A manifesto has surfaced that's being attributed to the man who set himself on fire -- and if it's legit, which it certainly seems to be, then the guy's motivation was purely political.

The man in question has been ID'd as Max Azzarello -- and he appears to have his own Substack page called The Ponzi Papers ... with his latest post titled "I have set myself on fire outside the Trump Trial."

The first lines are telling, and you can clearly make out that this man is very anti-governmental. He writes, "My name is Max Azzarello, and I am an investigative researcher who has set himself on fire outside of the Trump trial in Manhattan. This extreme act of protest is to draw attention to an urgent and important discovery."

The next line is in bold and reads, "We are victims of a totalitarian con, and our own government (along with many of their allies) is about to hit us with an apocalyptic fascist world coup."

He goes on to cite a conspiracy he believes to be afoot ... which ties into crypto, Uncle Sam and a lot of mumbo jumbo that frankly doesn't make a whole lot of sense. It is in line, however, with a lot of the content he's posted to social media in recent months.

The dude's page is full of conspiracy stuff, and in one video ... he sings of revolution.

On its face, it's hard to tell if Azzarello is anti-Trump ... frankly, he sounds anti-everybody ... accusing the Clintons and Bushes and lots of other politicians of being in cahoots with one another. It's a mouthful of a manifesto ... and like we said, it's really all over the place.