268 KARL MARX: A BIOGRAPHYvalue of commodities, is in fact, nothing but a mutual relation of the
exchange-value of individuals - labours which are similar and universal -
nothing but a material expression of a specific form of labour, it is a
tautology to say that labour is the only source of exchange-value and
consequendy of wealth, insofar as the latter consists of exchange-values.'^64
Marx left unanswered (for the moment) the key question that he himself
formulated: 'How does production, based on the determination of
exchange-value by labour-time only, lead to the result that the exchange-
value of labour is less than the exchange-value of its product?'^6 S In the
second section, on money, Marx went on to investigate 'the particular
commodity which ... appears as the specially adopted expression of the
exchange-value of all other commodities, the exchange-value of commodi-
ties as a particular exclusive commodity'^66 - money; the second section
was devoted to examining money as a measure of value and a medium of
circulation, with sections on coins, symbols and precious metals. Marx
investigated the process of commodities being turned into money to buy
further commodities, but there was nothing on capital as such. In the
long sections on the history of theories of value, money and circulation,
Marx incorporated much of the material that he had collected for the
third, 'historical' volume of his 'Economics' in the early 1850s.
In view of its extremely fragmentary nature, it is not surprising that
the book had a poor reception. Liebknecht declared that he had never
been so disappointed by a book before and even Engels told Marx that
the synopsis that he had given him was 'a very abstract abstract'.^67 The
Preface was reprinted in Das Volk, a small-circulation newspaper for
German workers in England that Marx was supporting with his own
money, and the paper also carried a review by Engels, the main points in
which had been dictated by Marx. These two pieces were reprinted in a
few American newspapers, but this hardly justified Marx's euphoric claim
to Lassalle that 'the first part has been thoroughly reviewed by the whole
German press from New York to New Orleans'.^68 In Germany itself,
however, Marx admitted that he had 'expected attacks or criticisms, any-
thing but complete ignoring'.^69 And Jenny spoke of the 'silent, long-
nourished hopes for Karl's book which have all been destroyed by the
German conspiracy of silence'.^70 Marx had also entertained hopes for an
English translation which he thought might make a coup if the book went
well in Berlin. He wrote to Dana for an American edition and entered
into negotiation with an English publisher, but nothing came of it -
according to Marx owing to the late appearance of the German edition.
*