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Marxism, a political and economic theory developed by Karl Marx, has left a significant impact on world history and society.

Whether you’re familiar with Marxist ideas or just curious, this collection of quotes will give you a glimpse into the principles that shaped many political movements and ideologies.

You’ll find these quotes to be insightful, powerful, and sometimes surprising. And as you read, you may find yourself reflecting on how these ideas connect to your own thoughts and experiences.

Let us have look at 51 best Marxism quotes.

51 Marxism quotes

1. “Workers of the world unite; you have nothing to lose but your chains.”

2. “The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles.”

3. “The philosophers have only interpreted the world in various ways; the point, however, is to change it.”

4. “The ruling ideas of each age have ever been the ideas of its ruling class.”

5. “Social progress can be measured by the social position of the female sex.”

6. “The worker becomes all the poorer the more wealth he produces.”

7. “From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs.”

8. “Capital is dead labor, which, vampire-like, lives only by sucking living labor.”

9. “Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions.”

10. “Democracy is the road to socialism.”

11. “The production of too many useful things results in too many useless people.”

12. “Revolutions are the locomotives of history.”

13. “The theory of Communism may be summed up in one sentence: Abolish all private property.”

14. “Reason has always existed, but not always in a reasonable form.”

15. “Necessity is blind until it becomes conscious. Freedom is the consciousness of necessity.”

16. “The last capitalist we hang shall be the one who sold us the rope.”

17. “The rich will do anything for the poor but get off their backs.”

18. “Society does not consist of individuals but expresses the sum of interrelations, the relations within which these individuals stand.”

19. “Landlords, like all other men, love to reap where they never sowed.”

20. “The advance of capitalist production develops a working class which by education, tradition, and habit looks upon the conditions of that mode of production as self-evident laws of Nature.”

21. “Every emancipation is a restoration of the human world and of human relationships to man himself.”

22. “Political power, properly so called, is merely the organized power of one class for oppressing another.”

23. “Revolutions are not made by men in spectacles.”

24. “Capitalist production develops technology and the combining together of various processes into a social whole, only by sapping the original sources of all wealth – the soil and the worker.”

25. “In proportion, therefore, as the repulsiveness of the work increases, the wage decreases.”

26. “The more the division of labor and the application of machinery extend, the more does competition extend among the workers, the more do their wages shrink together.”

27. “History repeats itself, first as tragedy, second as farce.”

28. “Religion is the opium of the people.”

29. “Labour cannot emancipate itself in the white skin where in the black it is branded.”

30. “The education of all children, from the moment that they can get along without a mother’s care, shall be in state institutions.”

31. “Let the ruling classes tremble at a communist revolution. The proletarians have nothing to lose but their chains.”

32. “The only antidote to mental suffering is physical pain.”

33. “Freedom consists in converting the state from an organ superimposed upon society into one completely subordinate to it.”

34. “A spectre is haunting Europe – the spectre of communism.”

35. “The human being is in the most literal sense a political animal, not merely a gregarious animal, but an animal which can individuate itself only in the midst of society.”

36. “Men make their own history, but they do not make it just as they please.”

37. “Machines were, it may be said, the weapons employed by the capitalists to quell the revolt of specialized labor.”

38. “Reason has always existed, only not always in a reasonable form.”

39. “We should not say that one man’s hour is worth another man’s hour, but rather that one man during an hour is worth just as much as another man during an hour.”

40. “Capital is money, capital is commodities.”

41. “The proletariat, the lowest stratum of our present society, cannot stir, cannot raise itself up, without the whole superincumbent strata of official society being sprung into the air.”

42. “Under no pretext should arms and ammunition be surrendered; any attempt to disarm the workers must be frustrated, by force if necessary.”

43. “History is nothing but the actions of men in pursuit of their ends.”

44. “The bourgeoisie is unfit to rule because it has allowed itself to be exploited by the proletariat.”

45. “Communism is the riddle of history solved, and it knows itself to be this solution.”

46. “What the bourgeoisie, therefore, produces, above all, are its own grave-diggers.”

47. “The worker is depressed, therefore, both intellectually and physically to the level of a machine.”

48. “The demand to give up the illusions about its condition is the demand to give up a condition which needs illusions.”

49. “The state is the form in which the individuals of a ruling class assert their common interests.”

50. “The free development of each is the condition for the free development of all.”

51. “In bourgeois society capital is independent and has individuality, while the living person is dependent and has no individuality.”

Conclusion

As you can see, Marxism offers a deep and critical view of society, class struggle, and the power dynamics that shape the world.

These 51 Marxism quotes capture the essence of Marxist theory in a way that makes you think about your role within the system. Hopefully, these Marxism quotes sparked some thoughts in your mind, and who knows, you might even share a few with friends.

Whether you’re familiar with Marxist ideas or you’re just beginning to explore them, these quotes remind you that change often begins with understanding.

Feel free to reflect on them and maybe, just maybe, they’ll influence how you see the world around you.

Also read – 51 powerful Sun Tzu quotes!