitrary sovereignty as the as it were natural fact in the field of international relations. So that it seemed as though we are confronted with two sets of duplicity in judging the rights or wrongs of all actions--the duplicity of standards originating in man’s being at the same time a citizen and an individual on one hand, and the duplicity of standards originating in the differetiation between foreign and domestic politics. Both problems are pertinent to our effort to understand the nature of totalitarianism because of the totalitarian governments’ claim to having solved them. The distinction and the dilemma between foreign and domestic |21 politics is solved by the claim to global rule which is substantiated in treating each conquered country, in complete disregard of its own law, as a delinquent transgressor of the totalitarian laws and by punishing its inhabitants according to laws which have retroactive validity. In other words, the claim to global rule is identical with the claim to having established a new and universally valid law on earth, the consequence of which is that all foreign politics to the totalitarian mind is domestic politics in disguise and all foreign wars in fact civil wars. The distinction and the dilemma between the citizen and the individual with its concomitant perplexities of a dichotomy between public and personal life are taken care of by the totalitarian claim to total domination of man.	[absent]	[absent]
70
To Montesquieu, only the dilemma between the citizen and the individual is a true political problem. The conflict between domestic and foreign politics as conflict between law and power exists only as long as one maintains that power is indivisible and sovereign; Montesquieu as well as Kant held that only division of powers can guarantee law and that a world federation would eventually solve the conflicts of sovereignty. (An eminently practical step into the direction of an identification of foreign and domestic politics was taken in the Constitution of the United States when its Article VI, in perfect spiritual agreement with Montesquieu, provided that together with the Constitution and the constitutionally made laws, “all treaties made .. under the authority of the United States, shall be the supreme law of the land.”)	[absent]	[absent]
71
The distinction between the citizen and the individual becomes a problem as soon as we become aware of the discrepancy between the public life, in which I am a citizen like all other citizens, and the personal life in which I am an individual unlike anybody else. Equality before the law is not only the distinguishing feature of modern republics, but in a deeper sense dominates all |22 constitutional governments in that all people living under it must equally receive from it what is rightfully theirs. The law in all constitutional forms of governments determines and can provide suum cuique; through it everybody comes into his own.	[absent]	[absent]
72
The rule of suum cuique, however, never extends to all spheres of life. There is no suum cuique which could be determined and handed to individual men in their personal lives. The very fact that in all free societies everything is permitted which is not explicitly prohibited reveals the situation clearly: the law defines the boundaries of personal life , but cannot touch what goes on within them. In this respect, the law fulfills two functions: it regulates the public-political sphere in which men act in concert, as equals, and have a common destiny, while, at the same time, it sircumscribes the space in which our individual destinies fulfill themselves, destinies which are so dissimilar to each other that no two biographies will ever read alike. The law in its sublime generality never can foresee and provide the suum which everybody receives in his irrevocable uniqueness. Laws, once they are established, are always applied according to precedents; but the trouble with the deeds and events in personal life is that this life is destroyed in its very essence of being personal as soon as it is judged by standards of comparison or in the light of precedents. One could define philistinism, and explain its deadening effect upon the creativity of human life, as the attempt, through a moralizing transformation of customs into general “laws” of behavior equally valid for all, to judge by precedents what by definition defies all precedents.	[absent]	[absent]
73
The trouble, obviously, with this discrepancy between public and personal life, between man as a citizen and man as an individual person, is that not only laws can never be used to guide and judge a man’s action in his personal life, but that the very standards for right and wrong are not the same and often even in conflict. That such conflicts, ranging all the way from the man who breaks all traffic laws because his wife is dying to the central theme of the Antigone, are always regarded by us as insoluble, that such “lawbreakers” almost invariably are depicted by the great tragedians as acting according to a “higher law”, reveals the depth in which Western man has experienced the calamity of even the best body politic of which he must be a citizen, even though his philosophers, strangely enough, in this particular experience have deserted him and done their best to evade the issue by elevating civil law to a level of unambiguous universality which it never possesses in fact. Kant’s famous categorical imperative: “Act in such a way that the maxim of your action could become a universal law” indeed goes to the root of the matter in the sense that this is the quintessence of the claim which the law makes upon us; this rigid morality, however, does not so much disregard sympathy and inclination, as it becomes a very real source for wrong doing in all cases in which no universal law, not even the imagined law of pure reasoning, can determine what is right in a particular case.	[absent]	[absent]
