MATERIALISM  
AND
EMPIRIO-
CRITICISM

The present edition of V. I. Lenin's Materialism and Empirio-Criticism, is a reprint of
the text given in the book under the same title by the Foreign Languages Publishing
House, Moscow. It contains "Ten Questions for a Lecturer," a reprint from the text given
in Collected Works of V. I. Lenin, English edition, Vol. 14. The notes at the end of the book
are based on those given in the Chinese edition published by the People's Publishing
House, Peking, April 1971.

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    1. Does the lecturer acknowledge that the philosophy of Marxism is dialectical materialism ?

    If he does not, why has he never analysed Engels' countless statements on this subject?

    If he does, why do the Machists call their "revision" of dialectical materialism "the philosophy of Marxism"?

    2. Does the lecturer acknowledge Engels' fundamental division of philosophical systems into idealism and materialism, Engels regarding those intermediate between these two, wavering between them, as the line of Hume in modern philosophy, calling this line "agnosticism" and declaring Kantianism to be a variety of agnosticism?

    3. Does the lecturer acknowledge that recognition of the external world and its reflection in the human mind form the basis of the theory of knowledge of dialectical materialism?

    4. Does the lecturer acknowledge as correct Engels' argument concerning the conversion of "things-in-themselves" into "things-for-us" ?

    5. Does the lecturer acknowledge as correct Engels' assertion that the "real unity of the world consists in its materiality"? (Anti-Dühring, 2nd ed., 1886, p. 28, section I, part IV on world schematism.)[2]

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    6. Does the lecturer acknowledge as correct Engels' assertion that "matter without motion is as inconceivable as motion without matter"? (Anti-Dühring, 1886, 2nd ed., p. 45, in part 6 on natural philosophy, cosmogony, physics and chemistry.)[3]

    7. Does the lecturer acknowledge that the ideas of causality, necessity, law, etc., are a reflection in the human mind of laws of nature, of the real world? Or was Engels wrong in saying so? (Anti-Dühring, S. 20-21, in part III on apriorism, and S. 103-04, in part XI on freedom and necessity.)[4]

    8. Does the lecturer know that Mach expressed his agreement with the head of the immanentist school, Schuppe, and even dedicated his last and chief philosophical work to him? How does the lecturer explain this adherence of Mach to the obviously idealist philosophy of Schuppe, a defender of clericalism and in general a downright reactionary in philosophy?

    9. Why did the lecturer keep silent about "adventure" with his comrade of yesterday (according to the Studies [5]), the Menshevik Yushkevich, who has today declared Bogdanov[6] (following in the wake of Rakhmetov[7]) an idealist ? Is the lecturer aware that Petzoldt in his latest book has classed a number of Mach's disciples among the idealists ?

    10. Does the lecturer confirm the fact that Machism has nothing in common with Bolshevism? And that Lenin has repeatedly protested against Machism?[8] And that the Mensheviks Yushkevich and Valentinov[9] are "pure" empirio-criticists?

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    A number of writers, would-be Marxists, have this year undertaken a veritable campaign against the philosophy of Marxism. In the course of less than half a year four books devoted mainly and almost exclusively to attacks on dialectical materialism have made their appearance. These include first and foremost Studies in [? -- it would have been more proper to say ''against''][11] the Philosophy of Marxism (St. Petersburg, 1908), a symposium by Bazarov, Bogdanov, Lunacharsky, Berman, Helfond, Yushkevich and Suvorov; Yushkevich's Materialism and Critical Realism ; Berman's Dialectics in the Light of the Modern Theory of Knowledge and Valentinov's The Philosophical Constructions of Marxism.

    All these people could not have been ignorant of the fact that Marx and Engels scores of times termed their philosophical views dialectical materialism. Yet all these people, who, despite the sharp divergence of their political views, are united in their hostility towards dialectical materialism, at the same time claim to be Marxists in philosophy! Engels' dialectics is "mysticism," says Berman. Engels' views have become "antiquated," remarks Bazarov casually, as though

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it were a self-evident fact. Materialism thus appears to be refuted by our bold warriors, who proudly allude to the "modern theory of knowledge," "recent philosophy" (or "recent positivism"), the "philosophy of modern natural science," or even the "philosophy of natural science of the twentieth century." Supported by all these supposedly recent doctrines, our destroyers of dialectical materialism proceed fearlessly to downright fideism[*][12] (in the case of Lunacharsky it is most evident, but by no means in his case alone![13]). Yet when it comes to an explicit definition of their attitude towards Marx and Engels, all their courage and all their respect for their own convictions at once disappear. In deed -- a complete renunciation of dialectical materialism, i.e., of Marxism; in word -- endless subterfuges, attempts to evade the essence of the question, to cover their retreat, to put some materialist or other in place of materialism in general, and a determined refusal to make a direct analysis of the innumerable materialist declarations of Marx and Engels. This is truly "mutiny on one's knees," as it was justly characterised by one Marxist. This is typical philosophical revisionism, for it was only the revisionists who gained a sad notoriety for themselves by their departure from the fundamental views of Marxism and by their fear, or inability, to "settle accounts" openly, explicitly, resolutely and clearly with the views they had abandoned. When orthodox Marxists had occasion to pronounce against some antiquated views of Marx (for instance, Mehring when he opposed certain historical propositions), it was always done with such precision

    With the exception of a few corrections in the text, the present edition does not differ from the previous one. I hope that, irrespective of the dispute with the Russian "Machians," it will prove useful as an aid to an acquaintance with the philosophy of Marxism, dialectical materialism, as well as with the philosophical conclusions from the recent discoveries in natural science. As for A. A. Bogdanov's latest works, which I have had no opportunity to examine, the appended article by Comrade V. I. Nevsky gives the necessary information.[14] Comrade V.I. Nevsky, not only in his work as a propagandist in general, but also as an active worker in the Party school in particular, has had ample opportunity to convince himself that under the guise of "proletarian culture" A. A. Bogdanov is imparting bourgeois and reactionary views.

