London, 4 January 1888 
122 Regent’s Park Road, N. W. 

Dear Citizen, 

My friend Karl Kautsky, editor of the Newe Zeit, has sent me several 
consecutive numbers of La Revista Sociala and of Contemporanul 
containing, amongst other things, your translations of some of my 
works, in particular my Origin of the Family, etc.?”” Allow me to prof- 
fer my sincere thanks for the trouble you have been so good as to take 
in making these writings accessible to the Romanian public. In addition 
to the honour you have thus done me, you have also rendered me, 
personally, the service of enabling me at long last to learn something of 
your language. I say at long last because, almost fifty years ago, I tried 
to do this, if in vain, with the help of the Grammaire comparée des 
langues romanes* by Diez. Recently I succeeded in getting hold of 
Cionca’s little grammar but, having no texts to read and no dictionary, 
I did not get on very well. But with your translation I have been able to 
make some progress, the original text and the Latin and Slav etymology 
having taken the place of the dictionary and now, thanks to you, I can 
say that Romanian is no longer, for me, a completely unknown 
language. However, if you could tell me of a passable dictionary, 
whether Romanian-German or Romanian-French or —Italian, you 
would be doing me another signal service; for it would help me the 

 Gramatica comparata a limbelor romanice 

better to understand your original articles and the pamphlets Ce vor 
socialist romini? and Karl Marx si economistii nostri, which Kautsky 
likewise sent me.208 

From these I have, with much pleasure, gained the conviction that the 
socialists of your country have adopted in their programme? the funda- 
mental principles of the theory formulated by my late friend Karl 
Marx—a theory which has succeeded in welding together into a single 
fighting force the vast majority of European and American socialists. At 
the time of that great thinker’s death, the social and political situation, 
and the progress being made by our Party in all civilised countries, 
enabled him to close his eyes in the conviction that his efforts to unite 
the proletarians of the two worlds into one big army and under the same 
flag would ultimately be crowned with success. But if only he had been 
able to catch a glimpse of the immense strides we have since made in 
America no less than in Europe! 

So great have been those strides that, for the European party at any 
rate, a common international policy has become imperative. In this 
regard, I again have the satisfaction of seeing that you agree, in principle, 
with ourselves and with the large majority of western socialists. Your 
translation of my article “The Political Situation in Europe’, as also your 
letter to the Editor of the Neue Zeit, are proof enough of this. 

Indeed we are all confronted by the same great obstacle that is 
hampering the free development of all the nations and of each individual 
nation; in the absence of that development we could not embark upon, 
still less accomplish, social revolution in the various countries merely by 
means of mutual cooperation. That obstacle is the old Holy Alliance? 
between the three assassins of Poland, led since 1815 by Russian Tsarism 
and surviving until today despite occasional domestic squabbles. It was 
founded in 1815 to combat the revolutionary spirit of the French people; 
in 1871 it was ratified by the annexation of Alsace, which turned 
Germany into the slave of Tsarism and the Tsar into the arbiter of 
Europe; in 1888 it is maintained for the purpose of crushing the revolu- 
tionary spirit within the three empires—the national aspirations no less 
than the political and social movements of the working classes. Since 
Russia enjoys a virtually impregnable strategic position, Russian Tsarism 
forms the nub of that alliance, great repository of all European reaction. 
To topple Tsarism, to destroy that incubus which lies heavy on the 

4 C. Dobrogeanu-Gherea, Ce vor socialistii romini. Expunerea socialismului 
stiintific si Programul socialist 

whole of Europe, such, in my eyes, is the first condition for the eman- 
cipation of the nationalities of central and eastern Europe. Once Tsarism 
has been crushed, the nefarious power represented today by Bismarck 
will in turn crumble.* Austria will fall to pieces, having lost its only 
raison d’étre, that of preventing by its very existence the annexation by 
conquering Tsarism of the scattered nations in the Carpathians and the 
Balkans. Poland will be reborn, Little Russia will be free to choose its 
political position, the Romanians, the Magyars and the South Slavs will 
be able to settle their own affairs and their new boundaries amongst 
themselves, unhampered by any foreign meddling and, finally, the noble 
nation of Great Russia, no longer engaged in pursuing chimerical 
conquest for the benefit of Tsarism, will be free to carry out its true civil- 
ising mission in Asia and to develop its vast intellectual resources in 
exchanges with the West, instead of squandering the best of its blood on 
the scaffold or in the katorga.> 

You in Romania must know what Tsarism is, having had more than 
enough experience of it through Kiselev’s ‘réglement organique’, 
through the intervention of 1848, through the theft—perpetrated not 
once, but twice—of Bessarabia,” through the innumerable invasions of 
your country, a mere Russian staging-post, no more, on the way to the 
Bosphorus, and through the sure knowledge that your independent exis- 
tence will cease on the day the Tsar fulfils his dream—the conquest of 
Constantinople.‘ 

At this moment the alliance appears to have disintegrated and war 
to be imminent. But even if war does come, it will be merely in order 
to make recalcitrant Prussia and Austria toe the line. I hope that peace 
will be maintained: in such a war it would be impossible to sympathise 
with any of the combatants; rather, were such a thing possible, one 
would wish that all should be beaten. It would be a terrible war—but, 
come what may, everything will eventually turn to the advantage of 
the socialist movement and bring nearer the accession of the working 
class. 

Pray excuse these elucidations, but just now I could not well write to 
a Romanian without expressing an opinion on these burning questions. 
What it boils down to is this: revolution in Russia at this moment would 

4The rough copy further reads: ‘and our workingmen’s Party will march with 
giant strides towards revolution’ — > penal servitude (Russ.) — © The last two 
sentences are missing in the rough copy 

save Europe from the horrors of a general war and would usher in 
universal social revolution.* 

Since your relations with the German socialists, newspaper exchange, 
etc., leave something to be desired, I would gladly do for you whatever 
I can. 

With fraternal greetings, 
F. Engels