《恩格斯致符·博尔吉乌斯》（节选）

【导读】

十九世纪后期，资产阶级学者和德国党内的机会主义者大肆歪曲、攻击和篡改马克思主义唯物史观，给德国的大学生造成了极大的思想混乱。不少人写信向恩格斯请教，大学生博尔吉乌斯就是其中之一。恩格斯在1894年1月25日的复信中, 针对他提出的间题，以丰富的历史材料和精深的理论分析，论述了经济关系是社会发展的决定性易础，并就伟大人物的出现和唯物史观的产生，进一步阐述了历史发展的经济必然性和偶然性的关系。

【箴言】

假如没有拿破仑这个人，他的角色就会由另一个人来扮演。

我们所研究的领域越是远离经济，越是接近纯粹抽象的意识形态，我们在这个领域的发展中所发现的偶然现象就越多，它的曲线就越是曲折。如果您划出曲线的中轴线，您就会发现，所考察的时期越长，所考察的范围越广，这个轴线同经济发展的轴线就越接近于平行。

【正文】

如果像您所说的，技术在很大程度上依赖于科学状况，那么科学却在更大得多的程度上依赖于技术的状况和需要。社会一旦有技术上的需要，这种需要就会比十所大学更能把科学推向前进。整个流体静力学（托里拆利等）是由于16世纪和17世纪意大利治理山区河流的需要而产生的。关于电，只是在发现它在技术上的实用价值以后，我们才知道了一些理性的东西。在德国，可惜人们撰写科学史时习惯于把科学看作是从天上掉下来的。

人们自己创造自己的历史，但是迄今为止，他们并不是按照共同的意志，根据一个共同的计划，甚至不是在一个具有明确界限的既定社会内来创造自己的历史。人们的意向是相互交错的，正因为如此，在社会中占据统治地位的必然性都是以偶然性为其补充和表现形式的。在这里通过各种偶然性而得到实现的必然性，归根到底仍然是经济的必然性。这里我们就来谈谈所谓伟大人物问题。恰巧某个伟大人物在一定时间出现于某一国家，这当然纯粹是一种偶然现象。但是，如果我们把这个人去掉，那时就会需要有另外一个人来代替他，并且这个代替者是会出现的，不论好一些或差一些，但是最终总是会出现的。

恰巧拿破仑这个科西嘉人做了被本身的战争弄得精疲力竭的法兰西共和国所需要的军事独裁者，这是个偶然现象。但是，假如没有拿破仑这个人，他的角色就会由另一个人来扮演。这一点可以由下面的事实来证明：每当需要有这样一个人的时候，他就会出现，如凯撒、奥古斯都、克伦威尔等等。如果说马克思发现了唯物史观，那么梯叶里、米涅、基佐以及1850年以前英国所有的历史编纂学家则表明，人们已经在这方面作过努力，而摩尔根对于同一观点的发现表明，发现这一观点的时机已经成熟了，这一观点必定被发现。

历史上所有其他的偶然现象和表面的偶然现象都是如此。我们所研究的领域越是远离经济，越是接近纯粹抽象的意识形态，我们在这个领域的发展中所发现的偶然现象就越多，它的曲线就越是曲折。如果您划出曲线的中轴线，您就会发现，所考察的时期越长，所考察的范围越广，这个轴线同经济发展的轴线就越接近于平行。

英文鉴赏

If, as you say, technique largely depends on the state of science, science depends far more still on the state and the requirements of technique. If society has a technical need, that helps science forward more than ten universities. The whole of hydrostatics (Torricelli, etc.) was called forth by the necessity for regulating the mountain streams of Italy in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. We have only known anything reasonable about electricity since its technical applicability was discovered. But unfortunately it has become the custom in Germany to write the history of the sciences as if they had fallen from the skies.

Men make their history themselves, but not as yet with a collective will or according to a collective plan or even in a definitely defined, given society. Their efforts clash, and for that very reason all such societies are governed by necessity, which is supplemented by and appears under the forms of accident. The necessity which here asserts itself amidst all accident is again ultimately economic necessity.

This is where the so-called great men come in for treatment. That such and such a man and precisely that man arises at that particular time in that given country is of course pure accident. But cut him out and there will be a demand for a substitute, and this substitute will be found, good or bad, but in the long run he will be found.

That Napoleon, just that particular Corsican, should have been the military dictator whom the French Republic, exhausted by its own war, had rendered necessary, was an accident; but that, if a Napoleon had been lacking, another would have filled the place, is proved by the fact that the man has always been found as soon as he became necessary: Caesar, Augustus, Cromwell, etc.(1)While Marx discovered the materialist conception of history, Thierry, Mignet, Guizot, and all the English historians up to 1850 are the proof that it was being striven for, and the discovery of the same conception by Morgan proves that the time was ripe for it and that indeed it had to be discovered.

So with all the other accidents, and apparent accidents, of history. The further the particular sphere which we are investigating is removed from the economic sphere and approaches that of pure abstract ideology, the more shall we find it exhibiting accidents in its development, the more will its curve run in a zig-zag. (2)So also you will find that the axis of this curve will approach more and more nearly parallel to the axis of the curve of economic development the longer the period considered and the wider the field dealt with.