What does the Communist Manifesto mean by the statement that the bourgeoisie has forged the weapons that will be used against it?

Marx means that the bourgeoisie, the owners of the means of production, have created a weapon by exploiting the proletariat, who are the masses of people who work for a living. The owners have paid the workers low wages and forced them to endure poor working conditions. The bourgeoisie do this so they can collect the profit the proletariat's labor produces. The proletariat will become a "weapon" when they rise against their masters. First, since...

Marx means that the bourgeoisie, the owners of the means of production, have created a weapon by exploiting the proletariat, who are the masses of people who work for a living. The owners have paid the workers low wages and forced them to endure poor working conditions. The bourgeoisie do this so they can collect the profit the proletariat's labor produces. The proletariat will become a "weapon" when they rise against their masters. First, since there will always be more people in the proletariat than in the upper classes, the proletariat (often called "the masses") will have numbers on their side. Eventually, Marx argues, these people will be politicized and recognize they "have nothing to lose but their chains," as he says later in this work. Once the workers recognize that their labor creates all the wealth in society and that they greatly outnumber their masters, they will rise up in revolution against the bourgeoisie and take over the means of production for their own benefit.