KARL MARX

4° TRIER, BONN AND BERLIN
41
restless Jewish penetration pushed every proposition of Young Hegelian
doctrine to its final conclusion and was already then, by his concentrated
study of economics, preparing his conversion to communism. Under
Marx's leadership the young newspaper soon began to speak very
recklessly.. . 172
In his first task as editor, however, Marx showed himself very circumspect:
he was faced with accusations of communism brought against the
Rheinische Zeitung by the Augsburger Allgemeine Zeitung, probably inspired
by Hoeffken, one-time editor of the Rheinische Zeitung, who had already
attacked the Rheinische Zeitung in March for printing an article by Bruno
Bauer. The basis for the accusation was that in September the Rheinische
Zeitung had reviewed two articles on housing and communist forms of
government, and that in October it had reported a conference at Strasbourg
where followers of Fourier had put forward their ideas. All these
items had been written by Hess. In his reply, Marx criticised the Augsburg
paper for trying to neglect what was an important issue, but denied that
the Rheinische Zeintung had any sympathy with communism:
The Rheinische Zeitung, which cannot even concede theoretical reality
to communistic ideas in their present form, and can even less wish or
consider possible their practical realisation, will submit these ideas to
thorough criticism. If the Augsburger wanted and could achieve more
than slick phrases, the Augsburger would see that writings such as those
by Leroux, Considerant, and above all Proudhon's penetrating work,
can be criticised only after long and deep study, not through superficial
and passing notions. 173
But these notions had to be taken seriously, for ideas were very powerful:
Because of this disagreement, we have to take such theoretical works
all the more seriously. We are firmly convinced that it is not the
practical effort but rather the theoretical explication of communist ideas
which is the real danger. Dangerous practical attempts, even those on
a large scale, can be answered with cannon, but ideas won by our
intelligence, embodied in our outlook, and forged in our conscience,
are chains from which we cannot tear ourselves away without breaking
our hearts; they are demons we can overcome only by submitting to
them. 174
This reply reflected the general policy of the Rheinische Zeitung, which
certainly treated poverty as a social and not merely a political question,
but which did not see the proletariat as a new social class but only as the
innocent victim of bad economic organisation.
It was not among the German working classes that socialist ideas either
originated or initially took root. Germany was only just beginning to