Letter to Conrad Schmidt, October 17, 1889

Author(s) Friedrich Engels
Written 17 October 1889


First published in Sozialistische Monatshefte, No. 17, 1920
Published in English for the first time in Marx-Engels Collected Works, Volume 48


ENGELS TO CONRAD SCHMIDT

IN BERLIN

London, 17 October 1889 122 Regent's Park Road, N.W.

Dear Schmidt,

Your work,[1] which you kindly sent me and for which I am most grateful, has brought us so much closer together that I no longer can bring myself to address you in the ceremonious style required by custom and, if you would like to oblige me, perhaps you would treat me similarly.

Even though I cannot actually say that you have solved the problem under discussion,[2] your own line of reasoning coincides with that of Volume III of Capital at many, and indeed, at important, points, and does so in such a way that the reading of Volume III will give you quite exceptional pleasure. For obvious reasons I am barred from making a detailed criticism of your work just at present; this will be done in the preface to Volume III[3] , when it will give me particular satisfaction to accord your work the full recognition that is its due. So until then, perhaps you will be patient. This much however is now quite certain— that your work has secured you a place in economic literature that must be the envy of all the worthy professors.

The work has been a source of particular pleasure to me personally in one further respect, namely by showing that we now have someone else who can think theoretically. Among the younger generation in Germany there are remarkably few who are capable of doing so. Bebel, who has a fine theoretical brain, is prevented by his practical party work from exer- cising this, the best of his attributes, other than in the application of theory to practical cases. Consequently there have hitherto been only Bernstein and Kautsky, though in Bernstein's case far too much of his time is taken up by practical activities for him to be able to participate in, and further his knowledge of, the theoretical side as much as he would no doubt like and be capable of doing. And there is, after all, so much still to be done here in the way of theory, especially in the field of economic history and its links with political history, as with the history of law, religion, literature and civilisation generally where the only sure guide through the labyrinth of facts is a clear theoretical insight. So you can imagine how I patted myself on the back for finding a new collaborator.

It's a very good thing that you should be re-editing Knapp's Bauernbefreiung for the Neue Zeit. Excellent material for this task is provided by Wolff's Schlesische Milliarde from the Neue Rheinische Zeitung of 1849, reprinted as No. VI of Volume I of the Sozialdemokratische Bibliothek. I shall send it to you in separate sheets enclosed in English newspapers, which would seem to be a pretty safe way. Kautsky will also be glad to have found another capable contribu- tor—he has to accept quite enough trash.

I haven't been able to do a stroke of work on Volume III since February. That damned Paris congress[4] saddled me with such a mess of correspondence to all parts of the globe that everything else had to be pushed into the background. The chaps had everywhere lost their inter- national contacts and as a result hatched up the most incredible schemes—sheer good will and a lack of knowledge of one another, as of things and circumstances, would have given rise to some fine old set-tos and everywhere the chaps would have made enemies of their friends, yet failed to appease their enemies. But luckily that's all over now and I've just had news that a 4th edition of Volume I is needed. And since the English edition2 has appeared in the meantime and a comparison by Mrs Aveling of each quotation with its original revealed occasional formal discrepancies but an even greater number of copyists' and printers' errors in the relevant passages, I cannot possibly allow the 4th edition to appear unless I put these right. All this will take time, after which I shall have the proofs to correct, but in a fortnight or so I shall get back to Volume III and thereafter allow nothing whatever to get in my way. I think I'm past the most difficult bits.

Kindest regards from

Yours very sincerely,

F. Engels

  1. ↑ Schmidt, Die Durchschnittsprofitrate auf Grundlage des Marx'schen Werthgesetzes
  2. ↑ In his preface to Volume II of Capital that appeared in 1885 Engels suggested that economists clarify the question 'in which way an equal average rate of profit can and must come about, not only without a violation of the law of value, but on the basis of it' (see present edition, Vol. 36). Marx had offered a solution to this problem in Volume III of Capital on which Engels was working at the time. Having taken an interest in the problem raised by Engels, C. Schmidt was working on the book Die Durchschnittsprofitrate auf Grundlage des Marx'schen Werthgesetzes which came out in 1889. In the review of Volume II of Capital - Die Marx'sche Kapitaltheorie - published by the journal Jahrhiicher fur Nationaldkonomie und Statistik, new series, Vol. XI, 1885, Wilhelm Lexis likewise raised this problem, though he could offer no solution. Engels made a circumstantial appraisal of these works in his preface to Volume III of Capital (see present edition, Vol. 37).
  3. ↑ See present edition, Vol. 37
  4. ↑ The International (Socialist) Working Men's Congress was in session in Paris on 14-20 July 1889, on the centennial of the storming of the Bastille. In fact, it became a constituent Congress of the Second International. Taking part were 393 delegates, representing the worker and socialist parties of 20 countries of Europe and America.
    The Congress heard the reports of representatives of the socialist parties on the situation in the labour movement in their countries; it outlined the principles of international labour legislation in respective countries by supporting demands for a legislative enactment of an 8-hour working day, prohibition of child labour and steps toward the protection of the work of women and adolescents. The Congress stressed the need of political organisation of the proletariat and of a struggle for implementation of democratic demands of the working class; it spoke out for a disbandment of regular armies and their replacement by armed detachments of the people. It resolved to hold, on 1 May 1890, demonstrations and meetings in support of an 8-hour working day and labour legislation.