(^2 54) KARL MARX: A BIOGRAPHY
colonisation and the economics of the Roman world; in the autumn, books
on banking, agronomy and technology. In all, Marx filled his notebooks
with long passages from about eighty authors and read many more. This
study was directed towards the completion of his work on economics.
Already in January 1851 Engels was urging Marx to 'hurry up with the
completion and publication of your Economics'.^185 By April Marx wrote:
I am so far advanced that in five weeks I will be through with the
whole economic shit. And that done, I will work over my Economics
at home and throw myself into another science in the Museum. I am
beginning to be tired of it. Basically, this science has made no further
progress since A. Smith and D. Ricardo, however much has been done
in individual and often very subtle researches.^186
The book was eagerly awaited by Marx's friends. In May Lassalle wrote:
'I have heard that your Economics will at last see the light of day. ... I
am burning to contemplate on my desk the giant three-volume work
of the Ricardo-turned-socialist and Hegel-turned economist.'^187 Engels,
however, who knew his friend well, declared that 'as long as you still have
not read a book that you think important, you do not get down to
writing'.^188 In June, however, Marx was as sanguine as ever, writing
to Weydemeyer: 'I am slogging away mostly from nine in the morning
until seven in the evening. The stuff I am working on has so many
damned ramifications that with every effort I shall not be able to finish
for 6- 8 weeks.'^189 Although he realised that 'one must at some point break
off forcibly',^190 in July 1851 Proudhon's new book The General Idea of
Revolution in the Nineteenth Century came into his hands and he immedi-
ately diverted his energies into criticising its contents. Despite its anti-
Jacobinism, Proudhon's book appeared to Marx to deal only with the
symptoms of capitalism and not with its essence.
However, by October Freiligrath and Pieper (who was travelling in
Germany at the time) had interested the publisher Lowenthal in Marx's
work. Marx's scheme comprised three volumes: 'A Critique of Economics',
'Socialism', and a 'History of Economic Thought'. Lowenthal wished to
begin with the last volume and see how it sold. Engels urged Marx
to accept this proposal, but to expand the History into two volumes:
After this would come the Socialists as the third volume - the fourth
being the Critique - what would be left of it - and the famous Positive,
what you 'really' want.. .. For people of sufficient intelligence, the
indications in the first volumes - the Anti-Proudhon and the Manifesto
- will suffice to put them on the right track. The mass of buyers and
readers will lose any interest in the 'History' if the great mystery is
already revealed in the first volume. They will say, like Hegel in the