A Darwinian Gentleman at Marx's Funeral

Aveling belonged to a group of radical atheists. He sought Darwin's official approval, and status as dedicatee, for a volume he had edited on Darwin's work and his (that is, Aveling's, not necessarily Darwin's) view of its broader social meaning (published in 1881 as The Student's Darwin, volume 2 in the International Library of Science and Free-thought). Darwin, who understood Aveling's opportunism and cared little for his antireligious militancy, refused with his customary politeness but with no lack of firmness. Darwin ended his letter to Aveling (and not to Marx, who did not treat religion as a primary subject in Das Kapital) by writing:

   It appears to me (whether rightly or wrongly) that direct arguments against
   christianity and theism produce hardly any effect on the public; and
   freedom of thought is best promoted by the gradual illumination of men's
   minds which follows from the advance of science. It has, therefore, been
   always my object to avoid writing on religion, and I have confined myself
   to science.

Nonetheless, despite this correction, Marx might still have regarded himself as a disciple of Darwin and might have sought the company of a key Darwinian in the younger generation--a position rendered more plausible by Engels's famous comparison (quoted earlier) in his funerary oration. But this interpretation must also be rejected. Engels maintained far more interest in the natural sciences than Marx ever did (as best expressed in two books, Anti-Duhring and Dialectics of Nature). Marx, as stated above, certainly admired Darwin as a liberator of knowledge from social prejudice and as a useful ally, at least by analogy. In a famous letter of 1869, Marx wrote to Engels about Darwin's Origin of Species: "Although it is developed in the crude English style, this is the book which contains the basis in natural history for our view."

But Marx also criticized the social biases in Darwin's formulation, again writing to Engels, and with keen insight:

   It is remarkable how Darwin recognizes among beasts and plants his English
   society with its division of labor, competition, opening up of new markets,
   `invention,' and the Malthusian `struggle for existence.' It is Hobbes's
   bellum omnium contra omnes [the war of all against all].

Marx remained a committed evolutionist, of course, but his interest in Darwin clearly diminished through the years. An extensive scholarly literature treats this subject, and I think that Margaret Fay speaks for a consensus when she writes (in her previously cited article):

   Marx ... though he was initially excited by the publication of Darwin's
   Origin ... developed a much more critical stance toward Darwinism, and in
   his private correspondence of the 1860s poked gentle fun at Darwin's
   ideological biases. Marx's Ethnological Notebooks, compiled circa 1879-81,
   in which Darwin is cited only once, provide no evidence that he reverted to
   his earlier enthusiasm.

To cite one final anecdote, the scholarly literature frequently cites Marx's great enthusiasm (until the more scientifically savvy Engels set him straight) for a curious book, published in 1865 by the now (and deservedly) unknown French explorer and ethnologist Pierre Tremaux, Origine et transformations de l'homme et des autres etres (Origin and transformation of man and other beings). Marx professed ardent admiration for this work, proclaiming it "einen Fortschritt uber Darwin" (an advance over Darwin). The more sober Engels bought the book at Marx's urging, but then dampened his friend's ardor by writing: "I have arrived at the conclusion that there is nothing to his theory if for no other reason than because he neither understands geology nor is capable of the most ordinary literary historical criticism."