Friedrich Engels to Karl Marx  
in Brussels  
Paris, around 18 October 1846  

Dear M.

At last, after long resistance, I have set myself to reading through Feuerbach’s rubbish and find that we cannot go into it in our critique. Why, you will see after I have told you the main content.

The Essence of Religion. *Epigonen*, Vol. I, pp. 117–178. – “The feeling of dependence in man is the basis of religion.” p. 117. Since man is dependent first on nature, “nature is the first, original object of religion.” 118. (“Nature is only a general word for denoting the beings, things, etc., which man distinguishes from himself and his products.”) The first religious utterances are festivals in which natural processes, the change of seasons, etc., are represented. The specific natural relations and products in whose environment a tribe or people lives pass over into its religion. – In his development man was aided by other beings, but these were not beings of a higher kind, angels, but beings of a lower kind, animals. Hence animal worship. (There follows an apology of the heathens against the attacks of the Jews and Christians, trivial.) – Nature continually remains, even with the Christians, the hidden background of religion. The attributes which establish the difference between God and man are attributes of nature (originally, fundamentally). Thus omnipotence, eternity, universality, etc. The actual content of God is only nature; i.e., insofar as God is conceived only as the creator of nature, not as a political and moral lawgiver. – Polemic against the creation of nature by an intelligent being, against creation out of nothing, etc. – mostly “humanised”, i.e., vulgar materialism translated into sentimental, bürgerlich-heart-stirring German. – Nature in natural religion is not an object as nature, but “as a personal, living, feeling being … as a being of feeling, i.e., a subjective, human being”, p. 138. Hence one worships it, seeks to determine it through human motives, etc. This comes mainly from the fact that nature is changeable. “The feeling of dependence on nature combined with the idea of nature as an arbitrarily acting, personal being is the basis of sacrifice, the most essential act of natural religion.” p. 140. But since the purpose of sacrifice is an egoistic one, man is still the final end of religion, the deity of man its final purpose. – There follow trivial glosses and solemn disquisitions on the fact that rude peoples who still have natural religion also make gods out of things that are unpleasant to them, plague, fever, etc. “As soon as man becomes, from a merely physical being, a political being, a being differentiating itself from nature generally and concentrating itself upon itself” (!!!), his God likewise becomes a political being distinct from nature. “Hence” man arrives “at distinguishing his essence from nature and consequently at a God distinct from nature only through his union with other men into a community, where powers different from nature, existing only in thought or in imagination (!!!), the power of law, of opinion, of honour, of virtue, become the object of his feeling of dependence …”. (This horribly stylised sentence stands on p. 149.) The natural power, the power over life and death, is degraded to an attribute and tool of political and moral power. Intermezzo, p. 151, on Oriental conservatives and Occidental progressives. “In the Orient man does not forget nature because of man … The king himself is for him not an earthly but a heavenly, divine being. Beside a god, however, man vanishes; only when the earth is de-deified … only then do men have room and space for themselves.” (fine explanation why the Orientals are stable. Because of the many idols which take up the room) “The Oriental stands to the Occidental as the countryman to the town-dweller, the former is dependent on nature, the latter on men” etc. “only the town-dwellers therefore make history”, (here the only faint, but somewhat malodorous, breath of materialism). “Only he who can sacrifice the power of nature to the power of opinion, his life to his name, his existence in the body to his existence in the mouth and mind of posterity, only he is capable of historical deeds.” Voilà. Everything that is not nature is imagination, opinion, nonsense. Hence “only human ‘vanity’ is the principle of history”! – p. 152: “As soon as man becomes conscious that … vices and folly result in misfortune, etc., virtue and wisdom on the other hand … in happiness, consequently that the powers determining the fate of men are understanding and will … nature, to him, also becomes a being dependent on understanding and will.” (Transition to monotheism – F. shares this illusory “consciousness” of the power of understanding and will.) With the rule of understanding and will over the world there then comes supernaturalism, creation out of nothing, and monotheism, which is further explained specifically out of the “unity of human consciousness”. That the one God would never have come into being without the one king, that the unity of the God controlling the many natural phenomena and holding together the conflicting natural forces is only the copy of the one oriental despot who, apparently or really, holds together the conflicting, colliding individuals in their interests – F. has thought it superfluous to say. – A long rigmarole against teleology, copied from the old materialists. In the process, F. commits the very same blunder towards the real world that he accuses the theologians of committing towards nature. He cracks bad jokes about the theologians’ claim that without God nature must dissolve into anarchy (i.e., without the belief in God it would fall to pieces), that God’s will, understanding, opinion is the bond of the world; and he himself indeed believes that opinion, the fear of public opinion, of laws and other ideas, now hold the world together. – In an argument against teleology, F. appears wholly as a *laudator temporis praesentis*: the enormous mortality of children in the first years of life is due to the fact that “nature, in its richness, sacrifices thousands of individual members without hesitation”; … “it is a consequence of natural causes that … e.g., in the first year one child in 3–4, in the fifth one in 25, etc., dies.”

