Letter to Karl Marx, July 21, 1874

Author(s) Friedrich Engels
Written 21 July 1874


First published in Der Briefwechsel zwischen F. Engels und K. Marx, Bd. 4, Stuttgart 1913
Printed according to the original
Published in English for the first time in Marx-Engels Collected Works, Volume 45


ENGELS TO MARX

IN RYDE

Ramsgate, 21 July 1874

11 Abbot's Hill Dear Moor,

Last Friday[1] evening I received out of the blue a letter from Gumpert posted in London; he has gone there to have an operation and asked us to visit him when it is all over (Saturday). I telegraphed and wrote to him at once and have received a reply today saying that the operation went off all right and that he hopes to be up again in a few days. Depending on what he says in his next letter, I shall visit him either this week or early next, when I have to be in London on business and to fetch Pumps.

I hope that your head has finally given in to the sea air and has ceased to rebel.

The Carlists have indulged in the pleasure of shooting a Prussian officer. So the Prussian fleet can go off there and take its revenge without delay, instead of blockading you in Ryde. It seems obvious that one way or the other the Prussians will come into conflict with Spain. In the meantime, Bismarck is putting his injured wrist to good use.[2] There will certainly be new legislation on the press, assembly, associations, etc.

I fear that you are deceived in William.[3] I suspect that from now on he will regard it as one of the chief duties of all his ministers to take all bullets upon themselves in peacetime, in accordance with the Constitution. The only aspect of constitutionalism that he takes seriously.

Friend Dizzy[4] will probably want to become a minority minister once more now that his crack-brained SQUIRES have compelled him, perhaps for the first time in English history, actually to revoke two parliamentary measures passed by his predecessors: the school business and now the ENDOWED SCHOOLS COMMISSION.[5] The jackasses don't know what they are doing by overturning the traditional unassailability and once-and-for-all establishment of laws which have been enacted. This certainly knocks quite a hole in the Old English tradition of loyalty. A few more tricks of that sort and this Tory Parliament will find itself in quite the same position as the Versailles Assembly vis-à-vis the electorate, and it will cling to its septennium just as desperately as MacMahon.[6]

But what a blockhead that man is! First the Prussian MESSAGE,[7] and then the abdication of the author of the MESSAGE,[8] and now the self-same MacMahon begs for a postponement, immediately after almost giving the order to charge! I think all this will come to nothing, the Assembly will pass contradictory resolutions, will adjourn its sessions until the winter, without any result, and will then start to go round in circles once again until a majority has been created in favour of dissolution. If it achieved anything, it would be a sheer FLUKE, a lucky shot at billiards, and up to now this Assembly hasn't a single FLUKE to its credit.

What a financier this Magne is, wanting to squeeze even more money from already overstrained indirect taxes! And he was the financial wizard of the Second Empire! Gambetta really looks very dignified in comparison, as he stands there with his big drum with which to convert the three men of principle, Blanc, Quinet & Co.! And the beaten Italians and the beaten French celebrate the 'supremacy of the Latin race' in Avignon and Arqua over the corpse of Petrarch![9] While at the same time the German philistine revels in the Kulturkampf[10] and his English equivalent gets drunk for CHURCH AND STATE. VERILY the ruling classes are going to seed at the same rate everywhere, and even our German citizens do not lag behind the times in this respect.

Best regards.

Your

F. E.

  1. ↑ 17 July
  2. ↑ Bismarck spent July and August 1874 at Bad Kissingen where an assassination attempt was made on him on 13 July. It was organised by the Catholic clergy enraged by the Kulturkampf policy he was pursuing (see Note 35). Bismarck was wounded by a shot fired by the artisan Kullmann.
  3. ↑ William I
  4. ↑ Benjamin Disraeli
  5. ↑ In 1870, the Gladstone government introduced a reform of public education which provided for the opening of secular schools controlled by locally elected school boards (alongside parish schools) at which religious instruction was no longer compulsory. The reform was attacked by the Conservatives. In mid-July 1874, one of them, Lord Sandon, proposed an amendment to the law of 1869 which had established the Endowed Schools Commission. He suggested that the money be henceforth distributed by the Charity Commission, which would have allowed the church to regain the ground it had lost in school education. Sandon's Bill was strongly opposed by the Liberals.
  6. ↑ On 20 November 1873, the French National Assembly passed a law on the septennium, which allowed Mac-Mahon to hold the post of president of the republic for seven years (up to 20 November 1880). This signified consolidation of the President's individual power and bolstered the monarchists' position.
    The monarchist parties' attempts to have the National Assembly dissolved and the monarchy restored made in the summer of 1874 provoked indignation in republican quarters. Fearing an outburst on the part of the republican-minded masses, on 9 July Mac-Mahon issued an address to the Assembly stating that he would use all available means to retain the power granted him for the term of seven years. At the same time, he demanded an early introduction of new laws that would, to all intents and purposes, secure his dictatorship. Specifically, he demanded that the President be given a right to dissolve the Assembly, announce new elections and form the majority in parliament.
  7. ↑ See this volume, p. 23.
  8. ↑ Pierre Magne, the finance minister in the Mac-Mahon government, tried to eliminate the enormous budget deficit of 1873 (149 million francs), among other things by greatly increasing indirect taxes on all everyday necessities. In July 1874, his proposals were discussed in the French National Assembly. They were opposed by the left-wing deputies, who feared discontent and possible mass protests. After a stormy debate, some of Magne's proposals were rejected, and he was forced to resign.
  9. ↑ In July 1874, Padua and Arqua (Italy), Avignon and Vaucluse (France) hosted a festival to mark the quincentenary of the death of Petrarch, the great Italian lyric poet. The choice of venues was not accidental. The 'new man', as Petrarch has been called, spent his last years in Arqua near Padua. In Avignon, the Popes' residence from 1309, he was ordained, which gave him access to the papal court. In Vaucluse near Avignon, Petrarch spent four years (1337-41) in total seclusion, and later repeatedly returned there to work and rest. It was here that he wrote or conceived most of his works.
  10. ↑ The reference is to the German Workers' Educational Society in London founded in February 1840 by Karl Schapper, Joseph Moll and other members of the League of the Just. After the establishment of the Communist League in 1847, the leading role in the Society was assumed by the League's local communities. Marx and Engels were actively involved in its work in 1847 and 1849-50. On 17 September 1850, Marx, Engels and some of their followers left the Society in protest at the domination of the Willich-Schapper group, and rejoined it only in the late 1850s. After the foundation of the International Working Men's Association, the Society with Lessner among its leaders, became its German section in London. The London Educational Society existed until 1918, when it was closed down by the British government.