Remarks On Dr. Johann Plenge’s “Marx and Hegel”. Tübingen, 1911

The remarks on Johann Plenge’s book “Marx und Hegel.” Tübingen, 1911 (J. Plenge, Marx and Hegel ,
Tübingen, 1911) are contained in the second notebook on imperialism
(notebook “β”).

Note that this document has undergone special formating to ensure that
Lenin’s sidenotes fit on the page, marking as best as possible
where they were located in the original manuscript.

DR. JOHANN PLENGE
MARX UND HEGEL

TÜBINGEN, 1911

| Plenge fails to understand how “ma- terialism” can coincide with revolu- tionism (calling the latter “ideal- ism,” etc.) and waxes angry over his lack of understanding!!! | Plenge fails to understand how “ma- terialism” can coincide with revolu- tionism (calling the latter “ideal- ism,” etc.) and waxes angry over his lack of understanding!!! | | | | | | extremely vulgar! |
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| Plenge fails to understand how “ma- terialism” can coincide with revolu- tionism (calling the latter “ideal- ism,” etc.) and waxes angry over his lack of understanding!!! |
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| A good example of how bourgeois professors vulgarise the fundamentals of Marxism, its theoretical fundamentals!! Ad notam of the imperialist economists [1] and Co.!! | A good example of how bourgeois professors vulgarise the fundamentals of Marxism, its theoretical fundamentals!! Ad notam of the imperialist economists [1] and Co.!! |
| A good example of how bourgeois professors vulgarise the fundamentals of Marxism, its theoretical fundamentals!! Ad notam of the imperialist economists [1] and Co.!! |
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| After a pretentious introduction (How I, I, I “read” Hegel and Marx) follows an essay of the Hegelian “doctrine” that is extremely shallow (idealism is not distin- guished from “speculation,” very, very few things have been grasped; still there is some good in this essay as compared with Kantianism, etc.). Then, comes a critic- ism of Marx which is altogether nonsens- ical. | | | | | | Theo- retical aspect of dialectics has been over- looked!! | Theo- retical aspect of dialectics has been over- looked!! |
| Theo- retical aspect of dialectics has been over- looked!! |
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| Marx is being accused of “pure ideology,” when by “actual” proletarian he means a representative of a class. (82) | | | | | | Marx = “ideologist”... |
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| “Now the strong language of the apos- tate, who decisively renounced any sort of idealism ... now the ideal demand of the political enthusiast—such is the actual- ity of Karl Marx.” (81-82) | | | | | | ! |
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| “It is passing strange that this Jewish radical healer should have known all his life just one universal remedy for all social conditions that are in need of cure; critic- ism and political struggle.” (56) | | | | | | “nur”!! [2] |
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| ...Marx’s historical materialism is ac- tually “nothing but ... a pathetical gesture,” “an extremely rationalistic doctrine,” “in its most profound basis an idealist examina- tion of society,” etc., etc. ... (83) | | | | | | Marx!! “did not understand” Hegel 97 et al. | Marx!! “did not understand” Hegel 97 et al. |
| Marx!! “did not understand” Hegel 97 et al. |
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| ...“agitational motives”... (84) (id. 86 , 92 et al .) ( 115 et al.) Marx borrowed “this natural-scientific empiricism” (88), “Marx naturalises social science (ibid.). ...“His” (Marx’s) “path is not that of the thinker, but ... of the prophet of free- dom....”!!! (94-95) |
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| Socialist revolution = subjectivist hope to present it as “an objectively scientific cognition” is an illusion of an ecstatic dreamer, an illusion which degenerated into charlatanry” (p. 110). | | | | | | !! |
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| ...“Marx ... was dominated by the passion- ate will of a radical apostle of freedom....” (111) | ...“Marx ... was dominated by the passion- ate will of a radical apostle of freedom....” (111) | | | | | | !! |
| ...“Marx ... was dominated by the passion- ate will of a radical apostle of freedom....” (111) |
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| Marx “agitationally whipping up all the instincts of hatred....” (115) | | | | | | inde ira!! [3] |
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| “Marxism ... becomes ethics of abstract negative, fanatical enthusiasm” (just like Mohammedanism according to Hegel!).... (120) | | |
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| ...“Temperament of a fanatic” of Marx (and his “hot head”)—that’s the point. (120) And more of such vulgar gibberish! Whence this quotation ? The author did not give chapter and verse. [4] |
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| “Without revolution socialism cannot be realised. It stands in need of a polit- ical act, inasmuch as it stands in need of destruction and dissolution. But wher- ever its organic activity begins and its end-in-itself bares its soul, socialism casts off its political integument.” | “Without revolution socialism cannot be realised. It stands in need of a polit- ical act, inasmuch as it stands in need of destruction and dissolution. But wher- ever its organic activity begins and its end-in-itself bares its soul, socialism casts off its political integument.” | | | | | | NB NB |
| “Without revolution socialism cannot be realised. It stands in need of a polit- ical act, inasmuch as it stands in need of destruction and dissolution. But wher- ever its organic activity begins and its end-in-itself bares its soul, socialism casts off its political integument.” |
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| —After quoting this passage without giving its source Plenge continues: “‘The political integument’ that will be hurled aside is of course the whole of Marxism.” (129) |
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| How Plenge seeks out “contradictions”: Marx, he says, wrote in Rheinisehe Zei- tung [5] : “‘The same spirit which con- structs railways with the help of industry, constructs philosophical systems in the minds of philosophers’ (p. 143). And then these means of production are eman- cipated from the spirit which created them and begin, in turn, sovereignly, to determine the spirit.” | How Plenge seeks out “contradictions”: Marx, he says, wrote in Rheinisehe Zei- tung [5] : “‘The same spirit which con- structs railways with the help of industry, constructs philosophical systems in the minds of philosophers’ (p. 143). And then these means of production are eman- cipated from the spirit which created them and begin, in turn, sovereignly, to determine the spirit.” | | | | | | “Clever-r-r” |
| How Plenge seeks out “contradictions”: Marx, he says, wrote in Rheinisehe Zei- tung [5] : “‘The same spirit which con- structs railways with the help of industry, constructs philosophical systems in the minds of philosophers’ (p. 143). And then these means of production are eman- cipated from the spirit which created them and begin, in turn, sovereignly, to determine the spirit.” |
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| Example of how Plenge criticises Mehrwertstheorie [6] : ↓ |
| “By its gross exaggeration it brings to |
| a white heat the hard fact of capitalism that the urge for profit lowers wages and | | | | | | !! |
| worsens working conditions. But then it suffers from the elementary mistake of du- plication of concepts veiled by the termin- ology used....” (157) ...“Agitational requirements dictate that the inflammatory theory of surplus-value be given the most prominent place in the entire system....” (164) |
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| ...“Marx is a revolutionary Jew of the nineteenth century who has re-tailored the garment borrowed from our great philos- ophy to suit his ends.” ( 171 ) | | | | | | a pearl!! |
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| This Plenge is an extreme vulgar- iser; the scientific value of his trashy book is zero. | This Plenge is an extreme vulgar- iser; the scientific value of his trashy book is zero. |
| This Plenge is an extreme vulgar- iser; the scientific value of his trashy book is zero. |