The Great Dictator's Speech
by Charlie Chaplin
I’m sorry, but I don’t want to be an emperor. That’s not my business. I
don’t want to rule or conquer anyone. I should like to help everyone - if
possible - Jew, Gentile - black man - white. We all want to help one another.
Human beings are like that. We want to live by each other’s happiness - not by
each other’s misery. We don’t want to hate and despise one another. In this
world there is room for everyone. And the good earth is rich and can provide
for everyone. The way of life can be free and beautiful, but we have lost the
way.
Greed has poisoned men’s souls, has barricaded the world with hate, has
goose-stepped us into misery and bloodshed. We have developed speed, but we
have shut ourselves in. Machinery that gives abundance has left us in want. Our
knowledge has made us cynical. Our cleverness, hard and unkind. We think too
much and feel too little. More than machinery we need humanity. More than
cleverness we need kindness and gentleness. Without these qualities, life will
be violent and all will be lost....
The aeroplane and the radio have brought us closer together. The very nature
of these inventions cries out for the goodness in men - cries out for universal
brotherhood - for the unity of us all. Even now my voice is reaching millions
throughout the world - millions of despairing men, women, and little children -
victims of a system that makes men torture and imprison innocent people.
To those who can hear me, I say - do not despair. The misery that is now
upon us is but the passing of greed - the bitterness of men who fear the way of
human progress. The hate of men will pass, and dictators die, and the power
they took from the people will return to the people. And so long as men die,
liberty will never perish. .....
Soldiers! Don’t give yourselves to brutes - men who despise you -
enslave you - who regiment your lives - tell you what to do - what to think and
what to feel! Who drill you - diet you - treat you like cattle, use you as
cannon fodder. Don’t give yourselves to these unnatural men - machine men with
machine minds and machine hearts! You are not machines! You are not cattle! You
are men! You have the love of humanity in your hearts! You don’t hate! Only the
unloved hate - the unloved and the unnatural! Soldiers! Don’t fight for
slavery! Fight for liberty!
In the 17th Chapter of St Luke it is written: “the Kingdom of God is
within man” - not one man nor a group of men, but in all men! In you! You, the
people have the power - the power to create machines. The power to create
happiness! You, the people, have the power to make this life free and
beautiful, to make this life a wonderful adventure.
Then - in the name of democracy - let us use that power - let us all
unite. Let us fight for a new world - a decent world that will give men a
chance to work - that will give youth a future and old age a security. By the
promise of these things, brutes have risen to power. But they lie! They do not
fulfil that promise. They never will!
Dictators free themselves but they enslave the people! Now let us fight
to fulfil that promise! Let us fight to free the world - to do away with national
barriers - to do away with greed, with hate and intolerance. Let us fight for a
world of reason, a world where science and progress will lead to all men’s
happiness. Soldiers! in the name of democracy, let us all unite!
