He was too petty himself to attain the stature of this kind of evil,
Actually, we do not agree. You used the words, “personally evil.”
I have researched the man several times over the years. I do consider him evil on a personal level - but not on a trans-personal level. (He died before that ambition could be realized.) Many petty criminals are evil on a personal level.
The trans-personal - societal, cultural - evil resulted from his books, which were an extrapolation of his personal evil on a darkly grand scale.
If I had exploited my father and friend, Engels, as Marx did, and abused my chambermaid, as Marx did, and done the other things he reputedly did, then those of my family and friends would rightly call me “personally evil.”
Francis Wheen in particular exposed the man for the fraud he was. A good and kind man Karl Marx was not.