With the exception of the few sentences specified here, there is nothing to remark. One learns nothing about the historical development of the different religions. At most examples are drawn from them in order to prove the above trivialities. The bulk of the article consists of polemic against God and the Christians, exactly in the same manner as he has done hitherto, except that now, when he has exhausted himself, despite all the repetitions of the old cabbage the dependence on the materialists emerges far more shamelessly. If one wanted to say something about the trivialities concerning natural religion, polytheism, monotheism, one would have to contrast them with the actual development of these religious forms, for which one would first have to study them. But this concerns our work just as little as his explanation of Christianity does. For F.’s positivo-philosophical standpoint the essay offers nothing new; the few sentences calling for criticism that I have excerpted above only confirm what we have already said. See, if the fellow interests you further, that you get hold of the first volume of his collected works from Kiessling, directly or indirectly; there he has still written a kind of preface, in which there might be something more. I have seen extracts where F. speaks of “ills of the head” and “ills of the stomach”, a feeble kind of apology as to why he does not concern himself with real interests. Just as he wrote to me 1½ years ago.

I have just received your letter, which was left lying in my old lodgings for a couple of days because I moved. I will make the attempts with the Swiss booksellers. But I hardly believe I shall succeed. The fellows all have no money to print 50 sheets. I am of the opinion that we shall get nothing printed if we do not separate the things and try to place the volumes individually, first the philosophical history, which is the most pressing, and then the rest. 50 sheets at one go is so dangerously large that many booksellers will already not take it for that reason, because they cannot. – Then there was also the Bremen Kühtmann, or whatever his name was, whom Moses and Weitling enticed away from us; that fellow wanted to print books that were forbidden but not pay much. We can quite well turn to him with this manuscript. What do you think if one divided the history and offered the 1st volume to the one and the 2nd to the other? Vogler knows K.’s address in Bremen. List is as good as finished.

I have seen the stories in the *Volkstribun*, about 3 weeks ago. Nothing so ridiculously stupid has ever come before me. The infamy of Brother Weitling reaches its peak in this letter to Kriege. As for the details, however, I no longer remember them well enough to be able to say anything about it. But I am likewise of the opinion that one should reply both to Kriege’s and to the Straubinger proclamation, rub their noses in how they deny having said what we reproach them with, while at the same time they again proclaim the same denied stupidities in their reply; and that Kriege in particular, with his high-moral pathos and his indignation at our mockery, should be thoroughly given it in the neck. Since the issue is just now circulating among the local Straubingers, I cannot get hold of them without having to wait 4–5 days.

The local Straubingers are barking ferociously against me. In particular 3–4 “educated” workers whom Ewerbeck and Grün have initiated into the secrets of true humaninity. But by means of some patience and a little terrorism I have carried the day, the great mass goes with me. Grün has renounced communism, and these “educated” ones had a great desire to go along with him. So I have just struck out, so intimidated old Eisermann that he no longer comes, and have had them discuss communism or non-communism contradictorily. This evening a vote is taken whether the meeting is communist or, as the educated ones say, “for the welfare of humanity”. I am sure of the majority. I have declared that if they were not communists they could go to blazes, I would not come any more. This evening Grün’s disciples will be definitively overthrown, and then I shall have to start entirely from the raw. –

You have no idea of the demands that these educated Straubingers made on me. “Gentleness”, “meekness”, “warm brotherliness”. But I gave them a proper dressing-down, every evening I reduced their whole opposition of 5, 6, 7 fellows (for at the beginning I had the whole shop against me) to silence. More soon on this whole history, which throws all manner of light on Herr Grün.

Proudhon is supposed to come here in a fortnight. That will be fine.

Here is something in the works about a journal. That little cigar-man Maurer claims he can get money for it. But I don’t trust the fellow until the money is there. If it comes off, everything is already so arranged that the thing will come entirely into our hands. I have left Maurer, the ostensible editor, the right to print his own nonsense in it; it couldn’t be otherwise. Everything else passes through my hands; I have absolute veto. What I write, of course pseudonymously or anonymously. In any case, if it comes into being, the thing will fall neither to Hess, nor to Grün, nor to any other wild tendency. It would be quite good for sweeping something away. But speak to no one of it until it is settled; it must be decided this very week. Farewell and write soon.

