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Steklov has only related what Marx had written, while Mehring has repeated
what Engels had told us. And one cannot but believe Engels, for who is more
qualified to relate the history of an enterprise than the person who himself took part
in it? Still a critical attitude must be preserved even where Engels is concerned,
particularly since in his article he described affairs that had occurred forty years
before. After such a considerable interval of time it is rather easy to forget things,
particularly if one writes under entirely different circumstances and in a wholly
different mood.
We have at our disposal other facts which do not at all tally with the above
account. Marx and Engels were not at all the pure theoreticians that Steklov, for
instance, makes them out to be. On the contrary, as soon as Marx had come to the
view that any necessary and radical change in the existing social order had to be
wholly dependent upon the working class -- the proletariat -- which in the very
conditions of its life was finding all the stimuli, all the impulses that were forcing it
into opposition to this system -- as soon as Marx was convinced of this, he forthwith
went into the midst of the workers; he and Engels tried to penetrate all places, all
organisations, where the workers had already been subjected to other influences.
Such organisations were already then in existence.
In the account of the history of the workers' movement we have reached the
early forties. The League of the Just after the debacle of May, 1839, ceased to exist as
a central organisation. At any rate, no traces of its existence or its activity as a central
organisation are found after 1840. There remained only independent circles
organised by ex-members of the League. One of these circles was organised in
London.
Other members of the League of the Just fled to Switzerland, the most
influential among them being Wilhelm Weitling (1809-1864). A tailor by trade, one
of the first German revolutionists from among the artisan proletariat, Weitling, like
many other German artisans of the time, peregrinated from town to town. In 1835 he
found himself in Paris, but it was in 1837 that he settled there for long. In Paris he
became a member of the League of the Just and familiarized himself with the
teachings of Hugues Lamennais, the protagonist of Christian socialism, of Saint-
Simon and Fourier. There he also met Blanqui and his followers. Towards the end of
1838 he wrote, at the request of his comrades, a pamphlet called Mankind As It Is
and As It Ought To Be, in which he championed the ideas of communism.
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In Switzerland Weitling and some friends, after an unsuccessful attempt to
propagandise the Swiss, began to organise circles among the German workers and
the emigrants. In 1842 he published his chief work, Guarantees of Harmony and
Freedom. In this book he developed in greater detail the views he had expressed in
1838.
Influenced by Blanqui, Weitling's ideas differed from those of other
contemporary utopians, in that he did not believe in a peaceful transition into
communism. The new society, a very detailed plan of which was worked out by him,
could only be realised through the use of force. The sooner existing society is
abolished, the sooner will the people be freed. The best method is to bring the
existing social disorder to the last extreme. The worse, the better! The most
trustworthy revolutionary element which could be relied upon to wreck present
society was, according to Weitling, the lowest grade proletariat, the
lumpenproletariat, including even the robbers.
It was in Switzerland, too, that Michael Bakunin (1811-1876) met Weitling
and absorbed some of his ideas. Owing to the arrest and the judicial prosecution
started against Weitling and his followers, Bakunin was compromised and forever
became an exile from his own country.
After a term in prison, Weitling was extradited to Germany in 1841. Following
a period of wandering, he finally landed in London where his arrival was joyously
celebrated.
A large mass meeting was arranged in his honour. English socialists and
Chartists as well as German and French emigrants participated. This was the first
great international meeting in London. It suggested to Schapper the idea of
organising, in October, 1844, an international society, The Society of Democratic
Friends of all Nations. The aim was the rapprochement of the revolutionists of all
nationalities, the strengthening of a feeling of brotherhood among peoples, and the
conquest of social and political rights At the head of this enterprise were Schapper
and his friends.
Weitling stayed in London for about a year and a half. In the labour circles,
where all kinds of topics dealing with current events were being passionately
discussed, Weitling had at first exerted a great influence. But he soon came upon
strong opposition. His old comrades, Schapper, Heinrich Bauer and Joseph Moll
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(1811-1819), had during their much longer stay in London, learned all about the
English labour movement and the teachings of Owen.
According to Weitling the proletariat was not a separate class with distinct
class interests; the proletariat was only a portion of the indigent oppressed section of
the population. Among these poor, the Iumpenproletariat was the most revolutionary
element. He was still trumpeting his idea that robbers and bandits were the most
reliable elements in the war against the existing order. He did not attach much
weight to propaganda. He visualised the future in the form of a communist society
directed by a small group of wise men. To attract the masses, he deemed it
indispensable to resort to the aid of religion. He made Christ the forerunner of
communism, picturing communism as Christianity minus its later accretions.
To better understand the friction that subsequently developed between him
and Marx and Engels, it is well to remember that Weitling was a very able worker,
self-taught and gifted with a literary talent, but handicapped by all the limitations of
those who are self-educated.
The tendency of an autodidact is to try to get out of his own head something
extra-new, to invent some intricate device. He is often doomed to find himself in a
foolish predicament, as after a great expenditure of labour he discovers a long-
discovered America.
An autodidact may be in search of a perpetuum mobile; he may invent a
funnel of wisdom whereby one might become a savant before one counts two.
Weitling belonged to this class of autodidacts. He wanted to contrive a system of
teaching that would enable man to master all sciences in a very short time. He
wanted to devise a universal language. It is characteristic that another worker-
autodidact, Pierre Proudhon (1809-1865), also laboured over a solution of this
problem. As to Weitling, it was at times difficult to determine what he preferred,
what was dearer to him -- communism, or a universal language. A veritable prophet,
he brooked no criticism. He nursed a particular distrust for people learned in books
who used to regard his hobby with scepticism.
In 1844 Weitling was one of the most popular and renowned men, not only
among German workers but also among the German intelligentsia. We have a
characteristic description of a meeting between the famous tailor and the famous
poet Heine. Heine writes:
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