Brentano vs. Marx

came before. Marx actually does not shrink from citing The Times of April 17, 1863 as proof of the correctness of his quotation.

The Times of April 17, 1863, p.7, col. 5, line 17ff, reports, however, the speech as follows:

 

"That is the state of the case as regards the wealth of this country. I must say for one, I should look almost with

apprehension and with pain upon this intoxicating augmentation of wealth and power, if it were my belief that it

was confined to classes finding themselves in pleasant circumstances. This takes no cognizance at all of the condition

of the labouring population. The augmentation I have described, and the figures of which are based, I think, upon

accurate returns, * is entirely confined to classes of property." (Marx quotes The Times to this point; we quote further.)

"Now, the augmentation of Capital is of indirect benefit to the labourer, because it cheapens the commodity which in the

business of production comes into direct competition with labour. (Hear, hear!) But we have this profound, and, I must

say, inestimable consolation, that, while the rich have been growing richer, the poor have been growing less poor. --

Whether the extremes of poverty are less extreme than they were I do not presume to say, but the average condition of

the British labourer, we have the happiness to know, has improved during the last 20 years in a degree which we know to

be extraordinary, and which we may almost pronounce to be unexampled in the history of any country and of any age.

(Cheers)"

 

* (Note by Brentano: In his German quotation in the Volksstaat Marx omits this relative clause and instead inserts: "which he"

(Gladstone) "had just described as 'this intoxicating augmentation of wealth and power'." This omission and this insertion too

are designed to mislead the reader about the sense of Gladstone's words. The omitted relative clause and in addition the general

context show that the sense of the speech is as follows: The augmentation of wealth shown by the income tax returns is

certainly confined to the classes of property (since this tax is only imposed upon persons with an income of 150 pounds sterling

and over), but with regard to the labouring class, we know, etc.)

 A comparison of this Times report with the report after Hansard in the Concordia of March 7 will show that both reports fully

coincide materially. The report in The Times just gives, formally more contracted, what the shorthand report by Hansard gives

verbatim. Yet despite the fact that the Times report contains the direct opposite of that notorious passage in the Inaugural

Address, and the fact that according to the Times report, too, Mr. Gladstone said he believed this intoxicating augmentation of

wealth and power not to be confined to classes in easy circumstances, Marx has the impudence to write in the Volksstaat of

June 1:

 

"So, on April 16, 1863, Mr. Gladstone declared 'both in form and in content' that 'this intoxicating augmentation of

wealth and power is entirely confined to the classes possessed of property'."

 

But even more. Since we had already presented to the public the complete text of the speech from Hansard, and this text

completely excluded the possibility of any distortion, an attempt is made to delete this very embarrassing circumstance with the

phrase in the Hansard "edition, here botchily corrected, Mr. Gladstone was bright enough clumsily to excise the passage that

would be, after all, compromising on the lips of an English Chancellor of the Exchequer"! All that is lacking is the claim that

Gladstone probably did this in deference to the diatribe The Theory of the Exchanges, which did not appear until 1864!

 What can one say about such methods? First we are presented, on the basis of an obscure diatribe, with a quotation which was

completely forged, and the contradictory substance of which proved that it was forged, even without confronting it with the

original. Called to account in this matter, Marx states that others quoted in the same way as he did, and refers to people whom

he himself fooled with this lie. Even more: from the fact that his fuzzy sources accord with him, he tries to fashion an argument

to excuse himself and show the correctness of his quotation, as though both of them had drawn upon a joint, correct, third

source, though in fact one had only copied from the other. And finally he has the impudence to base himself on newspaper

reports which directly contradict him. Indeed, to describe these practices we know only one word, a word with which Marx

himself is very familiar (see Capital, p. 257): they are simply "nefarious".

 Marx closes his defence with these words: "The irksome subsequent events will perhaps teach the Manufacturing Associates

that, however well they may know how to forge goods, they are as well fitted to judge literary goods as a donkey is to play the

lute."

 We confidently leave it to the reader to decide on which side the forgery and the irksomeness ultimately lie. In a further article

we shall explain to Mr. Marx the importance which we attach to the content of Gladstone's words.

 

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The second article, Concordia, No. 28, July 11, 1872, contains absolutely nothing of relevance, and is therefore omitted.

 

No. 6.

MARX'S SECOND REPLY

 DER VOLKSSTAAT, No. 55, AUGUST 7, 1872

 

In the Concordia of July 4, the German Manufacturers' Association attempted to prove to me that its "learned men" were as

well fitted to judge literary goods as the Association was to forge commercial ones.

 With reference to the passage from Gladstone's budget speech of April 16, 1863, as quoted in the Inaugural Address of the

International, the manufacturers' organ (No. 10) stated:

 

"Marx has added the sentence lyingly, both in form and in content."

 

It thus declares that I fabricated the sentence in both form and content, with hair and bones. Even more: it knows exactly how I

did so. The paper writes: "The fact that Gladstone mentioned this, etc., was utilised by Marx in order to hove Gladstone say,

etc." By quoting the sentence from a work published before the Inaugural Address, The Theory of the Exchanges, I exposed the

crude lie of the manufacturers' organ. As the paper itself relates, it then ordered from London this work which it did not know,

and convinced itself of the facts of the matter. How could it lie itself out of the situation? See here:

 

"When we stated that Marx had lyingly added the sentence in question to Gladstone's speech, we did not claim, either in

form or in content, that he himself had also fabricated it."

 

Here we obviously have a case of equivocation peculiar to the mind of manufacturers. For example, when a manufacturing

swindler, in agreement with business colleagues, sends out into the world rolls of ribbon that contain, instead of the alleged

three dozen ells only two dozen, then he has in fact lyingly added one dozen ells, precisely because he "has not fabricated"

them. Why, moreover, should lyingly added sentences not behave just like lyingly added ells? "The understandings of the

greater part of men," says Adam Smith, "are necessarily formed by their ordinary employments", the understandings of the

manufacturer included.

 Through the Volksstaat, I extended the erudite materials of the manufacturers' organ, not only with the quotation from The

Theory of the Exchanges, but also with the pages from my work Capital concerning Gladstone's budget speeches. Now, from

the material with which I provided it, the paper attempts to prove that I did not quote the disputed passage from a "London

newspaper", but from The Theory of the Exchanges. The chain of arguments is another sample of manufacturers' logic.

 I told the manufacturers' sheet that The Theory of the Exchanges quotes on page 134 exactly as I quoted, and it discovers -- that

I quoted exactly as The Theory of the Exchanges quotes on page 134.

 And further!

 

"And the glosses too, which Marx bases on the contradiction contained in this version, are already contained in that

book."

 

This is simply a lie. On page 639 of Capital, I give my glosses to the words in Gladstone's speech:

 

"While the rich have been growing richer, the poor have been growing less poor. Whether the extremes of poverty are

less, I do not presume to say."

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