N. Lenin  

September 2, 1920

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Valentinov, Chernov[*] and other Machians. I shall use this latter term throughout as a synonym for "empirio-criticist" because it is shorter and simpler and has already acquired rights of citizenship in Russian literature. That Ernst Mach is the most popular representative of empirio-criticism today is universally acknowledged in philosophical literature,[**] while Bogdanov's and Yushkevich's departures from "pure" Machism are of absolutely secondary importance, as will be shown later.

    The materialists, we are told, recognise something unthinkable and unknowable -- "things-in-themselves" -- matter "outside of experience" and outside of our knowledge. They lapse into genuine mysticism by admitting the existence of something beyond, something transcending the bounds of "experience" and knowledge. When they say that matter, by acting upon our sense-organs, produces sensations, the materialists take as their basis the "unknown," nothingness; for do they not themselves declare our sensations to be the only source of knowledge? The materialists lapse into "Kantianism" (Plekhanov, by recognising the existence of "things-in-themselves," i.e., things outside of our consciousness); they "double" the world and preach "dualism," for the materialists hold that beyond the appearance there is the thing-in-itself; beyond the immediate sense data there is something else, some fetish, an "idol," an absolute, a source

    The work of Bishop George Berkeley, published in 1710 under the title Treatise Concerning the Principles of Human Knowledge [*] begins with the following argument: "It is evident to anyone who takes a survey of the objects of human knowledge, that they are either ideas actually imprinted on the senses; or else such as are perceived by attending to the passions and operations of the mind; or lastly, ideas formed by help of memory and imagination. . . . By sight I have the ideas of light and colours, with their several degrees and variations. By touch I perceive hard and soft, heat and cold, motion and resistance. . . . Smelling furnishes me with odours; the palate with tastes; and hearing conveys sounds. . . . And as several of these are observed to accompany each other,

as the foundation of all its reasoning the recognition of the external world and the reflection thereof in the minds of men. Berkeley does not deny natural science, which has always adhered (mostly unconsciously) to this, i.e., the materialist, theory of knowledge. We read in § 59: "We may, from the experience [Berkeley -- a philosophy of 'pure experience'][*] we have had of the train and succession of ideas in our minds . . . make . . . well-grounded predictions concerning the ideas we shall be affected with pursuant to a great train of actions, and be enabled to pass a right judgment of what would have appeared to us, in case we were placed in circumstances very different from those we are in at present. Herein consists the knowledge of nature, which [listen to this!] may preserve its use and certainty very consistently with what hath been said."

    Let us regard the external world, nature, as "a combination of sensations" evoked in our mind by a deity. Acknowledge this and give up searching for the "ground" of these sensations outside the mind, outside man, and I will acknowledge within the framework of my idealist theory of knowledge all natural science and all the use and certainty of its deductions. It is precisely this framework, and only this framework, that I need for my deductions in favour of "peace and religion." Such is Berkeley's train of thought. It correctly expresses the essence of idealist philosophy and its social significance, and we shall encounter it later when we come to speak of the relation of Machism to natural science.

    Let us now consider another recent discovery that was borrowed from Bishop Berkeley in the twentieth century by

primary and spirit secondary, for the idealists the reverse is the case. In between these two camps Engels places the adherents of Hume and Kant, who deny the possibility of knowing the world, or at least of knowing it fully, and calls them agnostics[15]. In his Ludwig Feuerbach Engels applies this term only to the adherents of Hume (those people whom Fraser calls, and who like to call themselves, "positivists"). But in his article "On Historical Materialism," Engels explicitly speaks of the standpoint of "the Neo-Kantian agnostic,"[16] regarding Neo-Kantianism as a variety of agnosticism.[*]

    We cannot dwell here on this remarkably correct and profound judgment of Engels' (a judgment which is shamelessly ignored by the Machians). We shall discuss it in detail later on. For the present we shall confine ourselves to pointing to this Marxist terminology and to this meeting of extremes: the views of a consistent materialist and of a consistent idealist on the fundamental philosophical trends. In order to illustrate these trends (with which we shall constantly have to deal in our further exposition) let us briefly note the views of outstanding philosophers of the eighteenth century who pursued a different path from Berkeley.

    Here are Hume's arguments. In his An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding, in the chapter (XII) on sceptical philosophy, he says: "It seems evident, that men are carried, by a natural instinct or prepossession, to repose faith in their senses; and that, without any reasoning, or even almost before the use of reason, we always suppose an external universe, which depends not on our perception, but would

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exist though we and every sensible creature were absent or annihilated. Even the animal creations are governed by a like opinion, and preserve this belief of external objects, in all their thoughts, designs, and actions. . . . But this universal and primary opinion of all men is soon destroyed by the slightest philosophy, which teaches us, that nothing can ever be present to the mind but an image or perception, and that the senses are only the inlets, through which these images are conveyed, without being able to produce any immediate intercourse between the mind and the object. The table, which we see, seems to diminish, as we remove farther from it: But the real table, which exists independent of us, suffers no alteration: It was, therefore, nothing but its image, which was present to the mind. These are the obvious dictates of reason; and no man, who reflects, ever doubted, that the existences, which we consider, when we say, 'this house,' and 'that tree' are nothing but perceptions in the mind. . . . By what argument can it be proved, that the perceptions of the mind must be caused by external objects, entirely different from them, though resembling them (if that be possible), and could not arise either from the energy of the mind itself, or from the suggestion of some invisible and unknown spirit, or from some other cause still more unknown to us? . . . How shall the question be determined? By experience surely; as all other questions of a like nature. But here experience is, and must be entirely silent. The mind has never anything present to it but the perceptions, and cannot possibly reach any experience of their connection with objects. This supposition of such a connection is, therefore, without any foundation in reasoning. To have recourse to the veracity of the Supreme Being, in order to prove the veracity of our senses, is surely making a very unexpected circuit . . . if the external

