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Title: Engels to Florence Kelley-Wischnewetzky, London, 3 June 1886
Description: Engels on the entry of the American working class upon the scene: the last bourgeois paradise on earth is turning into a purgatory.
Author: Friedrich Engels
Date: 1886-06-03
URL: https://marxismo.school/archivo/marx-engels/cartas/originales/1886-06-03%20Engels%20to%20Florence%20Kelley-Wischnewetzky
---


*Letter from Friedrich Engels to Florence Kelley-Wischnewetzky in Zurich, London, 3 June 1886. Written in English. Text from: F. A. Sorge (ed.),* Briefe und Auszüge aus Briefen von Joh. Phil. Becker, Jos. Dietzgen, Friedrich Engels, Karl Marx u. A. an F. A. Sorge und Andere *(Stuttgart, 1906), pp. 224-225. [Spanish translation](https://marxismo.school/archivo/marx-engels/cartas/1886-06-03%20Engels%20a%20Florence%20Kelley-Wischnewetzky)*

London, June 3rd 1886.

Dear Mrs. Wischnewetzky.

I have looked over the proofs and corrected in pencil a few additional mistakes.

That the get-up of the work would be anything but elegant, I foresaw as soon as I knew who had it in charge, and am therefore not much surprised; I am afraid there is no help now, so it's no use grumbling.

Whatever the mistakes and the Borniertheit of the leaders of the movement, and partly of the newly-awakening masses too, one thing is certain: the American working class is moving and no mistake. And after a few false starts, they will get into the right track soon enough. This appearance of the Americans upon the scene I consider one of the greatest events of the year.

What the downbreak of Russian Czarism would be for the great military monarchies of Europe — the snapping of their mainstay — that is for the bourgeois of the whole world the breaking out of class-war in America. For America after all was the ideal of all bourgeois: a country rich, vast, expanding, with purely bourgeois institutions unleavened by feudal remnants or monarchical traditions and without a permanent and hereditary proletariate. Here every one could become, if not a capitalist, at all events an independent man, producing or trading, whith his own means, for his own account. And because there were not, *as yet*, classes with opposing interests, our — and your — bourgeois thought that America stood *above* class antagonisms and struggles. That delusion has now broken down, the last Bourgeois-Paradise on earth is fast changing into a Purgatorio, and can only be prevented from becouming like Europe an Inferno by the go-ahead pace at which the development of the newly fledged proletariate of America will take place. The way in which they have made their appearance on the scene, is quite extraordinary — six months ago nobody suspected any thing and now they appear all of a sudden in such organized masses as to strike terror into the whole capitalist class. I only wish Marx could have lived to see it! —

I am in doubt whether to send this to Zurich or to the address in Paris you give at foot of your letter. But as in case of mistake Zurich is safest, I forward this and the proofs to Mr. Schlüter, who no doubt will forward them wherever it may be necessary.

Ever sincerely yours

F. Engels.