London, 9 August 1882 

Dear Mr Bernstein, 

Today just a few comments in great haste, as I shall be going to the 
seaside in a few days’ time and my hands are absolutely full. 

1. A German edition of Socialisme utopique et socialisme scientifique is 
something I have long had in mind, particularly now that I have seen 
what a regular revolution the thing has wrought in the minds of 
many of the better people in France.? I am glad that we see eye to 
eye here. The only thing is that the German text, because more con- 
centrated, is appreciably more difficult than the French from which 
quite a lot is omitted. To popularise the work without prejudice to 
the substance, and in such a way as to make it fit for general use as 
a propaganda pamphlet is a difficult task; however, I shall do the best 
I can at the seaside. When shall you be able to start printing and how 
long will the impression take? I must, of course, be sent the proofs (in 

duplicate, as in France, which has a number of advantages). 

2. Naturally you would have thought that, in view of our old 
friendship, Liebknecht was really within his rights in asking you to 
hand over my letter* to him, and that you were under an obligation 
to put it at his disposal. I can find nothing to complain about in that. 
Nor could you know that, of the many differences I have had with 
Liebknecht, four-fifths were due to similar high-handed acts on his 
part, to the public misuse of private letters, to notes, etc., on my arti- 
cles that were either silly or ran immediately counter to the sense of 
the passage. On this occasion, too, he has made unjustifiable use of 
my letter. That letter was written with specific reference to your arti- 
cle.*°° Liebknecht treated it as though it were ‘my’ account of the 
Irish question as a whole. Frightfully easy and all the more so if one 
trots out in refutation Davitt’s speeches which had not as yet been made at 
all at the time the letter was written and, indeed, have no bearing 
at all on that letter, Davitt and his state ownership of land having 
hitherto been no more than a straw in the wind. But Liebknecht always 
takes this kind of easy way out when trying to come the ‘top dog’. 
Now, I don’t begrudge him his fun, but he ought not to misuse my 
letters for the purpose and in this way fe has compelled me to request 
you in future (let me try to make this sound as formally diplomatic as 
possible) de lui donner—tout au plus—lecture de mes lettres sans ce- 
pendant (ut abandonner Voriginal ni ut en laisser copre. 

3. I have passed on to Marx, in as humorous a form as possible, the 
substance of the Hirsch-Mehringiad °*° and I fear that, should little 
Carl* see Marx, he will go through a not altogether agreeable quarter 
of an hour. 

4. IT should say that, in the Egyptian affair,?5> you take the so- 
called National Party rather too much under your wing.°°' We don’t 
know much about Arabi, but I’d wager 10 to 1 that he is a run- 
of-the-mill Pasha who begrudges the financial chaps their tax reve- 
nue because he would, in good oriental fashion, sooner pocket it him- 
self. Here we have the same old story as in all agrarian countries. 
From Ireland to Russia, from Asia Minor to Egypt, the peasant of an 
agrarian country is there to be exploited. It has been the same since 
the time of the Assyrian and Persian empires. The satrap, alias pasha, 
is the eastern prototype of the exploiter, as are the business men and 

@ See this volume, pp. 285-90.-> at most to permit him to read my letters, without, 

however, handing over the original to him or letting him keep a copy.-° Carl Hirsch 

jurists in the west today. Repupration of the Khedive’s #? debts may 
be all right, but the question is, what then? And we West European 
socialists ought not to allow ourselves to be so easily duped as the 
Egyptian fellaheen *°* or as—all Latins. Strange. All Latin revolu- 
tionaries lament the fact that their revolutions invariably redound to 
someone else’s advantage — quite simply because they have always 
been taken in by the word ‘revolution’. And yet it’s hardly possible 
for a scrap to break out anywhere without revolutionary Latins rav- 
ing about it with one voice— and quite uncritically. As I see it, we 
can perfectly well enter the arena on behalf of the oppressed fellaheen 
without sharing their current illusions (for a peasant population has 
to be fleeced for centuries before it learns from experience), and 
against the brutality of the English without, for all that, espousing the 
cause of those who are currently their military opponents. The ut- 
most caution should be observed in making use of the politically emo- 
tional French and Italian party papers in all questions of interna- 
tional politics; we Germans, however, now we have attained superi- 
ority where theory is concerned, are duty bound to preserve it in this 
sphere also by the exercise of criticism. 

But now, enough of criticism. Unfortunately I haven’t got suffi- 
cient time left today to send you a contribution for the feuilleton.>** 
I am particularly keen to prove to our good little Carl in black and 
white what tremendous piffle it was he fobbed off on Mehring about 
my relations with the Sozialdemokrat. However, you will get it before 
long and may then, if you like — it’s all the same to me — make some 
direct allusion to it in a note, without, of course, actually mentioning 
our little Carl, who must surely by now be panting for cooling 
streams.’ 

Well, my kindest regards. If at all possible, I shall also send you 
a letter from the coast for ce brave» Kautsky whose address, or such as 
I have, is of somewhat ancient date. The last one was that of some las- 
sie with a French name—a genuine accommodation address, I trust. 

Yours, 
F. E.