Letter to Friedrich Engels, July 9, 1860

Author(s) Karl Marx
Written 9 July 1860


First published in Der Briefwechsel zwischen F. Engels und K. Marx, Bd. 2, Stuttgart, 1913
Printed according to the original
Published in English for the first time in Marx-Engels Collected Works, Volume 41


MARX TO ENGELS

IN MANCHESTER

[London,] 9 July [1860]

Dear Frederick,

As regards Meissner, the thing strikes me as somewhat dubious, since he is pretty well hand in glove with Vogt and Co. At any rate, I shan't send him a manuscript[1] unless he concludes a contract beforehand.

What about Bohemia? I must have it now, otherwise I shall be held up. Anyway, it need only be brief, you know.[2]

I should also like you to devote a few sentences to a discussion of the military inanities contained in the following utterances of Falstaff Vogt's.c

1. This man, who has made such a detailed study of the relationship between 'Energy and Matter',[3] maintains that, within their present boundaries, the United Danubian Principalities are capable—qua independent kingdom—of forming a 'bulwark' against Russia and, indeed, of withstanding the Russians, Aus- trians and Turks.

2. As the main proof of Badinguet'slb3 altruism and policy of non-conquest he puts forward the argument that, after the 'glorious' Crimean campaign/ he did not annex either 'Russian' or 'Turkish' territory.

I am still not yet quite fit. One day, I feel a bit better, the next day a bit worse.

Salut.

Your

K. M.

Apropos. I have seen (thanks to a young ENGLISHMAN by the name of Green) a letter from Garibaldi in which he heartily reviles Bonaparte and hopes eventually to draw his sword against him.[4]

  1. ↑ Marx means his Herr Vogt.
  2. ↑ See this volume, pp. 165, 168, 170. ' in Vogt's Studien zur gegenwärtigen Lage Europas d the Crimean war (1853 56)
  3. ↑ An ironic allusion to the book Kraft und Stoff (Energy and Matter) (1855) by the German physiologist Ludwig Büchner, a vulgar materialist like Vogt.
  4. ↑ Garibaldi's letter to Green, written in the summer of 1860, was used by Marx in his article 'Interesting from Sicily.—Garibaldi's Quarrel with La Farina.—A Letter from Garibaldi' (see present edition, Vol. 17).