Karl Marx

“ The German working-class have resolutely supported the war, which it was not in their power to prevent, as a war for German independence and the liberation of France and Europe from that pestilential incubus, the Second Empire. It was the German workmen who, together with the rural labourers, furnished the sinews and muscles of heroic hosts, leaving behind their half-starved families. Decimated by the battles abroad, they will be once more decimated by misery at home. ”

“ As Louis Bonaparte flattered himself that the war of 1866, resulting in the common exhaustion of Austria and Prussia, would make him the supreme arbiter of Germany, so Alexander flattered himself that the war of 1870, resulting in the common exhaustion of Germany and France, would make him the supreme arbiter of the Western Continent. As the second Empire thought the North German Confederation incompatible with its existence, so autocratic Russia must think herself endangered by a German empire under Prussian leadership. ”

“ The French working-class moves, therefore, under circumstances of extreme difficulty. Any attempt at upsetting the new Government in the present crisis, when the enemy is almost knocking at the doors of Paris, would be a desperate folly. The French workmen must perform their duties as citizens; but, at the same time, they must not allow themselves to be swayed by the national souvenirs of 1792, as the French peasants allowed themselves to be deluded by the national souvenirs of the First Empire. They have not to recapitulate the past, but to build up the future. ”

“ What we want is not glory, but safety. The Germans are an essentially peaceful people. In their sober guardianship, conquest itself changes from a condition of future war into a pledge of perpetual peace. Of course it is not Germans that invaded France in 1792, for the sublime purpose of bayonetting the revolution of the 18th century. ”

“ If the French workmen amidst peace failed to stop the aggressor, are the German workmen more likely to stop the victor amidst the clangour of arms? The German workmen's manifesto demands the extradition of Louis Bonaparte as a common felon to the French Republic. Their rulers are; on the contrary, already trying hard to restore him to the Tuileries as the best man to ruin France. However that may be, history will prove that the German working-class are not made of the same malleable stuff as the German middle class. They will do their duty. ”

“ The English working-class stretch the hand of fellowship to the French and German working-people. They feel deeply convinced that whatever turn the impending horrid war may take, the alliance of the working-classes of all countries will ultimately kill war. The very fact that while official France and Germany are rushing into a fratricidal feud, the workmen of France and Germany send each other messages of peace and goodwill ”

“ Let them calmly and resolutely improve the opportunities of Republican liberty, for the work of their own class organization. It will gift them with fresh Herculean powers for the regeneration of France, and our common task—the emancipation of labour. Upon their energies and wisdom hinges the fate of the Republic. ”

“ If the German working class allow the present war to lose its strictly defensive character and to degenerate into a war against the French people, victory or defeat will prove alike disastrous. All the miseries that befell Germany after her war of independence will revive with accumulated intensity. ”

“ If eventual impossibilities are in wild phraseology promised in the name of the Republic, is it not with a view to prepare the cry for a 'possible' government? Is the Republic, by some of its middle-class undertakers, not intended to serve as a mere stop-gap and bridge over an Orleanist Restoration? ”

“ Mindful of the watchword of the International Working-men's Association: Proletarians of all countries unite, we shall never forget that the workmen of all countries are our friends and the despots of all countries our enemies. ”

“ The principles of the International are, however, too widely spread and too firmly rooted amongst the German working class to apprehend such a sad consummation. The voices of the French workmen have re-echoed from Germany. A mass meeting of workmen, held at Brunswick on July 16th, expressed its full concurrence with the Paris minifesto, spurned the idea of national antagonism to France, and wound up its resolutions with these words:—"We are enemies of all wars, but above all of dynastic wars. . . . . With deep sorrow and grief we are forced to undergo a defensive war as an unavoidable evil ”

“ In answer to the warlike proclamations of those who exempt themselves from the blood-tax, and find in public misfortunes a source of fresh speculations, we protest, we who want peace, labour, and liberty! ”

“ History will measure its retribution, not by the extent of the square miles conquered from France, but by the intensity of the crime of reviving, in the second half of the 19th century, the policy of conquest! ”

“ It proves that in contrast to old society, with its economical miseries and its political delirium, a new society is springing up, whose International rule will be Peace, because its national ruler will be everywhere the same—Labour! The Pioneer of that new society is the International Working-Men's Association. ”

“ The Orleanists have seized the strongholds of the army and the police, while to the professed Republicans have fallen the talking departments. Some of their first acts go far to show that they have inherited from the Empire, not only ruins, but also its dread of the working-class. ”

“ If this rule were to prevail, Austria would still be entitled to Venetia and the line of the Mincio, and France to the line of the Rhine, in order to protect Paris, which lies certainly more open to an attack from the North East than Berlin does from the South West. If limits are to be fixed by military interests, there will be no end to claims, because every military line is necessarily faulty, and may be improved by annexing some more outlying territory ”