lace him in a class by himself. Engels was the able co-adjutor
and co-worker with Marx. He was a deep and acute thinker, a most patient
investigator, a careful writer. More practical than his friend, he was
better able to cope with material problems, and his advice and his purse
were always at the disposal of Marx.

The latter could hardly have worked under more discouraging conditions.
Poverty, inadequate opportunities, lack of stimulating companionship,
and the complete absence of any kind of encouragement and such sympathy
as a man of his affectionate temperament craved fell to his lot. His
most learned works were written for groups of workingmen, his most
laborious efforts were made without the slightest hope of recognition
from the learned and the powerful.

All through these years Engels remained his faithful friend, and helped
him over many hard places when family troubles and straitened
circumstances pressed upon the old revolutionist.

This work is Engels' testimony with regard to the method employed by
them in arriving at their philosophical conclusions. It is the statement
of the philosophical foundations of modern socialism by one who helped
to lay them; it is an old man's account of the case upon the preparation
of which he has spent his entire life, for, this work, short as it is,
represents the results of forty years of toil and persevering effort.

As the "Communist Manifesto" was a gage flung with all the impetuosity
of youthful impatience into the face of constituted authority, so this
is the deliberate statement of the veteran, who has learned the game too
well to leave any openings, and proceeds to the demolition of pet
opinions in a quiet, deadly and deliberate fashion.

Step by step, the argument is built up. The ghosts of old controversies
long since buried are raised, to show how the doctrine imperishably
associated with the names of Marx and Engels came into existence; the
"Young Hegelians," the "Tuebingen School," and finally Feuerbach himself
are summoned from the grave to which the Revolution of 1848 had
consigned them. Still, ancient history as these controversies are from
the German standpoint, such is the backwardness of philosophy among
English-speaking peoples, that we find Engels exposing again and again
fallacies which persist even in our time, and ridiculing sentiments
which we receive with approbation in our political assemblies, and with
mute approval in our churches and convent