Letter to Paul Lafargue, Mid-December 1884

Author(s)	Friedrich Engels
Written	December 1884

First published in Lyon-Socialiste, No. 15, 21 décembre 1884
Printed according to the newspaper
Translated from the French
Published in English in Marx-Engels Collected Works, Volume 47

ENGELS TO PAUL LAFARGUE

IN PARIS

[Excerpt]

[London, mid-December 1884]

In Germany there are far too many soldiers and non-commissioned officers belonging to the party for one to be able to preach a riot with the slightest chance of success. They know that it is in the ranks of the army itself that the demoralisation (from the bourgeois point of view) must take place; given modern military conditions (rapid-firing arms, etc.), the revolution is bound to begin in the army. At any rate it will begin there in our country. No one knows better than the government how the number of socialist conscripts is growing year after year. Our universal suffrage does not begin until the age of twenty-five; if the great reserve of the 21- to 25-year-olds does not figure in the voting, it is present in the army.