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The fight of the German, and especially, of the Prussian

bourgeoisie, against feudal aristocracy and absolute monarchy, in

other words, the liberal movement, became more earnest.

By this, the long wished-for opportunity was offered to "True"

Socialism of confronting the political movement with the

Socialist demands, of hurling the traditional anathemas against

liberalism, against representative government, against bourgeois

competition, bourgeois freedom of the press, bourgeois

legislation, bourgeois liberty and equality, and of preaching to

the masses that they had nothing to gain, and everything to lose,

by this bourgeois movement. German Socialism forgot, in the nick

of time, that the French criticism, whose silly echo it was,

presupposed the existence of modern bourgeois society, with its

corresponding economic conditions of existence, and the political

constitution adapted thereto, the very things whose attainment

was the object of the pending struggle in Germany.