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world be once called in question, we shall be at a loss to find arguments, by which we may prove the existence of that Being, or any of his attributes."[*]

    He says the same thing in his Treatise of Humtm Nature (Part IV, Sec. II, "On Scepticism Towards Sensations"): "Our perceptions are our only objects." (P. 281 of the French translation by Renouvier and Pillon, 1878.) By scepticism Hume means refusal to explain sensations as the effects of objects, spirit, etc., refusal to reduce perceptions to the external world, on the one hand, and to a deity or to an unknown spirit, on the other. And the author of the introduction to the French translation of Hume, F. Pillon -- a philosopher of a trend akin to Mach (as we shall see below) -- justly remarks that for Hume subject and object are reduced to "groups of various perceptions," to "elements of consciousness, to impressions, ideas, etc."; that the only concern should be with the "groupings and combinations of these elements."** The English Humean, Huxley, who coined the apt and correct term "agnosticism," in his book on Hume also emphasises the fact that the latter, regarding "sensations" as the "primary and irreducible states of consciousness," is not entirely consistent on the question how the origin of sensations is to be explained, whether by the effect of objects on man or by the creative power of the mind. "Realism and idealism are equally probable hypotheses" (i.e., for Hume).*** Hume does not go

    As for the materialists, here is an opinion of Berkeley given by Diderot, the leader of the Encyclopaedists: "Those philosophers are called idealists who, being conscious only of their existence and of the sensations which succeed each other within themselves, do not admit anything else. An extravagant system which, to my thinking, only the blind could have originated; a system which, to the shame of human intelligence and philosophy, is the most difficult to combat, although the most absurd of all."[*] And Diderot, who came very close to the standpoint of contemporary materialism (that arguments and syllogisms alone do not suffice to refute idealism, and that here it is not a question for theoretical argument), notes the similarity of the premises both of the idealist Berkeley, and the sensationalist Condillac. In his opinion, Condillac should have undertaken a refutation of Berkeley in order to avoid such absurd conclusions being drawn from the treatment of sensations as the only source of our knowledge.

    In the "Conversation Between d'Alembert and Diderot," Diderot states his philosophical position thus: " . . . Suppose

    The subject matter of physics is the connection between sensations and not between things or bodies, of which our sensations are the image. And in 1883, in his Mechanik, Mach repeats the same thought: "Sensations are not 'symbols of things.' The 'thing' is rather a mental symbol for a complex of sensations of relative stability. Not the things (bodies) but colours, sounds, pressures, spaces, times (what we usually call sensations) are the real elements of the world."[*]

    About this word "elements," the fruit of twelve years of "reflection," we shall speak later. At present let us note that Mach explicitly states here that things or bodies are complexes of sensations, and that he quite clearly sets up his own philosophical point of view against the opposite theory which holds that sensations are "symbols" of things (it would be more correct to say images or reflections of things). The latter theory is philosophical materialism. For instance, the materialist Frederick Engels -- the not unknown collaborator of Marx and a founder of Marxism -- constantly and without exception speaks in his works of things and their mental pictures or images (Gedanken-Abbilder ), and it is obvious that these mental images arise exclusively from sensations. It would seem that this fundamental standpoint of the "philosophy of Marxism" ought to be known to everyone who speaks of it, and especially to anyone who comes out in print in the name of this philosophy. But because of the extraordinary confusion which our Machians have introduced, it becomes necessary to repeat what is generally known. We

turn to the first section of Anti-Dühring and read: ". . . things and their mental images . . . ";[*] or to the first section of the philosophical part, which reads: "But whence does thought obtain these principles [i.e., the fundamental principles of all knowledge]? From itself? No . . . these forms can never be created and derived by thought out of itself, but only from the external world . . . the principles are not the starting point of the investigation [as Dühring who would be a materialist, but cannot consistently adhere to materialism, holds], but its final result; they are not applied to nature and human history, but abstracted from them; it is not nature and the realm of humanity which conform to these principles, but the principles are only valid in so far as they are in conformity with nature and history. That is the only materialistic conception of the matter, and Herr Dühring's contrary conception is idealistic, makes things stand completely on their heads, and fashions the real world out of ideas" (ibid., p. 21).[18] Engels, we repeat, applies this "only materialistic conception" everywhere and without exception, relentlessly attacking Dühring for the least deviation from materialism to idealism. Anybody who reads Anti-Dühring and Ludwig Feuerbach with the slightest care will find scores of instances when Engels speaks of things and their reflections in the human brain, in our consciousness, thought, etc. Engels does not say that sensations or ideas are "symbols" of things, for consistent materialism must here use "image," picture, or reflection instead of "symbol," as we shall show in detail in the proper place. But the question here is not of this or

elements, it is impossible to imagine (ist keine Möglichkeit abzusehen ) how any psychical experience can be composed (darstellen ) of the elements employed in modern physics, i.e., mass and motion (in their rigidity -- Starrheit -- which is serviceable only for this special science)."[*]

