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Title: Democracy in America — Volume 2

Author: Alexis de Tocqueville

Translator: Henry Reeve

Release date: January 21, 2006 [eBook #816]
Most recently updated: March 21, 2013

Language: English

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/816

Credits: Produced by David Reed and David Widger

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK DEMOCRACY
IN AMERICA — VOLUME 2 ***

DEMOCRACY IN AMERICA

By Alexis De Tocqueville

Translated by Henry Reeve

Volume II.

CONTENTS

Book Two: Influence Of Democracy On Progress
Of Opinion

De Tocqueville's Preface To The Second Part

Section I: Influence of Democracy on the Action
of Intellect
Chapter I: Philosophical Method Among the
Americans

Chapter II: Of The Principal Source Of Belief
Among Democratic Nations
Chapter III: Why The Americans Display More
Readiness And More Taste
Chapter IV: Why The Americans Have Never Been
So Eager As The French
Chapter V: Of The Manner In Which Religion In
The United States Avails
Chapter VI: Of The Progress Of Roman
Catholicism In The United States
Chapter VII: Of The Cause Of A Leaning To
Pantheism
Chapter VIII: The Principle Of Equality Suggests
To The Americans
Chapter IX: The Example Of The Americans Does
Not Prove
Chapter X: Why The Americans Are More Addicted
To Practical
Chapter XI: Of The Spirit In Which The Americans
Cultivate The Arts
Chapter XII: Why The Americans Raise Some
Monuments So Insignificant
Chapter XIII: Literary Characteristics Of
Democratic Ages
Chapter XIV: The Trade Of Literature
Chapter XV: The Study Of Greek And Latin
Literature Peculiarly Useful

Chapter XVI: The Effect Of Democracy On
Language
Chapter XVII: Of Some Of The Sources Of Poetry
Chapter XVIII: Of The Inflated Style Of American
Writers And Orators
Chapter XIX: Some Observations On The Drama
Chapter XX: Characteristics Of Historians In
Democratic Ages
Chapter XXI: Of Parliamentary Eloquence In The
United States

Section 2: Influence of Democracy on the
Feelings of Americans
Chapter I: Why Democratic Nations Show A More
Ardent And Enduring Love
Chapter II: Of Individualism In Democratic
Countries
Chapter III: Individualism Stronger
Chapter IV: That The Americans Combat The
Effects Of Individualism
Chapter V: Of The Use Which The Americans Make
Of Public Associations
Chapter VI: Of The Relation Between Public
Associations And Newspapers
Chapter VII: Connection Of Civil And Political
Associations
Chapter VIII: The Americans Combat Individualism

Chapter IX: That The Americans Apply The
Principle Of Interest Rightly
Chapter X: Of The Taste For Physical Well-Being In
America
Chapter XI: Peculiar Effects Of The Love Of
Physical Gratifications
Chapter XII: Causes Of Fanatical Enthusiasm In
Some Americans
Chapter XIII: Causes Of The Restless Spirit Of
Americans
Chapter XIV: Taste For Physical Gratifications
United In America
Chapter XV: That Religious Belief Sometimes Turns
The Thoughts
Chapter XVI: That Excessive Care Of Worldly
Welfare
Chapter XVII: That In Times Marked By Equality
Of Conditions
Chapter XVIII: That Amongst The Americans All
Honest Callings
Chapter XIX: That Almost All The Americans
Follow Industrial Callings
Chapter XX: That Aristocracy May Be Engendered
By Manufactures

Book Three: Influence Of Democracy On
Manners, Properly So Called

Chapter I: That Manners Are Softened As Social
Conditions Become
Chapter II: That Democracy Renders The Habitual
Intercourse
Chapter III: Why The Americans Show So Little
Sensitiveness
Chapter IV: Consequences Of The Three Preceding
Chapters
Chapter V: How Democracy Affects the Relation Of
Masters And Servants
Chapter VI: That Democratic Institutions And
Manners Tend To Raise Rents
Chapter VII: Influence Of Democracy On Wages
Chapter VIII: Influence Of Democracy On Kindred
Chapter IX: Education Of Young Women In The
United States
Chapter X: The Young Woman In The Character Of
A Wife
Chapter XI: That The Equality Of Conditions
Contributes
Chapter XII: How The Americans Understand The
Equality Of The Sexes
Chapter XIII: That The Principle Of Equality
Naturally Divides
Chapter XIV: Some Reflections On American
Manners
Chapter XV: Of The Gravity Of The Americans

