Page:Karl Radek - The Development of Socialism from Science to Action.djvu/8



What is Communism? This question is answered by the young Friedrich Engels in a sketch of the Communist Manifesto in the year 1847: "Communism is the theory of the conditions for the victory of the working class." According to this definition, which in itself contains the pervading spirit of scientific Socialism, the whole work of Marx and Engels consisted in seeking, in the development of capitalistic society, the development of the conditions for the final victory of the working class, in order to make of it a starting point for Communist activity. In this manner the development from Utopia into Science was accomplished.

The predecessors of Marx and Engels, the Utopian Socialists, have accomplished much in the characterizing of bourgeois society. The grim Fourier, who scourged himself and divested himself of all masks, the Faust-like gifted Saint-Simon, who illuminated whole epochs of human history in a few words; Owen, who penetrated deeply into the nature of man and exhibited his dependence on economic conditions in his writings and his speeches—all of them contributed blocks for building the mighty edifice of scientific Socialism. Without them Marx would have been impossible. But in spite of the deeply penetrating criticism of capitalist society, the predecessors of Marx did not understand how this very society could furnish those mass forces which would overthrow it. For this reason, they had to play the role of historic prophecy, and to work out a plan for the rescue of humanity from the claws of Capitalism, a plan the only weakness of which was, that the architect was missing who could by means of it erect that temple of humanity to Heaven. Marx and Engels showed how the development