(again from the book Democracy in America) Written between, I believe, 1830 and 1850. It is a French aristocrat who travels to America to understand their Democracy better.
“Despotism, by its very nature suspicious, sees the isolation of men as the best guarantee of its own permanence. So it usually does all it can to isolate them. Of all the vices of the human heart egoism is that which suits it best. A despot will lightly forgive his subjects for not loving him, provided they do not love one another…he calls those who try to unite their effort to create a general prosperity ‘turbulent and restless spirits’, and twisting the natural meaning of words, he calls those ‘good citizens’ who care for none but themselves.” pg. 509
“Liberty engenders particular hatreds, but despotism is responsible for general indifference.” pg. 510
“Americans cleave to the things of this world as if assured that they will never die, and yet are in such a rush to snatch any that come within their reach, as if expecting to stop living before they have relished them. They clutch everything but hold nothing fast, and so lose grip as they hurry after some new delight” pg. 536
“Death steps in in the end and stops him before he has grown tired of this futile pursuit of that complete felicity which always escapes him” pg. 536
“The taste for physical pleaures must be regarded a the first cause of this secret restlessness” pg. 536
“Those whose passions are bent on physical pleasures are eager in their desires, they are also easily discouraged. For as their ultimate object is enjoyment, the means to it must be prompt and easy.” pg. 537
“But men will never establish an equality which will content them” pg. 537
“When everything is more or less level, the slightest variation is noticed. Hence the more equal men are, the more insatiable will be their longing for equality” pg. 538
“In democratic times enjoyments are more lively than in times of aristocracy, and more especially, immeasurably greater numbers taste them. But, on the other hand, one must admit that hopes and desires are much more often disappointed, minds are more anxious and on edge, and trouble is felt more keenly.” pg. 538
“When a workman is constantly and exclusively engaged in making one object, he ends by performing this work with singular dexterity. But at the same time, he loses the general faculty of applying his mind to the way he is working. Every day he becomes more adroit and less industrious, and one may say that in his case the man is degraded as the workman improves.” pg. 555
TITLE OF CHAPTER 20 “How an aristocracy may be created by industry” pg. 555
“Each occupies a place made for him, from which he does not move. One is in a state of constant, narrow, and necessary dependence on the other and seems to have been born to obey, as the other was to command. What is this, if not an aristocracy?” pg. 556 (by each he is referring to workers and owners of a company)
“In any event, the friends of democracy should keep their eyes anxiously fixed in that direction. For if ever again permanent inequality of conditions and aristocracy make their way into the world, it will have been by that door that they entered” pg. 558 (speaking of industry)
“Men living in democratic times have many passions, but most of these culminate in love of wealth or derive from it” pg. 614
“The prospect really does frighten me that they may finally become so engrossed in a cowardly love of immediate pleasures that their interest in their own future and in that of their descendants may vanish, and that they will prefer tamely to follow the course of their destiny rather than make a sudden energetic effort necessary to set things right” pg. 645
“There are two things that will always be very difficult for a democratic nation: to start a war and to end it” pg. 649
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