The word tyrant can be defined in many different ways. Is a tyrant merely a man who rules with indecency and no restrictions? Or can it be something more? The well known tyrants seem not to have much in common. They all rule differently, come from different backrounds, and because of this most potential tyrants remain invisible until their time is already at hand. The inevitable rise of more limitless oppressors is inherently clear. But perhaps by focusing on past dictators, we may further grasp what it is to be a tyrant.

The man who, for a dark time dominated not just Germany but most of Europe, intimadating and menacing the whole world, came from an undistiguished and average backround. Adolf Hitler was born in Austria in early 1889 into a middle class family. His childhood was less than perfect. Adolf percieved his father as brutal, and the young...