    Of the rigidity of the conceptions of many modern scientists and of their metaphysical (in the Marxist sense of the term, i.e., anti-dialectical) views, Engels speaks repeatedly and very precisely. We shall see later that it was just on this point that Mach went astray, because he did not understand or did not know the relation between relativism and dialectics. But this is not what concerns us here. It is important for us here to note how glaringly Mach's idealism emerges, in spite of the confused -- ostensibly new -- terminology. There is no difficulty, you see, in constructing any physical element out of sensations, i.e., psychical elements! Oh yes, such constructions, of course, are not difficult, for they are purely verbal constructions, shallow scholasticism, serving as a loophole for fideism. It is not surprising after this that Mach dedicates his works to the immanentists; it is not surprising that the immanentists, who profess the most reactionary kind of philosophical idealism, welcome Mach with open arms. The "recent positivism" of Ernst Mach was only about two hundred years too late. Berkeley had already sufficiently shown that "out of sensations, i.e., psychical elements," nothing can be "built" except solipsism. As regards materialism, against which Mach here, too, sets up his own views, without frankly and explicitly naming the "enemy," we have already seen in the case of Diderot what the real views of the materialists are. These views do not consist in deriving sensation

begriff, 1891, Vorwort, S. ix [The Human Concept of the World, 1891, Foreword, p. ix]), but "the sterility of philosophical idealism compelled me to doubt the correctness of my previous path" (p. x). This idealist starting point of Avenarius' is universally acknowledged in philosophical literature. Of the French writers I shall refer to Cauwelaert, who says that Avenarius' philosophical standpoint in the Prolegomena [19] is "monistic idealism."[*] Of the German writers, I shall name Rudolf Willy, Avenarius' disciple, who says that "Avenarius in his youth -- and particularly in his work of 1876 -- was totally under the spell (ganz itn Banne ) of so-called epistemological idealism."[**]

    And, indeed, it would be ridiculous to deny the idealism in Avenarius' Prolegomena, where he explicitly states that "only sensation can be thought of as the existing " (pp. 10 and 65 of the second German edition; all italics in quotations are ours). This is how Avenarius himself presents the contents of § 116 of his work. Here is the paragraph in full: "We have recognised that the existing (das Seiende ) is substance endowed with sensation; the substance falls away [it is "more economical," don't you see, there is "a lesser expenditure of effort" in thinking that there is no "substance" and that no external world exists!], sensation remains; we must then regard the existing as sensation, at the basis of which there is nothing which does not possess sensation (nichts Empfindungsloses )."

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    Sensation, then, exists without "substance," i.e., thought exists without brain! Are there really philosophers capable of defending this brainless philosophy? There are! Professor Richard Avenarius is one of them. And we must pause for a while to consider this defence, difficult though it be for a normal person to take it seriously. Here, in §§ 89 and 90 of this same work, is Avenarius' argument:

    ". . . The proposition that motion produces sensation is based on apparent experience only. This experience, which includes the act of perception, consists, presumably, in the fact that sensation is generated in a certain kind of substance (brain) as a result of transmitted motion (excitation) and with the help of other material conditions (e.g., blood). However -- apart from the fact that such generation has never itself (selbst ) been observed -- in order to construct the supposed experience, as an experience which is real in all its component parts, empirical proof, at least, is required to show that sensation, which assumedly is caused in a certain substance by transmitted motion, did not already exist in that substance in one way or another; so that the appearance of sensation cannot be conceived of in any other way than as a creative act on the part of the transmitted motion. Thus only by proving that where a sensation now appears there was none previously, not even a minimal one, would it be possible to establish a fact which, denoting as it does some act of creation, contradicts all the rest of experience and radically changes all the rest of our conception of nature (Naturanschauung ). But such proof is not furnished by any experience, and cannot be furnished by any experience; on the contrary, the notion of a state of a substance totally devoid of sensation which subsequently begins to experience sensation is only a hypothesis. But this hypothesis merely complicates and

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obscures our understanding instead of simplifying and clarifying it.

    "Should the so-called experience, viz., that the sensation is caused by a transmitted motion in a substance that begins to perceive from this moment, prove upon closer examination to be only apparent, there still remains sufficient material in the content of the experience to ascertain at least the relative origin of sensation from conditions of motion, namely, to ascertain that the sensation which is present, although latent or minimal, or for some other reason not manifest to the consciousness, becomes, owing to transmitted motion, released or enhanced or made manifest to the consciousness. However, even this bit of the remaining content of experience is only an appearance. Were we even by an ideal observation to trace the motion proceeding from the moving substance A, transmitted through a series of intermediate centres and reaching the substance B, which is endowed with sensation, we should at best find that sensation in substance B is developed or becomes enhanced simultaneously with the reception of the incoming motion -- but we should not find that this occurred as a consequence of the motion. . . ."

    We have purposely quoted this refutation of materialism by Avenarius in full, in order that the reader may see to what truly pitiful sophistries "recent" empirio-critical philosophy resorts. We shall compare with the argument of the idealist Avenarius the materialist argument of -- Bogdanov, if only to punish Bogdanov for his betrayal of materialism!

    In long bygone days, fully nine years ago, when Bogdanov was half "a natural-historical materialist" (that is, an adherent of the materialist theory of knowledge, to which the overwhelming majority of contemporary scientists instinctively hold), when he was only half led astray by the

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muddled Ostwald, he wrote: "From ancient times to the present day, descriptive psychology has adhered to the classification of the facts of consciousness into three categories: the domain of sensations and ideas, the domain of emotions and the domain of impulses. . . . To the first category belong the images of phenomena of the outer or inner world, as taken by themselves in consciousness. . . . Such an image is called a 'sensation' if it is directly produced through the sense-organs by its corresponding external phenomenon."[*] And a little farther on he says: "Sensation . . . arises in consciousness as a result of a certain impulse from the external environment transmitted by the external sense-organs" (p. 222). And further: "Sensation is the foundation of mental life; it is its immediate connection with the external world" (p. 240). "At each step in the process of sensation a transformation of the energy of external excitation into a state of consciousness takes place" (p. 133). And even in 1905 when with the gracious assistance of Ostwald and Mach Bogdanov had already abandoned the materialist standpoint in philosophy for the idealist standpoint, he wrote (from forgetfulness!) in his Empirio-Monism : "As is known, the energy of external excitation, transformed at the nerve-ends into a 'telegraphic' form of nerve current (still insufficiently investigated but devoid of all mysticism), first reaches the neurons that are located in the so-called 'lower' centres -- ganglial, cerebro-spinal, subcortical, etc." (Bk. I, 2nd ed., 1905, p. 118.)