74
In this personal sphere, however, where no universal laws can ever determine unequivocally what is right and what is wrong, man does not act in complete arbitrariness either. Here, he is guided not by laws, under which cases can be subsumed, but by principles--such as loyalty, honor, virtue, faith--which, as it were, map out certain directions. Montesquieu never asked himself if |24 these principles might not have, in themselves, some cognitive power of judging or even creating what is right and wrong. But what he found out when he added to his traditionally defined structure of government a moving princip which alone makes men, rulers and ruled alike, act, was that law and power relations in any given form of polity define only the boundaries within which an entirely different, non-public sphere of life exists and that it is this non-public sphere from which the sources of action and motion, as distinguished from the stabilizing, structural forces of law and power, spring. Hedged in by law and power and occasionally overwhelming them lie the origins of motion and action,	[absent]	[absent]
75
Montesquieu saw, as others had before him, that these pricniples of action and their standards for right and wrong were widely different in different countries at different times. More important is that he discovered that each structure of government, as it manifests itself in law and power, had its own correlative principle according to which men living under this particular law and within the structure of this particular government would act. Only this, indicidentally, gave him and those historians who came after him the tools with which to describe the peculiar unity of each culture; he had found out that there was more to the dilemma between personal and public sphere, between man as an individual and man as a citizen than discrepancy and conclict; that there was or must be some underlying ground from which both sprang, even though they might conflict, because there was an obvious, historically patent correspondence between the principles of honor and the structure of monarchy, of virtue and republic, of fear (understood not as an psychological emotion but as a principle of action) and tyranny.	[absent]	[absent]
76
The common underlying ground for both essence of government and principle of its actions is that in which the structure is rooted and from which the source of action springs. The phenomenon of correspondences between the discrepant spheres of life and the miracle of the unities of cultures and periods in the midst of discrepancies and contingencies indicate that at the bottom of each cultural or historical entitity lies one common ground which is both, fundament and source, basis and origin. Montesquieu defines as distinction the common ground in which the laws of a monarchy are rooted and from which the actions of its subjects spring, so that he identifies honor, the supreme guiding principle in a monarchy, with love of distinction. The fundamental experience upon which monarchies and, we may add, all hierarchical forms of government are founded is the experience, inherent in the human condition, that men are distinguished and different from each other by birth.	[absent]	[absent]
77
Yet, we all know that in direct opposition and with no less insistent validity rises the opposite experience, the experience of the inherent equality of all men who are “born equal” and become distinguished by social status only. This equality--insofar as it was not an equality before God as an infintely superior instance before whom all distinctions and differences become negligible--has always meant, not only that all men, regardless of their differences, are equally valuable, but also that they have received by nature an equal amount of power. The fundamental experience upon which republican laws are founded and from which action of its citiyens spring is the experience of living together with and being member of a group of equally powerful men. The laws which regulate their lives are laws, not of distinction, but of restriction of the power of each so that room may be left for the power of his fellow. The common ground of republican law and action is the insight that human power is not primarily limited |26 by some superior power, God or Nature, but by the powers of my equals, and the joy that springs from it, the “love of equality” which is virtue, which comes from the experience that only because this is so, only because there is equality of power, man is not alone; for to be alone means to be without equals. (“One is one and all alone and ever more shall be so”--as the old English nursery rhyme dares to indicate what to human mind can only be the supreme tragedy of God.)	[absent]	[absent]
78
Montesquieu failed to indicate the common ground for structure and action in tyrannies; we may therefore be permitted to fill this gap in the light of his own discoveries. 