German socialists of to-day may be divided into three groups—viz., social democrats, professorial socialists, and Christian socialists. We also hear of state socialists, who form one class with professorial socialists; save that a few of them may, perhaps, belong to the social democrats. Sometimes they are separated from professorial socialists and made to include simply German office-holders, but the ideas of German office-holders, as such, can have no interest for us in this place. The same man is sometimes called a professorial socialist and sometimes a state socialist, as, for example, Professor Wagner—state socialist as an office-holder who lays stress on the beneficial effects of state activity, professorial socialist as a professor who does the same. It is best to use the term professorial socialists in a wide sense, so as to include all holding similar views.
CHAPTER X.
KARL MARX.
The more immediate theoretical founder of social democracy, and for many years its leading representative, was Karl Marx, born in 1818 in Treves (Trier). The social position of his family in Germany was excellent. His father, a converted Jew, occupied a high position in the civil service. Marx studied law at the universities of Bonn and Berlin. In the latter place he became so much interested in philosophy that he abandoned law. The philosophy which he adopted was the Hegelian. He intended to become a professor, but was led into politics and journalism by the apparent dawn of freedom accompanying the succession of Frederick William IV. to the Prussian throne in 1840. He soon became editor-in-chief of the Rhenish Gazette (Rheinische Zeitung), which had been founded by leading liberals, and began to criticise the government with what was then called unheard-of boldness. But he was so skilful in his expressions that the special censor of the press, who was sent from Berlin to Cologne to watch the paper, could find no cause for legal proceedings against him. Finally, government becoming weary of such attacks, and having then the power to do so, simply decreed that at the expiration of the first quarter-year of 1843 the paper should cease to appear.[171] The interest which Marx had begun to take in matters of government showed him the necessity of informing himself more fully on subjects of political economy. He went to Paris, accordingly, after the suppression of the Rheinische Zeitung, to study that science, thinking that France then afforded better advantages for that purpose. He was, no doubt, right in this, as the Germans have only lately become great in political economy. In Paris he continued to wage war with the pen on the Prussian government, and was banished from France in 1844 by Guizot, to please Prussia. Going to Brussels, he continued his economic studies, interested himself in the cause of the laborers, and in his writings at this time expressed views similar to those which he held at the time of his death. In 1847, in company with Friedrich Engels, he composed and published a manifesto of the communistic party, which closed with these words: “The communists scorn to conceal their views and purposes. They declare openly that their aims can be attained only by a violent overthrow of the existing social order. Let the ruling classes tremble before a communistic revolution. The proletarians have nothing to lose except their chains. They have a world to gain. Proletarians of all lands, unite!”
The events of 1848 brought Marx to Germany again, where, with his friends, Engels, Wolff, and the poet Freiligrath, he founded the New Rhenish Gazette (Neue Rheinische Zeitung). For one year this paper was an able advocate of the cause of the laborers. German democracy and reaction were alike rejected, and the interest of the laborers was represented as irreconcilably opposed to that of all other classes. The paper was suppressed in 1849, and its founders banished from Germany. Marx lived thereafter in London.
The last issue of the paper contained a spirited farewell poem, by Freiligrath, promising the reappearance of the journal when its undying spirit should have triumphed over all its foes. The following is a good translation:[172]
“FAREWELL OF THE NEW RHENISH GAZETTE.
“Farewell, but not forever farewell!
They cannot kill the spirit, my brother;