    For every scientist who has not been led astray by professorial philosophy, as well as for every materialist, sensa-

    Mach explicitly declares his solidarity with the French physicists, Pierre Duhem and Henri Poincaré.[*] We shall have occasion to deal with the particularly confused and inconsistent philosophical views of these writers in the chapter on the new physics. Here we shall content ourselves with noting that for Poincaré things are "groups of sensations"[**] and that a similar view is casually expressed by Duhem.[***]

    We shall now proceed to examine how Mach and Avenarius, having admitted the idealist character of their original views, corrected them in their subsequent works.

    Such is the title under which Friedrich Adler, lecturer at the University of Zürich, probably the only German author also anxious to supplement Marx with Machism, writes of

Mach.[*] And this naïve university lecturer must be given his due: in his simplicity of heart he does Machism more harm than good. At least, he puts the question point-blank -- did Mach really "discover the world-elements"? If so, then, only very backward and ignorant people, of course, can still remain materialists. Or is this discovery a return on the part of Mach to the old philosophical errors?

    We saw that Mach in 1872 and Avenarius in 1876 held a purely idealist view; for them the world is our sensation. In 1883 Mach's Mechanik appeared, and in the preface to the first edition Mach refers to Avenarius' Prolegomena, and greets his ideas as being "very close" (sehr verwandte ) to his own philosophy. Here are the arguments in the Mechanik concerning the elements: "All natural science can only picture and represent (nachbilden und vorbilden ) complexes of those elements which we ordinarily call sensations. It is a matter of the connection of these elements. . . . The connection of A (heat) with B (flame) is a problem of physics, that of A and N (nerves) a problem of physiology. Neither exists separately; both exist in conjunction. Only temporarily can we neglect either. Even processcs that are apparently purely mechanical, are thus always physiological" (op. cit., German ed., p. 498). We find the same in the Analysis of Sensations : "Wherever . . . the terms 'sensation,' 'complex of sensations,' are used alongside of or in place of the terms 'element,' 'complex of elements,' it must be borne in mind

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that it is only in this connection [namely, in the connection of A, B, C with K, L, M, that is, in the connection of "complexes which we ordinarily call bodies" with "the complex which we call our body"] and relation, only in this functional dependence that the elements are sensations. In another functional dependence they are at the same time physical objects" (Russian translation, pp. 23 and 17). "A colour is a physical object when we consider its dependence, for instance, upon the source of illumination (other colours, temperatures, spaces and so forth). When we, however, consider its dependence upon the retina (the elements K, L, M), it is a psychological object, a sensation " (ibid., p. 24).

    Thus the discovery of the world-elements amounts to this:

    1) all that exists is declared to be sensation,

    2) sensations are called elements,

    3) elements are divided into the physical and the psychical; the latter is that which depends on the human nerves and the human organism generally; the former does not depend on them;

    4) the connection of physical elements and the connection of psychical elements, it is declared, do not exist separately from each other; they exist only in conjunction;

    5) it is possible only temporarily to leave one or the other connection out of account;

    6) the "new" theory is declared to be free from "one sidedness."*

    Indeed, it is not one-sidedness we have here, but an in coherent jumble of antithetical philosophical points of view.

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Since you base yourself only on sensations you do not correct the "one-sidedness" of your idealism by the term "element," but only confuse the issue and cravenly hide from your own theory. In a word, you eliminate the antithesis between the physical and psychical,[*] between materialism (which regards nature, matter, as primary) and idealism (which regards spirit, mind, sensation as primary); indeed, you promptly restore this antithesis; you restore it surreptitiously, retreating from your own fundamental premise! For, if elements are sensations, you have no right even for a moment to accept the existence of "elements" independently of my nerves and my mind. But if you do admit physical objects that are independent of my nerves and my sensations and that cause sensation only by acting upon my retina -- you are disgracefully abandoning your "one-sided" idealism and adopting the standpoint of "one-sided" materialism! If colour is a sensation only depending upon the retina (as natural science compels you to admit), then light rays, falling upon the retina, produce the sensation of colour. This means that outside us, independently of us and of our minds, there exists a movement of matter, let us say of ether waves of a definite length and of a definite velocity, which, acting upon the retina, produce in man the sensation of a particular colour. This is precisely how natural science regards it. It explains the sensations of various colours by the various lengths of light-waves existing outside the human retina, outside man and independently of him. This is

    Take Petzoldt, for instance, the last word in empirio-criti cism, as V. Lessevich, the first and most outstanding Russian

empirio-criticist describes him.[*] Having defined elements as sensations, he says in the second volume of the work mentioned: "In the statement that 'sensations are the elements of the world' one must guard against taking the term 'sensation' as denoting something only subjective and therefore ethereal, transforming the ordinary picture of the world into an illusion (Verflüchtigendes )."[**]

    One speaks of what hurts one most! Petzoldt feels that the world "evaporates" (verflüchtigt sich ), or becomes transformed into an illusion, when sensations are regarded as world-elements. And the good Petzoldt imagines that he helps matters by the reservation that sensation must not be taken as something only subjective! Is this not a ridiculous sophistry? Does it make any difference whether we "take" sensation as sensation or whether we try to stretch the meaning of the term? Does this do away with the fact that sensations in man are connected with normally functioning nerves, retina, brain, etc., that the external world exists independently of our sensations? If you are not trying to evade the issue by a subterfuge, if you are really in earnest in wanting to "guard" against subjectivism and solipsism, you must above all guard against the fundamental idealist premises of your philosophy; you must replace the idealist line of your philosophy (from sensations to the external world) by the materialist line (from the external world to sensations); you must abandon that empty and muddled verbal embellishment, "element," and simply say that colour is the result of the action of a physical object on the retina, which is the same

