Letter to Friedrich Engels, January 29, 1858

Author(s) Karl Marx
Written 29 January 1858


First published abridged in Der Briefwechsel zwischen F. Engels und K. Marx, Bd. 2, Stuttgart, 1913 and in full in: Marx and Engels, Works, First Russian Edition, Vol. XXII, Moscow, 1929
Printed according to the original
Published in English for the first time in Marx-Engels Collected Works, Volume 40


MARX TO ENGELS

IN MANCHESTER

[London,] 29 January 1858

DEAR Frederick,

The 3 B articles received.[1] It's excellent that you should have made 'Borodino' longer. Since the fellows' columns are so IMMENSE and their PAY so bad, the only remedy is to lengthen the articles. I hope that when you come to do 'Cavalry' you will spin it out as much as possible so that I can get rid of my DEBTS to those curs.

In France things are splendid. The COOLNESS with which the épiciers[2] responded to the news of the attempted assassination[3] has exasperated the fellow.[4] The secret of this indifference of the épiciers is doubtless the unspoken desire of many of them that some sudden political event should get them out of their mess. The majority of the laddies had had their bills renewed by the Bank, Discount Association, etc., which were acting on the ORDERS of Boustrapa. However, to put off is not to write off. A large number of French bourgeois, with commercial ruin staring them in the face, are anxiously awaiting the day of reckoning. They now find themselves in much the same STATE as Boustrapa before the coup d'état.[5] ANY POLITICAL PRETEXT FOR MAKING AN HONOURABLE EXIT WILL, CONSEQUENTLY, BE EAGERLY SEIZED UPON BY THE DAMNED FELLOWS JUST as it was 10 years ago. Boustrapa knows this and now wishes to act the real 'despot'. Nous verrons?[6] If he pins his faith on Magnan, Castellane, etc., he will be left high and dry.[7]

In my economic work I have now reached a point at which I could do with some information on practical matters from you, since nothing of the kind is to be found in theoretical writings. I mean, the circulation of capital—how it varies in various kinds of business; the effect of the same on profit and prices. If you can provide me with any information on the subject, it would be VERY welcome.

Mr Lassalle, in his preface to Die Philosophie Herakleitos des Dunklen von Ephesos, says inter alia:

'All but a small part of the same' (the book) 'was completed early in 1846, and I was on the point of putting the concluding touches to it when suddenly an interest of a different kind—how true in every respect is Sophocles' dictum:[8]

"iroXXà Ta ôeivà, xoùBèu àu6p<!>iToi> Seiwrepou irèXei"

— precipitated me into a welter of practical strife and prevented me over a period of nearly 10 years from devoting myself to the completion of this work.'

Do you suppose that Sophocles' verse, put into German by Lassalle, means: 'There's no more frightful specimen of human- kind than the Countess Hatzfeldt!'[9]

Salut.

Your

K. M.

  1. ↑ F. Engels, 'Berme', 'Blenheim', 'Borodino'.
  2. ↑ grocers
  3. ↑ Marx refers to an attempt on the life of Napoleon III by the Italian revolutionary Felice Orsini on 14 January 1858. Orsini hoped thus to give an impetus to revolutionary actions in Europe and activate the struggle for Italy's unification. The attempt failed and Orsini was executed on 13 March of that year.—251, 255, 256, 257, 266, 271, 289
  4. ↑ Napoleon III
  5. ↑ Marx refers to the position of Louis Bonaparte as President of the French Republic before the coup d'état of 2 December 1851. His term as president was to expire early in May 1852, and according to the republic's Constitution a person could be elected to the post a second time only after a four-year interval. So Louis Bonaparte was in danger not only of losing his power and salary but also of being prosecuted for numerous debts.—256
  6. ↑ We shall see.
  7. ↑ Marx developed these ideas in his article 'An Attempt on Bonaparte' published in the New-York Daily Tribune on 22 February 1858 (see present edition, Vol. 15).—256
  8. ↑ There are many wonderful things, and nothing is more wonderful than man' (Sophocles, Antigone, Lines 339-40).
  9. ↑ From 1846 to 1854 Ferdinand Lassalle handled Countess Sophie von Hatzfeldt's divorce suit against Count Edmund Hatzfeldt-Wildenburg. The divorce was agreed to in July 1851. Later, the countess received 300,000 talers under the property settlement.—23, 27, 227