26a The common ground on which lawlessness can be erected and from which fear springs is the impotence which all men feel who are really and radically isolated. One man against all has no longer the experience of an equality of power among men, but of the overwhelming combined power of all others against his own. It is the great advantage of monarchical or all kinds of hierarchical government that individuals who have their social and political status according to their “distinction” are never confronted with an undistinguished and undistinguishable “all others” against whom they can summon up nothing except their own absolute minority of one. It is the specific danger of all forms of government based on equality that the moment when the structure of lawfulness, within whose framework the experience of the equality of power receives its meaning and direction, breaks down or is threatened, the powers of equals cancel each other out and what is left is the experience of absolute impotence. Out of the conviction of one’s own impotence and the fear of the power of all others comes the will to dominate which is the will of the tyrant. Just as virtue is love of the equality of power, so fear is actually |26a All anxiety is ultimately connected with the |27 will to, or in its perverted form, lust for, power. Concretely and politically speaking, there is no other will to power but the will to dominate. For power itself in its true sense can never be possessed by one man alone; power comes, mysteriously as it were, into being whenever men act “in concert” and disappears, not less mysteriously, whenever one man is all by himself. Tyranny based on the essential impotence of all men who are alone is the hubrid attempt at being like God, personally and in complete solitude invested with power.	[absent]	[absent]
79
These three forms of government, monarchy, republic and tyranny, are authentic because the gound on which their structure is built--distinction of each, equality of power of all, impotence--and from which their principle of motion springs are authentic elements of the human condition on earth and reflected in primary human experiences. The question with which we shall now approach totalitarianism is whether or not this unprecedented form of government can lay claim to an equally authentic, albeit until now hidden, ground of the human condition on earth which may re- veal itself only under circumstances of a global unity of humanity which certainly are as unprecedented as totalitarianism itself.	[absent]	[absent]
80
Yet, before we proceed it may be good to admit that we are at least aware of one basic difficulty of this approach. According to modern standards, it is utterly unhistorical and unsociological to base reflections and considerations exclusively on the self-understanding of certain historical phenomena; it is thought to be uncritical to trust the monarchy’s affirmations that honor rules supreme in it, and not to seek behind such words some ulterior motives or interests. This approach coming from Montesquieu, seems all the more surprising because it was Montesquieu who first observed the great influence of climatic, social and other circumstances on the formation of strictly political institutions.	[absent]	[absent]
81
In these as in other matters true understanding has hardly any choice. The sources talk and what they reveal is self-understanding as well as self-interpretation of people who act and who believe that they know what they are doing. If we deny them this faculty and pretend that we know better and can tell them what their real “motives” are or of what real “trends” they are the objective representatives, no matter what they think they are, we have taken away from them the very faculty of speech insofar as speech is supposed to make sense. (If for instance Hitler says time and again that the Jews are the negative center of world history and if to support this opinion he designs factories for the liquidation of all people of Jewish origin, it is non-sensical to declare that antisemitism was of no great relevance for the up-building of this totalitarian regime and that Hitler suffered only an unfortunate prejudice. It then is the task of the scientist to find the historical and political background of antisemitism, but under no circumstances can he say that antisemitism stands only for petty-bourgeoisie or a father complex or what not. Cases in which people consciously tell lies and, to remain in our example, pretend to hate Jews while in fact they want to murder the bourgeoisie are very rare and easily detectable. In all other cases, self-understanding and self-interpretation are the very fundament of all analysis and understanding.)	[absent]	[absent]
82
Trying to understand the nature of totalitarianism, we therefore shall ask in good faith the traditional questions first regarding the nature of its government and the principle which sets it into motion. Since the rise of the scientific approach in the humanities, that is with the development of modern historicism, sociology and economics, these questions have no longer been thought likely to further understanding and Kant, in fact, is the last who thought in these matter[gap] along the lines of traditional political philosophy. Since |29 then, it is true, our standards for scientific accuracy have constantly grown and are certainly higher than at any time before us. It seems, however, that at the same time our standards and criteria for true understanding have no less constantly declined and, with the introduction of completely alien and frequently simply non-sensical categories for evaluation into the social sciences, reached an all-time low. Scientific accuracy did not permit any understanding which went beyond its own narrow limits of sheer factuality; it paid a heavy price for this arrogance when the wild growing superstitions of the twentieth century in the clothes of humbug scientificality began to supplement these deficiencies. Today the need for understanding has grown desperate and plays havoc not only with the standards for understanding but with the standards for pure scientific accuracy and intellectual honesty as well.	[absent]	[absent]
83
III	[absent]	[absent]
84
