Page:Zelda Kahan - The Life and Work of Friedrich Engels (1920).pdf/14

10 In it they already adopt the proletarian standpoint, although it deals very little with the economic sphere direct.

Engels had written only a few sheets (printer's), but Marx expanded them to many times their number. When Engels received the copy of the whole book he was astounded at its length, but he was delighted with the way in which Marx had treated the subject—only he thought the whole book too big; the subject matter was not worth it; still, he consoled himself that it was better so, for at least it was coming out straightaway, whereas otherwise "who knows how long the material might have still lain in your desks."

Although himself a very careful and painstaking writer, many were the occasions when Engels urged Marx to hurry up with his work, and not to allow the possibility of making his work a little more perfect to interfere with rapid publication. We shall see later that this feverish haste of his to get things published was due to his belief in the imminence of the revolution. Thus he writes to Marx, January, 1845: "See to it that you complete quickly your work on national economy. Even if you yourself are not quite satisfied with much of it—that is no matter. The time is ripe and we must strike the iron while it is hot … it is now high time. So see that you are ready by April. Do as I do; give yourself a definite date by which you absolutely must finish and see about the immediate printing of it … It must come out at once."

With their meeting at Paris, and their joint writing of The Holy Family, there commenced a loyal friendship, such as is rarely met with in history between two great men, and which lasted to the end of their days. We shall have occasion to speak of this friendship many times again.

Although it is well-nigh impossible to treat of the work of one inseparably from that of the other, yet since we have already given a brief survey of their fundamental economic and philosophic principles in the booklet dealing with the life and teaching of Karl Marx, published two years ago, on the occasion of the Marx centenary, we shall endeavour to deal here only with that part of their work which was, as far as can be, specifically the work of Engels, or with such parts of their common work as were not treated in the Marx pamphlet.

After their meeting and complete understanding in Paris, Engels went back to Barmen, there to complete and publish the results of his economic investigations in England—his historic Condition of the Working Classes in England in 1844—a reprint of the English edition of which, we are glad to learn, has just appeared.

The first edition was published in German in the summer of 1845, and was very widely read and criticised. Its chief merit is not so much the actual description of the conditions of life of the English workers,