Marx and a Professor
The critics of Marx are many and varied. Chiefly they belong to two camps: those who are completely ignorant of his life and writings, and those who, though acquainted with both, misrepresent them deliberately, or do not understand them.
Of this latter kind of critic a correspondent drawn our attention to an effort to dispose of Marx by Professor Hearnshaw. of the London University, in a book called “A Survey of Socialism.”
The professor’s criticism is levelled chiefly at the Materialist Conception of History and the Labour Theory of Value. The crux of his criticism of the latter is the so-called contradiction between the theory of value as outlined in Vol. I of “Das Capital,” and the theory of the price of production in Vol III. As this was dealt with in the March S.S., this article will be mainly confined to the Materialist Conception of History.
Concerning this, the professor cannot discover any contradictions from Marx’s own writings. Instead, he finds that it has been “exploded,” “abandoned,” and “explained away” by its adherents, among them the “faithful Engels.”
“Engels is quoted on page 238 as follows : Marx and I are partially responsible for the fact that the younger men have sometimes laid more stress on the economic side than it deserves.”
This is described as a recantation from Marx. But why? Engels says, “The younger men laid more stress on the economic side than it deserves.” He did not say, as Mr. Hearnshaw weuld have his readers believe, that the economic side deserves no stress.
Mr Hearnshaw displays great ability in quoting extracts from the writings of Marxists, most of them dragged from their context, to show that Marx has been abandoned. One example is the following extract from page 282 of Mr. Hearnshav/’s book. He says :
“In particular, the Marxian eschatology is as completely discredited and derelict as is the mediaeval hell. “History,” confessed Engels in 1895, “proved us wrong and showed the views which we then held to be illusions.” O shade of Marx ! What will not the injudicious Engels confess now you are no longer-near him to impose discretion ?”
The quotation from Engels, ” History proved us wrong” . . .,” is from his introduction to Marx’s “Class Struggles in France,” and is trickily used to imply that the illusions were the Materialist Conception of History and the Labour Theory of Value. Whereas, students of Marx know that Engels was writing of the tactics to be pursued by the workers, the question of constitutional methods versus the barricades. The illusions referred to were the barricades !
And, be it remembered, Mr. Hearnshaw is not a political peddler, but a professor of the London University.
Two extracts are taken from E. Belfort Bax’s book, “Outlooks from the New Standpoint,” and quoted on p. 239 01 Hearnshaw’s book.
The first is : —
“Although economics are the basis of human existence, they are the basis merely and not the complete whole.”
The use made of this by Mr. Hearnshaw is such as to convey to the superficial reader that Marx’s case is that economics are the whole of existence. In reality, however, this particular quotation, though weakly stated, says nothing that Marx did not say. It is a Marxist truism. The second quotation is :
“There are certain human interests whose development cannot be interpreted economically.”
With regard to this quotation we do not attempt to defend Belfort Bax’s position.
It would be as well, before proceeding further, to state what is the working basis of the Materialist Conception of History. It is, as stated by Engels in the preface to the Communist Manifesto :
“That in every historical epoch, the prevailing mode of production and exchange, and the social organisation necessarily following from it, form the basis upon which is built up, and from which alone can be explained, the political and intellectual history of that epoch.”
In much of his writing on the Materialist Conception of History Bax diverged from the Marxian view. He says, for example, in the book from which Mr Hearnshaw quotes, “Outlooks from the New Standpoint” (p. 132).
“It would be difficult to deduce the Cruades from the conditions of the mediaeval manor of the eleventh century.”
Again :
“There is much in the history of the first two centuries of the Christian era which cannot be directly referred to economical courses.”
It will be noticed that Belfort Bax does not say that the underlying causes of events are not economic, but merely that he finds certain events “difficult to deduce'” and others which “cannot be directly referred to economical causes.” This does not dispute the fundamental Marxian proposition that the intellectual and political history of an epoch are to be explained in the mode of production then prevailing; a proposition |which Belfort Bax emphasises repeatedly. It is, however, his obscure and ambiguous use of English (unusual with Bax) that gives Mr. Hearnshaw the opportunity to accuse him of making a “tolerably complete evacuation from Marx.”
Mr. Hearnshaw gives a typical illustration of his inability to understand the Materialist Conception of History or of his deliberate misrepresentation of it on page 105. He says that it does not take into iaccount “sex attraction and religious aspiration . . . they cannot be interpreted as consequences of economic antecedents.” It might surprise Mr. Hearnshaw and Marx’s critics to know that it docs take these into account; that it does not interpret them as “consequences of economic antecedents.” What the Materialist Conception of History does say is that the forms which “sex attraction and religious aspiration” take change from age to age; and that these forms can only be explained and understood in the light of the mode of production and consequent social organisation of the age in which they exist.
Mr. Hearnshaw summarises his arguments on page 241:
“The Materialist Conception of History may partially explain the evolution of primitive barbaric society which was wholly engrossed in the struggle for the means of existence, but it does not explain the evolution of civilised society in which other and higher interests prevail ; it leaves out of account—unexplained and wholly inexplicable—religion, patriotism, devotion to ideal causes, martyrdoms, spiritualities; it does not explain Buddha, Christ, Mohammed, Luther, Tolstoi; nay, it does not explain Marx himself. For Marx, assuredly, was not moved by economic considerations.”
It will only be possible to deal with a few of the points raised here.
