STIRNER, sterner, Max, German phi losopher, a pseudonym for JOHANN KASPAR ScHsturr, b. Bayreuth, 25 Oct. 1806; d. Berlin, 26 June 1856. His reputation is based upon a single book, 'Der Einzige and sein Eigentum' (1845, English tr. The Ego and his Own,' by S. T. Byington, London 1913). After complet ing hisgymnasium course in his native town (1819-26), he attended the University of Berlin (1826-28), where he heard lectures chiefly on philosophy and theology under Hegel, Schleier macher, Neander, Marheineke and others. His next university was that of Erlangen (1828-29), which he left for that of Konigsberg, not at tending any lectures at the latter institution, however, for °family reasons,)) the nature of which is not known, any more than the manner in which he distributed his time between Konigsberg and Kulm in East Prussia (the new home of his parents) in 1830-32. The year 1832-33 was again spent at the University of Berlin, after the completion of which he ap plied for a certificate as a teacher in Prussian gymnasiums. He wrote two papers as part of the requirement for this position, one on Thucy dides, the other on the School Laws, the latter showing considerable revolutionary spirit. He served as teacher in training (Probekandidat) without pay at the Berlin Konigliche Realschule for a year and a half, and married Agnes Burt: (1815-38), who (with her child) died in child birth after a very short marriage. Stirner seems to have kept away from government in stitutions after his first experience in teaching, and obtained a position in the Girls' School of Madame Gropius (later the Misses Zepp), in Berlin, which he held from 1839 to 1844. Little is known of his life, beyond the data given above. For several years after 1841 he was the most regular attendant at the meetings of an irregular organization known as °Die Freien' (The Free), which met in Hippel's Weinstube on Friedrichsstrasse and elsewhere, none of the other members of which attained much fame. A few occasional visitors to the place expressed themselves unfavorably as to its rather loose tone. Karl Marx, who was present once, never met Stirner, as the latter joined after Marx's departure. Stirner married, as his second wife (21 Oct. 1843), Marie Dahnhardt (1818-1898?), who after his death asserted that he had de ceived and neglected her, and who probably had little understanding for his philosophical work.
They separated in 1846, after which time Stir ner led an irregular life in furnished rooms. The house in which he died (Berlin NW, Phil ippstrasse 19) has been marked with a tablet since 1898.
Stirner's great work, Ego and His Own,' met with sensational success on its first publication (1845), but passed into a relative oblivion, and did not again attract attention until the superficially similar philosophy of Nietzsche began to be widely read (about 1895). It is a work in excellent aphoristic style, apparently an anarchistic attack on all human society, on co-operation and institutions of every kind, on the human race itself. Obed ience to any form of authority is derided, re spect for the traditions of the past scorned. The Ego is the supreme law, external obliga tions and submissions to them are concessions to the °spooks° with which the world is in fested. Laugh at them, and they melt away. A careful reading will convince the reader, how ever, that Stirner was not an anarchist, and that his propaganda was an attack on those ideological compulsions (church, state, mon archy, etc.) that are not based on the real needs of humanity, and displays a considerable anal ogy with the destructive portions of the social criticism of Karl Marx (whose 'Deutsch franzosische lahrbiicher) the book quotes un favorably), without any of the latter's construc tive method. All of Stirner's other writings seem to have been chiefly general literary work: a translation of Adam Smith's of Nations' (4 vols.), of the French economist Jean Baptiste Say's 'Handbuch der praktischen politischen (4 vols.), and an orig inal work: 'Geschichte der Reaktion) (2 vols. 1852), which sketches the practices of the reac tionary classes following the French Revolution as well as of the same classes in the German Revolution of 1848. Robert Giseke (1827-1890) published a novel, (Moderne Titanen' (Leipzig 1850), of which Stirner is the hero (under the name Horn). Consult Adler, M., (Wcgweiser: Studien zur Geistesgeschichte' (Stuttgart 1914) ; Carus, P., (The Predecessor of Niet zsche' (Chicago 1911) ; Mackay, J. H., 'Max Stirner' (Berlin 1910) •, Messer, M., (Max Stir ner' (Berlin 1907) ; Ruest, A., (Max Stirner' (Berlin 1906) ; Zoccoli, E., (I gruppi anarchici degli Stati Uniti e l'opera di Max Stirner' (Modena 1901) Stirner, M., (Kleinere Schrif ten,' ed. by J. H. Mackay (Berlin 1907).