    Let us take Avenarius. The most valuable material on the question of the "elements" is to be found in his last work (and, it might be said, the most important for the comprehension of his philosophy), Notes on the Concept of the Subject of Psychology.[*] The author, by the way, here gives a very "graphic" table (Vol. XVIII, p. 410), the main part of which we reproduce here:

    Compare this with what Mach says after all his elucidation of the "elements" (Analysis of Sensations, p. 33): "It is not bodies that produce sensations, but complexes of elements (complexes of sensations) that make up bodies." Here you have the "discovery of the world-elements" that overcomes the one-sidedness of idealism and materialism! At first we are assured that the "elements" are something new, both physical and psychical at the same time; then a little correction is surreptitiously inserted: instead of the crude, materialist differentiation of matter (bodies, things) and the psychical (sensations, recollections, fantasies) we are presented with the doctrine of "recent positivism" regarding elements substantial and elements mental. Adler (Fritz) did not gain very much from "the discovery of the world-elements"!

    Bogdanov, arguing against Plekhanov in 1906, wrote: ". . . I cannot own myself a Machian in philosophy. In the

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general philosophical conception there is only one thing I borrowed from Mach -- the idea of the neutrality of the elements of experience in relation to the 'physical' and 'psychical,' and the dependence of these characteristics solely on the connection of experience." (Empirio-Monism, Bk. III, St. Petersburg, 1906, p. xli.) This is as though a religious man were to say -- I cannot own myself a believer in religion, for there is "only one thing" I have borrowed from the believers -- the belief in God. This "only one thing" which Bogdanov borrowed from Mach is the basic error of Machism, the basic falsity of its entire philosophy. Those deviations of Bogdanov's from empirio-criticism to which he himself attaches great significance are in fact of entirely secondary importance and amount to nothing more than inconsiderable private and individual differences between the various empirio-criticists who are approved by Mach and who approve Mach (we shall speak of this in greater detail later). Hence when Bogdanov was annoyed at being confused with the Machians he only revealed his failure to understand what radically distinguishes materialism from what is common to Bogdanov and to all other Machians. How Bogdanov developed, improved or worsened Machism is not important What is important is that he has abandoned the materialist standpoint and has thereby inevitably condemned himself to confusion and idealist aberrations.

    In 1899, as we saw, Bogdanov had the correct standpoint when he wrote: "The image of the man before me, directly given to me by vision, is a sensation."* Bogdanov did not trouble to give a criticism of this earlier position of his. He

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blindly believed Mach and began to repeat after him that the "elements" of experience are neutral in relation to the physical and psychical. "As has been established by recent positivist philosophy," wrote Bogdanov in Book I of Empirio-Monism (2nd ed., p. 90), "the elements of psychical experience are identical with the elements of experience in general, as they are identical with the elements of physical experience." Or in 1906 (Bk. III, p. xx): "as to 'idealism,' can it be called idealism merely on the grounds that the elements of 'physical experience' are regarded as identical with the elements of 'psychical experience,' or with elementary sensations -- when this is simply an indubitable fact?"

    Here we have the true source of all Bogdanov's philosophical misadventures, a source which he shares with the rest of the Machians. We can and must call it idealism when "the elements of physical experience" (i.e., the physical, the external world, matter) are regarded as identical with sensations, for this is sheer Berkeleianism. There is not a trace here of recent philosophy, or positivist philosophy, or of indubitable fact. It is merely an old, old idealist sophism. And were one to ask Bogdanov how he would prove the "indubitable fact" that the physical is identical with sensations, one would get no other argument save the eternal refrain of the idealists: I am aware only of my sensations; the "testimony of self-consciousness" (die Aussage des Selbstbewusstseins ) of Avenarius in his Prolegomena (2nd German ed., § 93, p. 56); or: "in our experience [which testifies that "we are sentient substance"] sensation is given us with more certainty than is substantiality" (ibid., § 91, p. 55), and so on and so forth. Bogdanov (trusting Mach) accepted a reactionary philosophical trick as an "indubitable fact." For, indeed, not a single fact was or could be cited which would refute the

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view that sensation is an image of the external world -- a view which was shared by Bogdanov in 1899 and which is shared by natural science to this day. In his philosophical wanderings the physicist Mach has completely strayed from the path of "modern science." Regarding this important circumstance, which Bogdanov overlooked, we shall have much to say later.

    One of the circumstances which helped Bogdanov to jump so quickly from the materialism of the natural scientists to the muddled idealism of Mach was (apart from the influence of Ostwald) Avenarius' doctrine of the dependent and independent series of experience. Bogdanov himself expounds the matter in Book I of his Empirio-Monism thus: "In so far as the data of experience appear in dependence upon the state of the particular nervous system, they form the psychical world of the particular person, in so far as the data of experience are taken outside of such a dependence, we have before us the physical world. Avenarius therefore characterises these two realms of experience respectively as the dependent series and the independent series of experience" (p. 18).

    That is just the whole trouble, the doctrine of the independent (i.e., independent of human sensation) "series" is a surreptitious importation of materialism, which, from the standpoint of a philosophy that maintains that bodies are complexes of sensations, that sensations are "identical" with physical "elements," is illegitimate, arbitrary, and eclectic. For once you have recognised that the source of light and light-waves exists independently of man and the human consciousness, that colour is dependent on the action of these waves upon the retina, you have in fact adopted the materialist standpoint and have completely destroyed all the "indubitable facts" of idealism, together with all "the complexes of

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sensations," the elements discovered by recent positivism, and similar nonsense.

