“The Party seeks power entirely for its own sake. We are not interested in the good of others; we are interested solely in power, pure power. For, after all, how do we know that two and two make four? Or that the force of gravity works? Or that the past is unchangeable? If both the past and the external world exist only in the mind, and if the mind itself is controllable – what then? Power is not a means; it is an end.” George Orwell, 1984
“The Party seeks power entirely for its own sake. We are not interested in the good of others; we are interested solely in power, pure power.
For, after all, how do we know that two and two make four? Or that the force of gravity works? Or that the past is unchangeable? If both the past and the external world exist only in the mind, and if the mind itself is controllable – what then?
Power is not a means; it is an end.”
George Orwell, 1984
The base assumption of all statists, of both the Left and the Right, is that the individual exists and acts at the tolerance of the State, and only so far as the discretion of the State permits.
The happiness of the individual is as nothing compared to the objectives of the State. The fate of the individual is as nothing compared to the power of the State. The will of the individual is as nothing compared to the will of the State.
Power, real power, is the ability to define: to define what is wealth, what is value, what is to be read, what is to be said, and at the last, what is acceptably human.
The will to power is not bound by the past or by the law, because it is the past, and it is the law.
It is beyond all moral contingencies. And so for the State that truly understands its power, there can be no higher moral principle, and therefore no god but the State.
Power is the realization of pure discretion to shape reality as we wish. And all participants in the State's reality act and eventually exist at the State's discretion.