E.
23, rue de Lille,
Fbg. S’Germain.

Friedrich Engels
to the Communist Correspondence Committee
in Brussels
Paris, 23 October 1846

(Committee Letter No. 3)

There is little to say about the Straubinger doings here. The main thing is that the various points of contention I have hitherto had to fight out with the lads are now settled: Papa Eisermann, Grün’s chief adherent and pupil, has been thrown out, the others have been completely toppled in their influence on the mass, and I have carried a resolution against them unanimously.
The short course of things is this:
Proudhon’s plan of association was discussed for three evenings. At first I had almost the whole clique against me, at the end only Eis. and the other three Grünians. The main object was to refute the necessity of violent revolution and, in general, to show that Grün’s true socialism, which had found new vital forces in the Proudhonian panacea, was anti-proletarian, petty-bourgeois, and Straubinger-like. In the end I grew furious at the eternal repetition of the same arguments on the part of my opponents and directly attacked the Straubingers, which caused great indignation among the Grünians, through which, however, I provoked the noble Eiserm. into an open attack on communism. Thereupon I gave him such a ruthless trouncing that he never came back.
I now seized the handle given me by Eis. – the attack on communism – all the more so as Grün kept on intriguing, running around the workshops, summoning people to his place on Sundays, etc., and on the Sunday after the aforesaid sitting himself committed the boundless stupidity of attacking communism before 8–10 Straubingers. I therefore declared that, before I entered into further discussions, a vote must be taken on whether we assembled here as communists or not. In the first case, care must be taken that attacks on communism such as Eis.’s no longer occurred; in the other case, if they were merely any individuals discussing this or that as they pleased, they could go to the devil and I would not come back. This aroused great consternation among the Grünians; they had assembled here “for the good of humanity”, to enlighten themselves, men of progress, and not one-sided, system-mongers, etc., and such worthy gentlemen could not possibly be called “any sort of people”. Besides, they had to know first what communism actually was (these dogs, who have called themselves communists for years and had been enticed away merely by fear of Grün and Eiserm., after these had insinuated themselves among them under the pretext of communism!). Naturally, I did not allow myself to be caught by their affectionate request to tell them, the ignorant, in two or three words what communism was. I gave them a very simple definition, which went just far enough to cover the points at issue, which excluded the peaceableness, the tenderness and consideration towards the bourgeoisie or rather the Straubingerdom, and finally Proudhon’s joint-stock company with retention of individual possession, and all that goes with it, by asserting community of goods, and otherwise contained nothing that might give occasion for digressions and for evading the proposed vote. I therefore defined the aims of the communists as follows: 1) to enforce the interests of the proletarians in opposition to those of the bourgeoisie; 2) to do this by the abolition of private property and its replacement by the community of goods; 3) to recognise no other means of carrying out these aims than the forcible, democratic revolution. – Discussion on this for two evenings. On the second, the best of the three Grünians, noticing the mood of the majority, came over to me entirely. The other two continually contradicted one another without noticing it. Several fellows who had never spoken before suddenly opened their mouths and declared themselves quite decidedly for me. Hitherto only Junge had done this. Some of these homines novi, though trembling with mortal fear of getting stuck, spoke quite nicely and seem on the whole to have quite sound understanding. In short, when it came to the vote, the assembly was declared a communist one in the sense of the above definition by 13 votes to the two of the two Grünians who remained faithful – one of whom has since declared that he has the greatest desire to be converted.

With this, the slate has at last been wiped clean, and we can now begin to make something of the fellows, as far as that goes. Grün, who could easily extricate himself from his money affair because the main creditors were those very Grünians, his main adherents, is now very much down in the estimation of the majority and a part of his followers, and despite all his intrigues and experiments (e.g. going to the barrier assemblies in his cap, etc.) has suffered a brilliant failure with his Proudhonian Society. Had I not been there, our friend Ewerbeck would certainly have plunged headlong into it. —

What a fine stratagem Grün had! Despairing of the intelligence of his fellows, he repeats his stories to them so often that they know them by heart. After every session – nothing was naturally easier than to silence such an opposition – the whole beaten band ran to Grün, told him what I had said – everything distorted, of course – and had themselves armed again. When they then opened their mouths and said two words, one knew the whole sentence in advance each time. Naturally, with this tale-bearing, I took great care not to say anything general to the fellows which could serve Herr Grün for new embellishments of his true socialism; nonetheless, the dog recently exploited in the Kölner Zeitung, with various distortions on the occasion of the Geneva revolution, things I told the Straubingers, while he drummed the opposite into them here. He is now pursuing political economy, the worthy fellow.