    That is just the whole trouble. Bogdanov (like the rest of the Russian Machians) has never looked into the idealist views originally held by Mach and Avenarius, has never understood their fundamental idealist premises, and has therefore failed to discover the illegitimacy and eclecticism of their subsequent attempts to smuggle in materialism surreptitiously. Yet, just as the initial idealism of Mach and Avenarius is generally acknowledged in philosophical literature, so is it generally acknowledged that subsequently empirio-criticism endeavoured to swing towards materialism. Cauwelaert, the French writer quoted above, asserts that Avenarius' Prolegomena is "monistic idealism," the Critique of Pure Experience (1888-90) is "absolute realism," while The Human Concept of the World (1891) is an attempt "to explain" the change. Let us note that the term realism is here employed as the antithesis of idealism. Following Engels, I use only the term materialism in this sense, and consider it the sole correct terminology, especially since the term "realism" has been bedraggled by the positivists and the other muddleheads who oscillate between materialism and idealism. For the present it will suffice to note that Cauwelaert had the indisputable fact in mind that in the Prolegomena (1876) sensation, accord ing to Avenarius, is the only entity, while "substance" -- in accordance with the principle of "the economy of thought"! -- is eliminated, and that in the Critique of Pure Experience the physical is taken as the independent series, while the psychical and, consequently, sensations, are taken as the dependent series.

    Avenarius' disciple Rudolf Willy likewise admits that Avenarius was a "complete" idealist in 1876, but subsequently

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"reconciled" (Ausgleich ) "naïve realism" (i.e., the instinctive, unconscious materialist standpoint adopted by humanity, which regards the external world as existing independently of our minds) with this teaching (loc. cit.).

    Oskar Ewald, the author of the book Avenarius as the Founder of Empirio-Criticism, says that this philosophy combines contradictory idealist and "realist" (he should have said materialist) elements (not in Mach's sense, but in the human sense of the term element). For example, "the absolute [method of consideration] would perpetuate naïve realism, the relative would declare exclusive idealism as permanent."[*] Avenarius calls the absolute method of consideration that which corresponds to Mach's connection of "elements" outside our body, and the relative that which corresponds to Mach's connection of "elements" dependent on our body.

    But of particular interest to us in this respect is the opinion of Wundt, who himself, like the majority of the above mentioned writers, adheres to the confused idealist standpoint, but who has analysed empirio-criticism perhaps more attentively than all the others. P. Yushkevich has the follow ing to say in this connection: "It is interesting to note that Wundt regards empirio-criticism as the most scientific form of the latest type of materialism,"** i.e., the type of those materialists who regard the spiritual as a function of corporeal processes (and whom -- we would add -- Wundt de-

fines as standing midway between Spinozism and absolute materialism).[*]

    True, this opinion of Wundt's is extremely interesting. But what is even more "interesting" is Mr. Yushkevich's attitude towards the books and articles on philosophy of which he treats. This is a typical example of the attitude of our Machians to such matters. Gogol's Petrushka[25] used to read and find it interesting that letters always combined to make words. Mr. Yushkevich read Wundt and found it "interesting" that Wundt accused Avenarius of materialism. If Wundt is wrong, why not refute him? If he is right, why not explain the antithesis between materialism and empirio-criticism? Mr. Yushkevich finds what the idealist Wundt says "interesting," but this Machian regards it as a waste of effort to endeavour to go to the root of the matter (probably on the principle of "the economy of thought"). . . .

    The point is that by informing the reader that Wundt accuses Avenarius of materialism, and by not informing him that Wundt regards some aspects of empirio-criticism as materialism and others as idealism and holds that the connection between the two is artificial, Yushkevich entirely distorted the matter. Either this gentleman absolutely does not understand what he reads, or he was prompted by a desire to indulge in false self-praise with the help of Wundt, as if to say: you see, the official professors regard us, too, as materialists, and not as muddleheads.

    The above-mentioned article by Wundt constitutes a large book (more than 300 pages), devoted to a detailed analysis first of the immanentist school, and then of the empirio-

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criticists. Why did Wundt connect these two schools? Because he considers them closely akin ; and this opinion, which is shared by Mach, Avenarius, Petzoldt and the immanentists is, as we shall see later, entirely correct. Wundt shows in the first part of this article that the immanentists are idealists, subjectivists and adherents of fideism. This, too, as we shall see later, is a perfectly correct opinion, although Wundt expounds it with a superfluous ballast of professorial erudition, with superfluous niceties and reservations, which is to be explained by the fact that Wundt himself is an idealist and fideist. He reproaches the immanentists not because they are idealists and adherents of fideism, but because, in his opinion, they arrive at these great principles by incorrect methods. Further, the second and third parts of Wundt's article are devoted to empirio-criticism. There he quite definitely points out that very important theoretical propositions of empirio-criticism (e.g., the interpretation of "experience" and the "principal co-ordination," of which we shall speak later) are identical with those held by the immanentists (die empiriokritische in Uebereinstimmung mit der immanenten Philosophie annimmt,[26] S. 382). Other of Avenarius' theoretical propositions are borrowed from materialism, and in general empirio-criticism is a "motley" (bunte Mischung, ibid., S. 57), in which the "various component elements are entirely heterogeneous" (an sich einander völlig heterogen sind, S. 56).

