The bourgeoisie, historically, has played a most revolutionary part.
The bourgeoisie, wherever it has got the upper hand, has put an end to all feudal, patriarchal, idyllic relations. It has pitilessly torn asunder the motley feudal ties that bound man to his "natural superiors", and has left no other nexus between people than naked self-interest, than callous "cash payment". It has drowned out the most heavenly ecstacies of religious fervor, of chivalrous enthusiasm, of philistine sentimentalism, in the icy water of egotistical calculation. It has resolved personal worth into exchange value, and in place of the numberless indefeasible chartered freedoms, has set up that single, unconscionable freedom -- Free Trade. In one word, for exploitation, veiled by religious and political illusions, it has substituted naked, shameless, direct, brutal exploitation.
The bourgeoisie has stripped of its halo every occupation hitherto honored and looked up to with reverent awe. It has converted the physician, the lawyer, the priest, the poet, the man of science, into its paid wage laborers.
The bourgeoisie has torn away from the family its sentimental veil, and has reduced the family relation into a mere money relation.
The bourgeoisie has disclosed how it came to pass that the brutal display of vigor in the Middle Ages, which reactionaries so much admire, found its fitting complement in the most slothful indolence. It has been the first to show what man's activity can bring about. It has accomplished wonders far surpassing Egyptian pyramids, Roman aqueducts, and Gothic cathedrals; it has conducted expeditions that put in the shade all former exoduses of nations and crusades.
The bourgeoisie cannot exist without constantly revolutionizing the instruments of production, and thereby the relations of production, and with them the whole relations of society. Conservation of the old modes of production in unaltered form, was, on the contrary, the first condition of existence for all earlier industrial classes. Constant revolutionizing of production, uninterrupted disturbance of all social conditions, everlasting uncertainty and agitation distinguish the bourgeois epoch from all earlier ones. All fixed, fast frozen relations, with their train of ancient and venerable prejudices and opinions, are swept away, all new-formed ones become antiquated before they can ossify. All that is solid melts into air, all that is holy is profaned, and man is at last compelled to face with sober senses his real condition of life and his relations with his kind.
I wanted to concentrate on this rather long passage because of the finger-pointing repetition of “The bourgeoisie”, and I believe that by the end of this post I’ll finally remember how to spell it. Not only does the first line of all of these paragraphs, but the insistent “it has pitilessly torn asunder”, “it has drowned out”, “it has substituted”, “it has converted”’s never let you forget who you are reading about, and forcibly keeps your eyes focused on them. It starts off with a single, understated, ominous sentence, followed by a severe outpouring, a torrent of indictments, that halfway through, claim to be able to be summed up in one word. The anger of this text is clear when that very one word of “exploitation” is almost immediately amended to “brutal exploitation” surrounded by numerous qualifiers.
The last paragraph of this passage lets go of the pointed accusatory style and starts to actually explain the workings of the bourgeoisie. All of a sudden it seems more reasonable and relaxed and less incendiary. The isocolon that begins the last sentence begins to sound like poetry, and we hear “at last” with a sigh of relief and a sibilant hiss, “last compelled to face with sober senses”. After the storm we are let down easy, with “sober senses”, faced with a calm statement confronting our predicament, our condition, and our kind.
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