Totalitarian government is unprecedented because it defies all comparisons. It has exploded the very alternative on which the definitions of the essence of governments has relied since the beginning of Western political thought, the alternative between lawful or constitutional or “republican” and lawless or arbitrary or tyrannical government. Totalitarian rule is “lawless” insofar as it defies all positive laws; but it is not arbitrary insofar as it obeys in strict logic and executes in precise compulsion those laws of History or of Nature from which all positive laws are supposed to spring. It is the monstrous, yet seemingly unanswerable claim of totalitarian rule that, far from being “lawless”, it goes to the sources of authority from which all positive laws--based on “natural law” or on customs and tradition or on the historical event of divine revelation-- received their ultimate legitimation; xxxx what appears as lawless to the non-totalitarian world, would in fact constitute a higher form of legitimacy which, on the strength of being inspired by the sources themselves, can do away with the petty legality of positive laws which never can produce justice in any single, concrete and therefore unpredictable case, but can only prevent injustice. Totalitarian lawfulness, executing the laws of Nature or the laws of History, does not bother to translate these into standards of right and wrong for individual human beings but applies them directly to the “species, that is to mankind. The law of nature or the law of History, if properly executed, is espected to produce one mankind as its end product; and this expectation lies behind the claim to global rule of all totalitarian governments. |31 Humanity or rather the human species, on the other hand is regarded as a kind of active carriers of these laws while the rest of the universe is only passively determined by them.	[absent]	[absent]
85
At this point, the fundamental difference between the totalitarian and all others concepts of law comes to light. It is true that Nature or History as the sources of authority for all positive laws could reveal itself in man himself, be it as the lumen naturale of natural or as the voice of conscience of historical religious law; this, however, did not make out of human beings walking embodiments of these laws, but on the contrary remained distinct, as the authority which demanded obedience, from the actions of men which they were supposed to regulate. Compared to the source of authority, Nature or History, the positive laws of men were considered changing and changeable in accordance with circumstances; but these laws had relative permanence with respect to the ever and much more rapidly changing actions of men, and they received this relative permanence from the humanly speaking eternal presence of their authoritative sources. All laws, therefore, were thought of as stabilizing factors for the movements of men.	[absent]	[absent]
86
In the interpretation of totalitarianism, all laws become on the contrary laws of movement. Nature and History are no longer the stabilizing sources of authority for the actions of mortal men, but are in themselves movement and their laws, therefore, though one might need intelligence in order to perceive and understand them, have nothing to do with reason or permanence. At the bottom of the Nazis’ belief in race laws does lie Darwin’s idea of man as a more or less accidental product of a natural development which does not necessarily stop with a species of human beings such as we know them; at the bottom of the Bolshevik’s belief in class does lie the Marx’ notion of men as the product of a gigantic historical movement which races to the end of historical |32 times, that is, tends to abolish itself. The very term of law has changed its meaning: from expressing the framework of stability within which human actions and motions were supposed and permitted to take place, it has become the very expression of these motions themselves.	[absent]	[absent]
87
The various ideologies of racism or dialectical materialism which transformed Nature or History from the firm soil upon which human life and action moved into supragigantic forces whose movements race through humanity and drag every individual willy-nilly with it-- either on its ever triumphant car or crushed under its wheels--, these ideologies may be various and complicated; still, it is surprising to see how, for all practical political purposes, they always result in the same “law”, a law of elimination of individuals for the sake of the triumphant process and progress of the species. From the elimination of harmful or superfluous individuals the end result of the natural or the historical movement rises like the phoenix from its own ashes; but unlike the fabulous bird, this mankind which is the end result and at the same time the embodiment of the movement of either History or Nature requires permanent sacrifices, the permanent elimination of hostile or parasitic or unhealthy classes or race elements in order to enter upon its bloody eternity.	[absent]	[absent]
88
Just as positive laws in constitutional government are needed to translate and realize the immutable jus naturale or the eternal Commandments of God or the everlasting customs and traditions of history, so terror is needed to realize, to translate into a living reality the laws of movement of History or Nature. And just as positive laws, though they define transgressions in any given society, are independent of them, so that their absence does not render laws superfluous but on the contrary constitutes its most perfect rule--so terror in totalitarian government has ceased to be a means for the |33 suppression of political opposition, has become independent of it and rules supreme when no opposition any longer stands in its way.	[absent]	[absent]
89