    Wundt regards Avenarius' doctrine of the "independent vital series," in particular, as one of the materialist morsels of the Avenarius-Mach hotchpotch. If you start from the "system C" (that is how Avenarius -- who was very fond of making erudite play of new terms -- designates the human brain or the nervous system in general), and if the mental is for you a function of the brain, then this "system C" is a

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"metaphysical substance" -- says Wundt (ibid., p. 64), and your doctrine is materialism. It should be said that many idealists and all agnostics (Kantians and Humeans included) call the materialists metaphysicians, because it seems to them that to recognise the existence of an external world independent of the human mind is to transcend the bounds of experience. Of this terminology and its utter incorrectness from the point of view of Marxism, we shall speak in its proper place. Here it is important to note that the recognition of the "independent" series by Avenarius (and also by Mach, who expresses the same idea in different words) is, according to the general opinion of philosophers of various parties, i.e., of various trends in philosophy, an appropriation from materialism. If you assume that everything that exists is sensation, or that bodies are complexes of sensations, you cannot, without violating all your fundamental premises, all "your" philosophy, arrive at the conclusion that the physical exists independently of our minds, and that sensation is a function of matter organised in a definite way. Mach and Avenarius, in their philosophy, combine fundamental idealist premises with individual materialist deductions for the very reason that their theory is an example of that "pauper's broth of eclecticism"[27] of which Engels speaks with just contempt.*

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    This eclecticism is particularly marked in Mach's latest philosophical work, Knowledge and Error, 2nd edition, 1906. We have already seen that Mach there declared that "there is no difficulty in constructing every physical element out of sensation, i.e., out of psychical elements," and in the same book we read: "Dependencies outside the boundary U [ = Umgrenzung, i.e., "the spatial boundary of our body," S. 8] are physics in the broadest sense" (S. 323, § 4). "To obtain those dependencies in a pure state (rein erhalten ) it is necessary as much as possible to eliminate the influence of the observer, that is, of those elements that lie within U" (loc. cit.). Well, well, the titmouse first promised to set the sea on fire[28]. . . i.e., to construct physical elements from psychical elements, and then it turns out that physical elements lie beyond the boundary of psychical elements, "which lie within our body"! A remarkable philosophy!

    Another example: "A perfect (vollkommenes ) gas, a perfect liquid, a perfect elastic body, does not exist; the physicist knows that his fictions only approximate to the facts and arbitrarily simplify them; he is aware of the divergence, which cannot be eliminated" (S. 418, § 30).

    What divergence (Abweichung) is meant here? The divergence of what from what? Of thought (physical theory) from the facts. And what are thoughts, ideas? Ideas are the "tracks of sensations" (S. 9). And what are facts? Facts are "complexcs of sensations." And so, the divergence of the tracks of sensations from complexes of sensations cannot be eliminated.

    What does this mean? It means that Mach forgets his own theory and, when treating of various problems of physics, speaks plainly, without idealist twists, i.e., materialistically. All the "complexes of sensations" and the entire stock of

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Berkeleian wisdom vanish. The physicists' theory proves to be a reflection of bodies, liquids, gases existing outside us and independently of us, a reflection which is, of course, approximate; but to call this approximation or simplification "arbitrary" is wrong. In fact, sensation is here regarded by Mach just as it is regarded by all science which has not been "purified" by the disciples of Berkeley and Hume, viz., as an image of the external world. Mach's own theory is subjective idealism; but when the factor of objectivity is required, Mach unceremoniously inserts into his arguments the premises of the contrary, i.e., the materialist, theory of knowledge. Eduard von Hartmann, a consistent idealist and consistent reactionary in philosophy, who sympathises with the Machians' fight against materialism, comes very close to the truth when he says that Mach's philosophical position is a "mixture (Nichtunterscheidung ) of naïve realism and absolute illusionism."[*] That is true. The doctrine that bodies are complexes of sensations, etc., is absolute illusionism, i.e., solipsism; for from this standpoint the world is nothing but my illusion. On the other hand, Mach's afore-mentioned argument, as well as many other of his fragmentary arguments, is what is known as "naïve realism," i.e., the materialist theory of knowledge unconsciously and instinctively taken over from the scientists.

    Avenarius and the professors who follow in his footsteps attempt to disguise this mixture by the theory of the "principal co-ordination." We shall proceed to examine this theory presently, but let us first finish with the charge that Avenarius is a materialist. Mr. Yushkevich, to whom Wundt's opinion which he failed to understand seemed so interesting, was

    Wundt was answered, among others, by two of Avenarius' purest and most orthodox disciples, J. Petzoldt and Fr. Carstanjen. Petzoldt, with haughty resentment, repudiated the charge of materialism, which is so degrading to a German professor, and in support referred to -- what do you think? -- Avenarius' Prolegomena, where, forsooth, the concept of substance has been annihilated! A convenient theory, indeed, that can be made to embrace both purely idealist works and arbitrarily assumed materialist premises! Avenarius' Critique of Pure Experience, of course, does not contradict this teaching, i.e., materialism, writes Petzoldt, but neither does it contradict the directly opposite spiritualist doctrine.* An excellent defence! This is exactly what Engels called "a pauper's broth of eclecticism." Bogdanov, who refuses to own himself a Machian and who wants to be considered a Marxist (in philosophy ), follows Petzoldt. He asserts that "empirio-criticism is not . . . concerned with materialism, or with spiritualism, or with metaphysics in general,"** that

"truth . . . does not lie in the 'golden mean' between the conflicting trends [materialism and spiritualism], but lies out side of both."[*] What appeared to Bogdanov to be truth is, as a matter of fact, confusion, a wavering between materialism and idealism.

    Carstanjen, rebutting Wundt, said that he absolutely repudiated this "importation (Unterschiebung) of a materialist element" which is utterly foreign to the critique of pure experience."[**] "Empirio-criticism is scepticism [followed by the word written in Greek. -- DJR] (pre-eminently) in relation to the content of the concepts." There is a grain of truth in this insistent emphasis on the neutrality of Machism; the amendment made by Mach and Avenarius to their original idealism amounts to partial concessions to materialism. Instead of the consistent standpoint of Berkeley -- the external world is my sensation -- we some times get the Humean standpoint -- I exclude the question whether or not there is anything beyond my sensations. And this agnostic standpoint inevitably condemns one to vacillate between materialism and idealism.

    Avenarius' doctrine of the principal co-ordination is expounded in The Human Concept of the World and in the