London, 5 March 1892 

Dear Baron, 

Your ms.37° goes off by registered mail today. I have only been able 
to read the first 16 pages. If I were you I should omit the better part 

@ Le Soctaliste-> ‘partly socialist’ 

of this introduction. The reasons why a programme should have 
a commentary, etc., etc., in short, all those reflections of yours about 
why the pamphlet was written, only serve to weaken the impact and 
deter the reader from persevering. You must plunge straight into it — 
you could have no better justification. I cannot give an opinion of the 
way the rest, the major part, is arranged. So overwhelmed am I by 
work of all kinds that I don’t know whether I’m coming or going. 
Nothing but trifles, but quite scandalously time-consuming. I long to 
have time for Volume III* and every day am invariably robbed of it. 
Well, we shall get round to it some time or other. 

Ten copies of Neue Zeit containing my article” received with thanks. 

Simply amend the name Hodgskin and the figure 1824 in the next 
edition, and include a note saying that in the original these read such 
and such, obviously a slip of the pen or printer's error.*?* 

Menger is a jackass and will so remain. His critique of bourgeois 
law‘ is throughout nothing but a vindication of the ‘police state’ as 
opposed to the ‘constitutional state’. True, the law, especially bour- 
geois law, is stricter and more rigorous than police despotism which 
may sometimes appear humane precisely because it is despotic. If 
1 had the time, I should soon put paid to this empty talk which is 
possible only in backward countries such as Germany and Austria. 

I am glad you are agreeable to the Luther idea.‘ There’s no rush. 

Cunow’s letter returned with thanks. I look forward to seeing the 
ideas he has worked out about class.4?° He has made some very nice 
discoveries about the Peruvian gens. He had sent me the stuff and 
I thanked him for it. 

You will also be getting the Peruvian community system ?** —] 
have just looked at it. 

I don’t think you are in any danger for the time being. So change- 
able and multifarious are the cravings in Berlin that none could really 
be satisfied; now all at once it’s the liberal bourgeois who’s the béte 
noire. Liberalism is at the root of all socialism, so if one is to act radi- 
cally one has got to smash liberalism, whereupon socialism will au- 
tomatically wither away. For the present we may observe this excep- 
tionally cunning manoeuvre with quiet amusement. Once the liberal 
philistines have been driven wild—and they are, it seems, really be- 
ing whipped into a fury willy-nilly—then there'll be no more false 

 of Capital - » ‘Der Sozialismus in Deutschland’ - © A. Menger, Das bürgerliche Recht 
und die besitzlosen Volksklassen. - “ See this volume, pp. 342-43. 

alarms so far as we are concerned. Apart from the fact that in Ger- 
many there are also rulers to whom this wind from Berlin provides 
the not unwelcome opportunity of currying favour at little expense 
and thus extracting capital for particularism and reserved rights.*?° 
When the street rioting began in Berlin*?’? I was somewhat con- 
cerned lest it result in the ardently desired fusillade, but when the row- 
dies cheered young William,* thereby placating him, I knew that all 
was well — but Just let the Kélner Zeitung be locked up *? along with 
Peus,*?° and we may well see some fun. 

So in my view, in so far as there is any danger, it is primarily con- 
fined to Prussia, and the greater it becomes there, the better off 
you people in the small states will be. 

Now I have got to write to Sorge”— the American mail goes to- 
day—so FAREWELL. Aveling, who has just come in, sends his best 
wishes. Regards from one household to the other. 

Your 
F.E.