Letter to Henri Brissac, after April 7, 1892

Author(s) Friedrich Engels
Written 7 April 1892


First published in: Marx and Engels, Works, First Russian Edition, Vol. XXIX, Moscow 1946. Printed according to the original. Translated from the French
Published in English for the first time in Marx-Engels Collected Works, Volume 49


ENGELS TO HENRI BRISSAC

IN PARIS

[Draft]

[London, after 7 April 1892]

Dear Citizen,

I have just received your letter of the 7th inst. (postmarked yester- day). I am still awaiting the pamphlet[1] you were good enough to send me. I shall read it with interest. But I greatly regret that it will be impossible for me to render you the service you ask of me.[2] In the first place, if I were to write on your behalf a criticism of your work for publication, courtesy might, perhaps, preclude my speaking freely. Moreover, whatever I might do for you I should also be obliged to do for every other bona fide socialist, be he French, German, English, Italian, Spanish, Danish, etc., etc., and what would that lead to? I shouldn't have a single moment to call my own. And more impor- tant than any other consideration is the fact that I have before me a very difficult task which has been weighing on my conscience for years, namely the editing of Volume III of Marx's Capital. Several months ago I made a resolution not to take on any additional work whatsoever until I had discharged this urgent duty.

Yours sincerely

  1. ↑ H. Brissac, La Société collectiviste.
  2. ↑ On 7 April 1892 Henri Brissac asked Engels to review his pamphlet La Société col lectiviste (Paris, 1892), which was a collection of his articles published in Revue So cialiste.