If law therefore is the essence of constitutional or republican government, then terror is the essence of totalitarian government. Laws were established like boundaries (to follow one of the oldest images which Plato already used, invoking Zeus the God of the boundaries) and remain static so that men may move within them; under totalitarian conditions, on the contrary, everything is done to “stabilize” men, to make them static, to prevent any unforeseen, free, spontaneous act so that terror as the law of movement may race freely, unhindered by them. It is the law of movement itself, Nature or History, which singles out the foes of mankind and no move, no free action of men is permitted to interfere with it. Guilt and innocence become senseless notions; “guilty” is who is in the way of the terror movement, that is who willingly or unwillingly hinders the movement of Nature or History. The rulers, consequently, do not apply laws but execute the movement in accordance with its inherent law; they claim not to be just or to be wise, but to know “scientifically”[gap]	[absent]	[absent]
90
Terror freezes men in order to make the way free for the movement of Nature or History. It eliminates individuals for the sake of the species; it sacrifices men for the sake of mankind, not only those who eventually become the victims of terror, but in fact all of them insofar as this movement which has its own beginning and its own end can only be hindered by the new beginning and the individual end which the life of each man actually is. Laws erect the boundaries and the channels of communication between men who live together and must act in concert. With each new birth a new beginning (initium ut esset, creatus est homo) is born into the world, a new world has potentially |34 come into being. The stability of the laws hedge in this new beginning and assure at the same time the freedom of its movement, the potentiality of something entirely new, and the pre-existence of a common world, the reality of some transcending continuity which absorbs all origins and is nourished by them. Terror first razes these boundaries of man-made law, but not for the sake of some arbitrary tyrannical will, nor for the sake of the despotic power of one man against all, and least of all for the sake of a war of all against all. Terror substitutes for the boundaries and channels of communication between individual men an iron shred which holds them all so tightly together that it is as though they were melted into each other, as though they were only one. Terror, the obedient servant of Nature or History and the omnipresent executor of their predestined movement, fabricates the Oneness of men by abolishing the boundaries of laws which provide the living space for freedom of each individual man. Totalitarian terror does not curtail certain liberties or abolish certain essential freedoms, nor does it, at least to our limited knowledge, succeed in eradicating the love for freedom from the hearts of men; it simply and mercilessly presses men, such as they are, against each other so that the very space of free action, and that is the reality of freedom, disappears.	[absent]	[absent]
91
This terror constitutes the totalitarian body politic just as lawfulness constitutes the constitutional or republican body politic. As such, terror under totalitarian conditions is as independent from actual opposition to the government as the existence of laws is independent of individual transgressions or the lack of them under constitutional conditions. |35 Terror exists neither for nor against men; it is there in order to provide the movement of Nature or History with an incomparable instrument of acceleration. If the undeniable automatism of historical or natural happenings is understood as the stream of necessity whose meaning is identical with its law of movement and therefore quite independent of any event, which on the contrary would only be considered as the superficial and transitory outburst of some deeper and more permanent law, then the equally undeniable freedom of man which is identical with the fact that each man is a new beginning and therefore in some sense begins the world anew, can be regarded only as the irrelevant and arbitrary interference with higher forces, which to be sure could not permanently and definitely be declined by such ridiculous impotence but still are being hindered and prevented from full realization. Mankind organized in such a way that it marches with the movement of Nature or History as though all men were only One man creates a speed of the automatic movement which it could not ever reach by itself. Practically speaking, this means in all cases that terror executes the death sentences which Nature has pronounced on unfit races and individuals or History has pronounced on dying classes and institutions on the spot, without waiting for the slower and less efficient elimination which Nature or History in their movement is assumed to bring about anyhow.	[absent]	[absent]
92
In a perfect totalitarian government, where all men have become One Man or all individuals exemplars of the species, where all action had been transformed into the acceleration of the movement of Nature or History or every deed into the execution of the death sentences which Nature or History has already pronounced, that is under conditions in which terror as the essence of |36 government would be perfectly safe from the disturbing irrelevant interference of human wishes and needs, no principle of action in Montesquieu’s sense as the principle which makes men act as they act would be necessary. Montesquieu needed his principle of action because his essence, lawfulness of government and distribution of power, was basically stable and could only negatively set the limitations of all actions but not establish positively their principle. The greatness, but also the perplexity, of all laws in free societies is that they only tell what one should not, and never what one should do. Political action and historical movement in constitutional government remain free and unpredictable in the sense that they have only to conform to, but are not inspired by its essence.	[absent]	[absent]
93