Chapter XVI: Why The National Vanity Of The
Americans Is More Restless
Chapter XVII: That The Aspect Of Society In The
United States
Chapter XVIII: Of Honor In The United States And
In Democratic
Chapter XIX: Why So Many Ambitious Men And So
Little Lofty Ambition
Chapter XX: The Trade Of Place-Hunting In
Certain Democratic Countries
Chapter XXI: Why Great Revolutions Will Become
More Rare
Chapter XXII: Why Democratic Nations Are
Naturally Desirous Of Peace
Chapter XXIII: Which Is The Most Warlike And
Most Revolutionary Class
Chapter XXIV: Causes Which Render Democratic
Armies Weaker
Chapter XXV: Of Discipline In Democratic Armies
Chapter XXVI: Some Considerations On War In
Democratic Communities

Book Four: Influence Of Democratic Opinions
On Political Society
Chapter I: That Equality Naturally Gives Men A
Taste For Freedom
Chapter II: That The Notions Of Democratic
Nations On Government

Chapter III: That The Sentiments Of Democratic
Nations Accord
Chapter IV: Of Certain Peculiar And Accidental
Causes
Chapter V: That Amongst The European Nations Of
Our Time
Chapter VI: What Sort Of Despotism Democratic
Nations Have To Fear
Chapter VII: Continuation Of The Preceding
Chapters
Chapter VIII: General Survey Of The Subject

Appendix to Parts I. and II.

Part I.
Appendix A
Appendix B
Appendix C
Appendix D
Appendix E
Appendix F

Part II.
Appendix G
Appendix H

Appendix I
Appendix K
Appendix L
Appendix M
Appendix N
Appendix O
Appendix P
Appendix Q
Appendix R
Appendix S
Appendix T
Appendix U
Appendix V
Appendix W
Appendix X
Appendix Y
Appendix Z

Constitution Of The United States Of America
Article I
Section 1. All legislative Powers herein granted
shall be vested
Section 2. The House of Representatives shall be
composed

Section 3. The Senate of the United States shall be
composed
Section 4. The Times, Places and Manner of holding
Elections
Section 5. Each House shall be the Judge of the
Elections
Section 6. The Senators and Representatives shall
receive a Compensation
Section 7. All Bills for Raising Revenue shall
originate in the House
Section 8. The Congress shall have Power to lay
and collect Taxes
Section 9. The Migration or Importation of such
Persons
Section 10. No State shall enter into any Treaty,
Alliance
Article II
Section 1. The Executive Power shall be vested in a
President
Section 2. The President shall be Commander in
Chief of the Army
Section 3. He shall from time to time give to the
Congress Information
Section 4. The President, Vice-President and all
civil Officers
Article III
Section 1. The judicial Power of the United States
shall be vested

Section 2. The judicial Power shall extend to all
cases
Section 3. Treason against the United States shall
consist
Article IV
Section 1. Full Faith and Credit shall be given in
each State
Section 2. The Citizens of each State shall be
entitled
Section 3. New States may be admitted by the
Congress into this Union
Section 4. The United States shall guarantee to
every State
Article V
Article VI
Article VII

Bill Of Rights

Book Two: Influence Of Democracy On Progress
Of Opinion in The United States

De Tocqueville's Preface To The Second Part
The Americans live in a democratic state of society, which has naturally
suggested to them certain laws and a certain political character. This same
state of society has, moreover, engendered amongst them a multitude of
feelings and opinions which were unknown amongst the elder aristocratic
communities of Europe: it has destroyed or modified all the relations which
before existed, and established others of a novel kind. The—aspect of civil
society has been no less affected by these changes than that of the political
world. The former subject has been treated of in the work on the
Democracy of America, which I published five years ago; to examine the
latter is the object of the present book; but these two parts complete each
other, and form one and the same work.
I must at once warn the reader against an error which would be extremely
prejudicial to me. When he finds that I attribute so many different
consequences to the principle of equality, he may thence infer that I
consider that principle to be the sole cause of all that takes place in the
present age: but this would be to impute to me a very narrow view. A
multitude of opinions, feelings, and propensities are now in existence,
which owe their origin to circumstances unconnected with or even contrary
to the principle of equality. Thus if I were to select the United States as an
example, I could easily prove that the nature of the country, the origin of its
inhabitants, the religion of its founders, their acquired knowledge, and their
former habits, have exercised, and still exercise, independently of
democracy, a vast influence upon the thoughts and feelings of that people.
Different causes, but no less distinct from the circumstance of the equality
of conditions, might be traced in Europe, and would explain a great portion
of the occurrences taking place amongst us.
I acknowledge the existence of all these different causes, and their power,
but my subject does not lead me to treat of them. I have not undertaken to
unfold the reason of all our inclinations and all our notions: my only object
is to show in what respects the principle of equality has modified both the
former and the latter.

