Letter to Laura Lafargue, November 24, 1888

Author(s) Friedrich Engels
Written 24 November 1888


First published in full, in the language of the original (English), in: F. Engels, P. et L. Lafargue, Correspondance, t. II, Paris, 1956 and, in Russian, in Istorichesky arkhiv, No. 2, 1956
Published in English in full for the first time in Marx-Engels Collected Works, Volume 48


ENGELS TO LAURA LAFARGUE[1]

AT LE PERREUX

London, 24 November 1888

My dear Laura,

I was going to write two lines to Paul just when your letter[2] arrived. I have been busy with a very important chapter in Book III[3] which I have had to re-write entirely, the materials left by Mohr being all in the rought, and as it is a mathematical one, it required much attention.[4]

And when one has only two daily fragments of IV2 hours each allowed for work by the doctor, a thing which otherwise could be settled in 14 days takes more than 6 weeks—and so I determined to do it all before I allowed myself any interruption for correspondence. Well, the main portion is finished to-day and so I can just send a line to ask Paul to let me know as usual when he wants any money and I will do what I can.

As soon as my chapter is definitely got rid of, I shall write again—I have such a lot of letter-debts!—in the meantime hope to get the Figaro to-night, so far it has not come. The position in France seems indeed very curious—our friends have allowed themselves by their hatred of the Radicals[5] to take Boulanger too little au sérieux and find now that he is a real danger[6] —anyhow he has the lower ranks of the army on his side and that is a power not to be disdained. And anyhow the way the fellow not only accepts but courts the support of the monarchists makes him more contemptible in my eyes than even the Radicals. Let us hope that the conscious breaches of logic committed by all parties—but then one must not forget that the form of all unconscious development is the Negation der Negation,[7] the movement by contrasts, and that this in France means Republicanism (or respectively Socialism) and Bonapartism (or Boulangism). And Boulanger's avènement[8] would be a European war—the very thing most to be feared.

Ever yours

F. Engels

Pumps' boy has had to be transformed into a Jew last Wednesday—let Paul pronounce his blessing on his favourite operation![9] He is getting better. Nim had a severe cold, home-bound nearly 3 weeks.

  1. ↑ A brief excerpt from this letter was first published in French by the journal La Pensee, No. 61, 1955. For the first publication of this letter in English, see note 40.
  2. ↑ of 5 November 1888
  3. ↑ of Capital
  4. ↑ Engels was working on Chapter III of Volume III of Capital at the time. For more detail, see Engels' preface to Volume III of Capital (present edition, Vol. 37).
  5. ↑ The Radicals were a parliamentary group in France in the 1880s and 1890s that emerged from the party of moderate republicans ('Opportunists', see note 199). The Radicals relied chiefly on the petty bourgeoisie and to some extent on the middle bourgeoisie; they upheld the bourgeois-democratic demands: a unicameral system of parliament, separation of the church from the state, a progressive income tax, limitation of the workday, among other social issues. The Radicals were led by George Clemenceau. This group transformed itself into the Republican Party of Radicals and Radical-Socialists (parti republicain radical et radical-socialiste') in 1901.
  6. ↑ After his resignation from the post of War Minister, General Boulanger continued to whip up a revanchist campaign with the support of the chauvinist elements of different parties, from the radicals to the monarchists. On 8 July 1887, when Boulanger was leaving for Clermont-Ferrand to assume command of the 13th Corps, his supporters staged a chauvinist demonstration at the Lyons railway station. Boulangism was a reactionary movement in France in the mid-1880s, led by ex-War Minister General Boulanger. It urged a revanchist war against Germany to win back Alsace, annexed by Germany in the Franco-Prussian war of 1870-71. In alliance with the monarchists, the Boulangists sought to capitalise on the masses' discontent with the government's policy. Their large-scale demagogic propaganda was especially effective among the lower ranks of the army. France was under the threat of a monarchist coup. Measures taken by the republican government, with the support of the progressive forces led to the collapse of the Boulangist movement. Its leaders fled from France.
  7. ↑ negation of the negation
  8. ↑ accession to power
  9. ↑ An allusion to P. Lafargue's article 'Die Beschneidung, ihre soziale und religiose Bedeutung', published by the journal Neue Zeit, No. 11, 1888.