Under totalitarian conditions, this essence has itself become movement and is only insofar as it is kept in constant motion. As long as totalitarian rule has not conquered the whole earth and with the iron shred of terror melted all individual men down into One mankind, an incomparable instrument of acceleration of the movement of Nature or History, terror in its double function as essence of government and principle (not of action but) of motion cannot be fully realized. To add however to this peculiar essence which is essentially motion simply a principle of action--such, for instance, as fear--would be basically contradictory. Even fear is still a principle of action (doubtless as Montesquieu said the principle of all tyrannical government) and as such unpredictable in its consequences. Fear is always connected with isolation--it can be either its result or its origin--and the concomitant experiences of impotence and helplessness. The space which freedom needs for its realization is transformed into a desert when the arbitrariness of |37 tyrants destroy the boundaries of laws which hedge in and guarantee to each the realm in which he is free. Fear is the principle of human movements in the desert of neighborlessness and loneliness; as fear, however, it still is a principle which guides the actions of individual men and therefore retains a minimum of contact with other men, even though this is only a contact of fright. And the desert in which these individual and fearfully atomized men move retains an image, though a distorted one, of that space for each which human freedom needs.	[absent]	[absent]
94
Totalitarianism as we know it today in its Bolshevik and Nazi version has developed out of one-party dictatorships which used terror like other tyrannies as a means to establish the desert of neighborlessness and loneliness. Yet, when the well-known tranquillity of the cemetery had been obtained, totalitarianism was not satisfied but turned at once and with increased vigor the instrument of terror into an objective law of movement. Terror under totalitarian conditions does not only survive political opposition to the ruler, but increases after an especially ruthless persecution has liquidated all actual and virtual enemies. Fear becomes pointless when the selection of victims is completely freed from all reference to an individual’s actions or thoughts. Fear, though certainly the all-pervasive mood in totalitarian countries, can no longer serve as guide to specific deeds; it is no longer a principle of action. Totalitarian tyranny is unprecedented in that it introduces a gigantic motion into the tranquillity of the cemetery and melts people together in the desert of isolation and atomization.	[absent]	[absent]
95
No guiding principle of action, taken itself from the realm of human action--such as virtue, honor, fear-- is needed or could be useful to set into motion a body politic whose essence is terror. In its stead, it relies |38 [metamark ⋏]upon a new principle which as such dispenses with human action as a free deed altogether and substitutes for the very desire and will to action the craving and need for insight into the law of movement according to which the terror is functioning[metamark ⋏]. Human beings, caught in or thrown into the process of Nature or History for the sake of accelerating its movement, can only be the executioners or the victims of its inherent law. According to this law, they may be today those who eliminate the “unfit races and individuals” or the “dying classes and decadent peoples” and tomorrow those who for the same reason must be sacrificed themselves. What totalitarian rule therefore needs in the stead of a principle of action is a preparation of individuals which will fit them equally well for the role of executioner and the role of victim. This two-sided preparation, the substitute for a principle of action, is the ideology.	[absent]	[absent]
96
Fear, the inspiring principle of action in tyranny, is fundamentally connected with that anxiety which we experience in situations of complete loneliness. This anxiety reveals us the other side of equality and corresponds to the joy over sharing the world with our equals. The dependence and interdependence which we need in order to realize our power, the amount of strength which is strictly our own, becomes a source of despair whenever in complete loneliness we experience that one man alone has no power at all but finds himself always overwhelmed and defeated by superior power. If one man alone could have sufficient strength to match his power with the power of nature and circumstances, he would not be in need of company. Virtue is happy to pay the price of limited power for the blessing of being together with other men; fear is the despair about the impotence of all who, for whatever reason, have refused to “act in concert”. There is no virtue, no love of equality of power, which has not to overcome this anxiety of helplessness; for there is no human life which in some respects and some situations does not remain utterly helpless and without recourse to action, and be this only the situation of death. Fear as a principle of action is in some way a contradiction in terms, because fear is precisely the despair about the impossibility of all action. Fear, in distinction from the principles of virtue and honor, has no self-transcending power and, therefore, is truly anti-political. Fear as the principle of action can only be destructive, or--in the words of Montesquieu-- is “self-corrupting”. Tyranny, therefore, is the only form of government which bears its germs of destruction within itself. Other governments decline because of external circumstances; tyrannies, on the contrary, owe their existence and survvival only to accidental, external causes, which prevent their self- corruption. (Esprit des Lois, Book viii, 10)	[absent]	[absent]