Some readers may perhaps be astonished that—firmly persuaded as I am
that the democratic revolution which we are witnessing is an irresistible fact
against which it would be neither desirable nor wise to struggle—I should
often have had occasion in this book to address language of such severity to
those democratic communities which this revolution has brought into being.
My answer is simply, that it is because I am not an adversary of democracy,
that I have sought to speak of democracy in all sincerity.
Men will not accept truth at the hands of their enemies, and truth is
seldom offered to them by their friends: for this reason I have spoken it. I
was persuaded that many would take upon themselves to announce the new
blessings which the principle of equality promises to mankind, but that few
would dare to point out from afar the dangers with which it threatens them.
To those perils therefore I have turned my chief attention, and believing that
I had discovered them clearly, I have not had the cowardice to leave them
untold.
I trust that my readers will find in this Second Part that impartiality
which seems to have been remarked in the former work. Placed as I am in
the midst of the conflicting opinions between which we are divided, I have
endeavored to suppress within me for a time the favorable sympathies or
the adverse emotions with which each of them inspires me. If those who
read this book can find a single sentence intended to flatter any of the great
parties which have agitated my country, or any of those petty factions which
now harass and weaken it, let such readers raise their voices to accuse me.
The subject I have sought to embrace is immense, for it includes the
greater part of the feelings and opinions to which the new state of society
has given birth. Such a subject is doubtless above my strength, and in
treating it I have not succeeded in satisfying myself. But, if I have not been
able to reach the goal which I had in view, my readers will at least do me
the justice to acknowledge that I have conceived and followed up my
undertaking in a spirit not unworthy of success.
A. De T.
March, 1840

Section I: Influence of Democracy on the Action of
Intellect in The United States.

Chapter I: Philosophical Method Among the
Americans
I think that in no country in the civilized world is less attention paid to
philosophy than in the United States. The Americans have no philosophical
school of their own; and they care but little for all the schools into which
Europe is divided, the very names of which are scarcely known to them.
Nevertheless it is easy to perceive that almost all the inhabitants of the
United States conduct their understanding in the same manner, and govern
it by the same rules; that is to say, that without ever having taken the trouble
to define the rules of a philosophical method, they are in possession of one,
common to the whole people. To evade the bondage of system and habit, of
family maxims, class opinions, and, in some degree, of national prejudices;
to accept tradition only as a means of information, and existing facts only as
a lesson used in doing otherwise, and doing better; to seek the reason of
things for one's self, and in one's self alone; to tend to results without being
bound to means, and to aim at the substance through the form;—such are
the principal characteristics of what I shall call the philosophical method of
the Americans. But if I go further, and if I seek amongst these
characteristics that which predominates over and includes almost all the
rest, I discover that in most of the operations of the mind, each American
appeals to the individual exercise of his own understanding alone. America
is therefore one of the countries in the world where philosophy is least
studied, and where the precepts of Descartes are best applied. Nor is this
surprising. The Americans do not read the works of Descartes, because their
social condition deters them from speculative studies; but they follow his
maxims because this very social condition naturally disposes their
understanding to adopt them. In the midst of the continual movement which
agitates a democratic community, the tie which unites one generation to
another is relaxed or broken; every man readily loses the trace of the ideas
of his forefathers or takes no care about them. Nor can men living in this
state of society derive their belief from the opinions of the class to which
they belong, for, so to speak, there are no longer any classes, or those which
still exist are composed of such mobile elements, that their body can never

