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Trotsky as moral and prophetic natures. He is anxious to find a
moral basis for socialism and for this reason gives so much im·
portance to Marx as a moralist. As we have seen already, he looks
on Marx as a moral genius and with doubtful science derives his
moral insight and "world vision" from his Jewish ancestry. He
believes that in bringing moral concepts into economics, Marx
performed a great service, at least he did something of value to
his time. But in another place he regards it as a basic inconsistency
that Marx criticizes capitalism for the misery it produces and yet
speaks of this system as historically necessary; he thinks it is wrong
to mix science and moral observations. In an early writing, Marx
had anticipated Wilson's objection; speaking of Mandeville's proof
that the vices were indispensable for the maintenance of capital·
ism, Marx added: This was no apology for capitalism. We believe
that automobiles are necessary and we can predict the frequency of
accidents, but we are not therefore inconsistent in deploring acci·
dents and in trying to regulate traffic. But even the grounds on
which Wilson presents the moral criticism in
Capital
as a value
are obscure or inconsistent with his other views about morality.
For although he recognizes that the labor theories of value and
surplus value were framed in order to reveal the hidden relations
of capitalist and worker in the division of the total social product,
he rejects these theories as unscientific and metaphysical because
they are formulated from the viewpoint of a group interest and
because (like the marginal utility theory) they do not account for
particular prices (a function that neither the Marxist nor the mar·
ginal utility theory was designed to perform) . What then is the
value of the moral element that Marx introduced into economics?
It lies
in
the fact, apparently, that in analyzing economic processes,
Marx is arguing in behalf of "basic human rights." These vague,
unspecified rights are the "real bottom" of Marxism, according to
Wilson. But they can never be "ultimately proved," and hence
have to be defended or preached by an appeal to the feelings, by
what Wilson calls "moral and emotional methods." Values, it
seems, can only be conveyed irrationally. We are led to the con·
elusion that the scientific and theoretical parts of
Capital,
by
which Marx tries to explain why capitalism leaves so many in
want, are in error and without value because they are directed by
moral assumptions, whereas the great value of the book lies in the
