The Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion

What has restrained the beasts of prey who are called men?
What has served for their guidance hitherto?
In the beginnings of the structure of society they were
subjected to brutal and blind force; afterwards -- to Law, which
is the same force, only disguised. I draw the conclusion that by
the law of nature right lies in force.
Political freedom is an idea but not a fact. This idea one
must know how to apply whenever it appears necessary with this
bait of an idea to attract the masses of the people to one's
party for the purpose of crushing another who is in authority.
This task is rendered easier if the opponent has himself been
infected with the idea of freedom, so-called liberalism, and, for
the sake of an idea, is willing to yield some of his power. It is
precisely here that the triumph of our theory appears: the
slackened reins of government are immediately, by the law of
life, caught up and gathered together by a new hand, because the
blind might of the nation cannot for one single day exist without
guidance, and the new authority merely fits into the place of the
old already weakened by liberalism.
In our day the power which has replaced that of the rulers
who were liberal is the power of Gold.

In the hands of the States of to-day there is a great force
that creates the movement of thought in the people, and that is
the Press. The part played by the Press is to keep pointing out
requirements supposed to be indispensable, to give voice to the
complaints of the people, to express and create discontent. It is
in the Press that the triumph of freedom of speech finds its
incarnation. But the goyim States have not known how to make use
of this force; and it has fallen into our hands. Through the
Press we have gained the power to influence while remaining
ourselves in the shade: thanks to the Press we have got the
gold in our hands, notwithstanding that we have had to gather
it out of the oceans of blood and tears. But it has paid us,
though we have sacrificed many of our people. Each victim on
our side is worth in the sight of God a thousand goyim.

In order to put public opinion into our hands we must bring
it into a state of bewilderment by giving expression from all
sides to so many contradictory opinions and for such length of
time as will suffice to make the GOYIM lose their heads in the
labyrinth and come to see that the best thing is to have no
opinion of any kind in matters political, which it is not given
to the public to understand, because they are understood only by
him who guides the public. This is the first secret.
The second secret requisite for the success of our
government is comprised in the following: To multiply to such an
extent national failings, habits, passions, conditions of civil
life, that it will be impossible for anyone to know where he is
in the resulting chaos, so that the people in consequence will
fail to understand one another. This measure will also serve us
in another way, namely, to sow discord in all parties, to
dislocate all collective forces which are still unwilling to
submit to us, and to discourage any kind of personal initiative
which might in any degree hinder our affair. There is nothing
more dangerous than personal initiative; if it has genius behind
it, such initiative can do more than can be done by million, of
people among whom we have sown discord. We must so direct the
education of the goyim communities that whenever they come upon a
matter requiring initiative they may drop their hands in
despairing impotence. The strain which results from freedom of
action saps the forces when it meets with the freedom of another.