7 KARL MARX: A BIOGRAPHYget German participation but the liberal writers refused, and of the Berlin
Young Hegelians only Bruno Bauer agreed (and in the end even he
contributed nothing). So the contributors were reduced to those already
associated with Froebel through his Ziirich publications: Hess, Engels,
Bakunin and Herwegh. Their views were diverse: Hess and Bakunin
proclaimed their own brand of eclectic anarcho-communism, whereas
Froebel, Herwegh and Ruge vaguely called themselves democrats and
emphasised the importance of popular education. As French influence
increased the political awareness of the Young Hegelians, the slogan
'radicalism' began to give way to the more specifically political term
'democracy'. But the unity of Ruge's group amounted to little more than
a wish to further the political application of Feuerbach's philosophy; and
their favourite term was 'humanism'. But Feuerbach himself was unwilling
to co-operate. Marx considered that Schelling was enjoying a quite unjust-
ified reputation among the French: just before leaving Kreuznach for
Paris, he accordingly wrote to Feuerbach suggesting that he contribute a
critique of him:These sincere youthful ideas which, with Schelling, remained an
imaginative dream of his youth, have with you become truth, reality,
and virile earnestness. Schelling is therefore an anticipatory caricature
of you, and as soon as the reality appears opposite the caricature it
must dissolve into dust or fog. Thus I consider you the necessary and
natural opponent of Schelling - summoned by their majesties, Nature
and History. Your struggle with him is the struggle of an imaginary
philosophy with philosophy itself...Feuerbach, however, replied that in his opinion the time was not yet ripe
for a transition from theory to practice, for the theory had still to be
perfected; he told Marx and Ruge bluntly: they were too impatient for
action.
All the contributors to the Deutsch-FranzSsische Jahrbiicher were at least
united in regarding Paris as both a haven and an inspiration. Their
expectations were justified in so far as the revolutions of 1789 and 1830
had made Paris the undisputed centre of socialist thought. The 'bourgeois
monarchy' of Louis-Philippe was drawing to its close and becoming more
conservative; the censorship laws had been tightened in 1835 , and from
1840 onwards the anti-liberal Guizot dominated the Government. But
political activity was none the less lively for being semi-clandestine, and
there was a bewildering variety of every conceivable kind of sect, salon
and newspaper each proclaiming some form of socialism.'^8 As soon as he
had arrived in Paris Ruge set out to make contacts, guided by Hess who
was familiar with the political scene from his days as French corres-