You will have seen Proudhon’s book advertised. I shall get it one of these days; it costs 15 fr.; one cannot buy it, that is too dear.

The above-mentioned audience before which the affair was enacted consists of about 20 joiners, who otherwise assemble only at the barrière with all sorts of people, have no properly closed connection apart from a singing club, but are in part remnants of the League of the Just. If one could assemble publicly, we should soon have over 100 fellows from the joiners alone. Of the tailors I know only a few, who also come to the joiners’ meeting. Of smiths and tanners nothing is to be heard in all Paris. No one knows anything of them.

Kriege has lately sent in his report as a man of justice to the “Halle” (Central Authority). I have of course read the missive; but since this was a breach of oath punishable by death, dagger, rope and poison, you must not write it down anywhere. The letter proves, just like his reply to our attack, that this attack has done him a great deal of good and that he now concerns himself more with the things of this world. He gave a long account of their difficulties. The first section of this American Straubinger story contained their misfortune – evidently Kriege was at the head and conducted the money matters from the standpoint of the all-embracing heart, the tribune was given away, not sold, gifts of love formed the fund, in short they wanted to re-enact Chapters II–VI of the Acts of the Apostles; Ananias and Sapphira were not wanting either, and in the end they found themselves deep in debt. The second period, when Kriege becomes a mere “registrar” and other fellows appear to have taken over the management of the financial affairs, that of raising funds. Instead of appealing to the full bosom of mankind, appeal was now made to their dancing legs and in general to their uncommunistic sides, and they found to their astonishment that through balls, country outings, etc., the necessary money could be raised completely, and that even the wickedness of men could be exploited for communism. Now, they are said to be completely in funds. Among the “obstacles” they had to overcome, the brave Tecklenburger also lists the all-round slanders and suspicions which they had to endure, from, among others, “most recently from the ‘communist’ philosophers in Brussels”. For the rest, he chatters some trivial stuff against the colonies, recommends to them (i.e., to his most decided enemies) “Brother Weitling”, but on the whole keeps fairly down-to-earth, though somewhat unctuous, and only from time to time a bit of groaning about brotherliness, etc.

Do you have the Réforme there? If you don’t read it, write and tell me; I’ll report to you if anything special appears in it. For the last four days it has been harping on the National for its refusal to give its unconditional adhesion to a petition that is circulating here for electoral reform. This it does, it asserts, out of sheer partiality for Thiers. Some time ago it was rumoured here that Bastide and Thomas had resigned from the National, that Marrast remained alone, and that he had made an alliance with Thiers. The National denied it. Changes in its editorial staff have certainly taken place. I know nothing more precise; that for a year it has been particularly favourable to Thiers is well known; the Réforme is now showing it how badly it has ridden itself into embarrassments through this partiality. — Incidentally, the National, purely out of opposition to the Réforme, has recently committed some stupidities, such as denying out of sheer malice the Portuguese counter-revolution first reported by the Réforme, until it could no longer do so, etc. The Réforme is now tormenting itself trying to conduct as brilliant a polemic as the National, but it’s no go. —

After I had written up to this point, I went over to the Straubingers, where the following came to light: Grün, too impotent to do me any harm in any way, is now having me denounced at the Barrière. Eis., in the public Barrière assembly, which is frequented by mouchards, attacks communism, where, naturally, no one can answer him without exposing themselves to the danger of being turned out; the young man answered him most furiously, but was warned by us yesterday. Thereupon Eis. declared J. to be the mouthpiece of a third party (which is of course myself), who had suddenly burst in among the people like a bomb, and he well knew how people were drummed up for the Barrière discussions, etc. In short, he blabbed things there that amount to a complete denunciation to the police; for the landlord in whose establishment the affair took place still said four weeks ago il y a toujours des mouchards parmi vous, and the police commissioner also put in an appearance there about that time. He directly attacked J. as a “revolutionary.” Herr Grün was present the whole time and drummed into Eis. what he was to say. — This vileness really exceeds everything. Grün, as I know the situation, is to my mind fully responsible for everything Eis. says. There is nothing whatever to be done against it. The blockhead Eis. cannot be attacked at the Barrière, because there one would again denounce the weekly meeting to the police, and Grün is too cowardly to do anything in his own name. The only thing one can do is to have the people at the Barrière declare that they do not discuss communism because that could endanger the whole assembly with the police.

Do write at last.

Yours,

Paris 23 October 1846.