That primitive society was “wholly engrossed in the struggle for the means of existence” can only be wholly explained—not partially—by the fact that the means of production were primitive and had not developed to the point where it was possible to produce wealth easily, giving time for leisure, making it possible for any to live without working, or of living on the products of another class. In order to survive its struggle with nature the primitive social organisation demanded equal co-operatioa between its members. This equality was not an ethical creed, but a necessity which arose from the struggle. Class society emerged from primitive society when a mode of production had developed which destroyed this co-operative character of primitive society. It could not arise before. Nomadic tribes following their flocks and herds discovered a new method of production in agriculture, and laid the foundation of a new form of private property. The process was a gradual one, spread over a long period before society based on private property became clearly formed. The important point is that the change was determined by a change in the mode of production. The final result was class divided society, which gave leisure to, and made it possible for, certain classes to be other than “wholly engrossed in the struggles for the means of existence.”
Professor Hearnshaw refers also to patriotism. According to the dictionary patriotism means the “pride and love for one’s own country.” Not only does the Materialist Conception of History explain it, but nothing else can. In feudal society modern productive forces did not exist. Economically, the manorial village was almost a complete and self-sufficing unit in itself. It needed little or no intercourse with the outside world. When it did that intercourse was often “unfriendly.” Feudal history is one long record—so far as the nation is concerned—of internal conflicts. The conception of patriotism and nationalism did not come into existence until developments and changes in the methods of production were taking place, which gradually undermined the economic basis and social organisation of Feudalism. “Patriotism” and “England” grew simultaneously with the extension of the market. Mr. G. B. Shaw illustrates this point in his play, “St. Joan,” which was cast in the 15th century. He makes one of his characters, an English nobleman, say :
“A Frenchman ! Where did you pick up that expression? Are these Burgundians and Bretons and Picards and Gascons beginning to call themselves Englishmen? They actually talk of France and England as their countries. Theirs, if you please ! What is to become of me and you if that way of thinking comes into fashion ? Men cannot serve two masters. If this cant of serving their country takes hold of them, good-bye to the authority of their feudal lords, and good-bye to the authority of the church. That is, good-by to you and me.”
The rising capitalist class were a “patriotic” class at the same time that they were a revolutionary class. It was this patriotism which gave expression to the aspirations of the growing capitalist class that Dr. Johnson, the famous defender of waning feudal privileges, referred to when he said that “patriotism was the last refuge of the scoundrel.”
Changes in the mode of production have broken down the economic unity of the village, have made nations—and empires. Patriotism and Nationalism reflect this development and correspond to it.
MARX, CHRIST—AND OTHER MATTERS
When the learned professor speaks of explaining Christ and Marx he obviously means the ideas for which they stood in their time.
The basis of Christ’s teaching, i.e., the idea of the “One God,” reflected social forms that then existed. The ground for this conception had been prepared by the dissolution of tribal life, and the destruction of the tribal gods which synchronised with the growth of the Roman Empire. Christ came (or the Christian teaching arose) after the zenith of the Roman Empire had been passed and decay was setting in. The conditions of the slave-classes in the Empire were at their lowest. Appalling poverty, social disintegration and oppression. Christianity blessed the poor and cursed the rich; extolled poverty and promised riches—in heaven. It did not promise recompense on this earth. The economic conditions of the time did not make possible any proposal that would remedy their slavery on this earth. It was perfectly natural then that deliverance from these conditions should take the form of a belief that promised recompense in a “life to come.” This belief fostered—and taught—a tolerance of the conditions of this world, and submissiveness to slavery. The ruling class discovered this and adopted Christianity. Subsequent ruling-classes also recognised it and made use of it; at the same time adapting its theological aspects to suit changing conditions, and their class interests. Hence the changing form of Christianity, from Catholicism to Protestantism, and to the modern abstract forms which have abandoned some of the crudities that were originally attached to it.
There is some similarity in the misery and poverty of the slaves in Ancient Rome and those of the modern proletariat. There is this difference, however, capitalism suggests an alternative on this earth. The tendency which characterises the modern proletariat is not, therefore, like that of the slaves of Rome, to give expression to their discontent by embracing a creed which “despairs of this world,” but it is to express its discontent politically. This it does by supporting, and in withdrawing its support from one political party after another. Sooner or later, knowledge, and the lessons that come from experience, will lead to an understanding of the present order of society. When that point is reached the working class will fulfil its historic mission, gain political power, and establish Socialism. Thus the conditions of capitalism drive the workers to give expression to their discontent in material forms and away from religious forms. Hence, the growing irreligion of the workers.
One of the easiest (and very common) methods of argument is to state what it is thought an opponent’s views are, and then proceed to demolish them. Mr. Hearnshaw (wittingly or not) has used this method. Though Mr. Hearnshaw’s book has over four hundred pages and contains nearly five hundred quotations, there is not one quotation which clearly states Marx’s view on the Materialist Conception of History. Instead, there are hundreds of quotations from books written mostly by anti-Socialists which purport to state Marx’s view. And this, despite the fact that the fundamental principles of the Materialist Conception of History which are outlined in the preface to Marx’s “Critique of Political Economy” could be stated in a few pages. In view of this, the following from page 230 of Mr. Hearnshaw’s book is just cheek :
“The second thing to be considered is this : that the Marxian system, since its formulation in 1894, has been entirely shattered by criticism, so that it is now a moral and intellectual ruin which no impartial thinker professes to regard is an intact structure.”
And nearly forty years after 1894 the learned professor and “impartial thinker,” regardless of the fact that the “Marxian system has been shattered” finds that it is necessary to do so again. There is an endless procession of those who add their “mite” to the shattering of the “Marxian system”; though it might be thought that having once shattered it into a “moral and intellectual ruin” it would, be unnecessary to do so again. But, alas ! the problems of capitalism arouse ever fresh interest in the “Marxian system” and prove the logic of its analysis. Where capitalism appears, there translated into every language, appears the “Marxian system” also. And it will be so until capitalism is abolished.
Further points from our correspondent’s letter dealing with other aspects of socialist criticism will appear in a subsequent issue.
H. W