exercise a real control over its members. As to the influence which the
intelligence of one man has on that of another, it must necessarily be very
limited in a country where the citizens, placed on the footing of a general
similitude, are all closely seen by each other; and where, as no signs of
incontestable greatness or superiority are perceived in any one of them, they
are constantly brought back to their own reason as the most obvious and
proximate source of truth. It is not only confidence in this or that man
which is then destroyed, but the taste for trusting the ipse dixit of any man
whatsoever. Everyone shuts himself up in his own breast, and affects from
that point to judge the world.
The practice which obtains amongst the Americans of fixing the standard
of their judgment in themselves alone, leads them to other habits of mind.
As they perceive that they succeed in resolving without assistance all the
little difficulties which their practical life presents, they readily conclude
that everything in the world may be explained, and that nothing in it
transcends the limits of the understanding. Thus they fall to denying what
they cannot comprehend; which leaves them but little faith for whatever is
extraordinary, and an almost insurmountable distaste for whatever is
supernatural. As it is on their own testimony that they are accustomed to
rely, they like to discern the object which engages their attention with
extreme clearness; they therefore strip off as much as possible all that
covers it, they rid themselves of whatever separates them from it, they
remove whatever conceals it from sight, in order to view it more closely
and in the broad light of day. This disposition of the mind soon leads them
to contemn forms, which they regard as useless and inconvenient veils
placed between them and the truth.
The Americans then have not required to extract their philosophical
method from books; they have found it in themselves. The same thing may
be remarked in what has taken place in Europe. This same method has only
been established and made popular in Europe in proportion as the condition
of society has become more equal, and men have grown more like each
other. Let us consider for a moment the connection of the periods in which
this change may be traced. In the sixteenth century the Reformers subjected
some of the dogmas of the ancient faith to the scrutiny of private judgment;
but they still withheld from it the judgment of all the rest. In the seventeenth
century, Bacon in the natural sciences, and Descartes in the study of
philosophy in the strict sense of the term, abolished recognized formulas,

destroyed the empire of tradition, and overthrew the authority of the
schools. The philosophers of the eighteenth century, generalizing at length
the same principle, undertook to submit to the private judgment of each
man all the objects of his belief.
Who does not perceive that Luther, Descartes, and Voltaire employed the
same method, and that they differed only in the greater or less use which
they professed should be made of it? Why did the Reformers confine
themselves so closely within the circle of religious ideas? Why did
Descartes, choosing only to apply his method to certain matters, though he
had made it fit to be applied to all, declare that men might judge for
themselves in matters philosophical but not in matters political? How
happened it that in the eighteenth century those general applications were
all at once drawn from this same method, which Descartes and his
predecessors had either not perceived or had rejected? To what, lastly, is the
fact to be attributed, that at this period the method we are speaking of
suddenly emerged from the schools, to penetrate into society and become
the common standard of intelligence; and that, after it had become popular
among the French, it has been ostensibly adopted or secretly followed by all
the nations of Europe?
The philosophical method here designated may have been engendered in
the sixteenth century—it may have been more accurately defined and more
extensively applied in the seventeenth; but neither in the one nor in the
other could it be commonly adopted. Political laws, the condition of society,
and the habits of mind which are derived from these causes, were as yet
opposed to it. It was discovered at a time when men were beginning to
equalize and assimilate their conditions. It could only be generally followed
in ages when those conditions had at length become nearly equal, and men
nearly alike.
The philosophical method of the eighteenth century is then not only
French, but it is democratic; and this explains why it was so readily
admitted throughout Europe, where it has contributed so powerfully to
change the face of society. It is not because the French have changed their
former opinions, and altered their former manners, that they have convulsed
the world; but because they were the first to generalize and bring to light a
philosophical method, by the assistance of which it became easy to attack
all that was old, and to open a path to all that was new.

If it be asked why, at the present day, this same method is more
rigorously followed and more frequently applied by the French than by the
Americans, although the principle of equality be no less complete, and of
more ancient date, amongst the latter people, the fact may be attributed to
two circumstances, which it is essential to have clearly understood in the
first instance. It must never be forgotten that religion gave birth to Anglo-
American society. In the United States religion is therefore commingled
with all the habits of the nation and all the feelings of patriotism; whence it
derives a peculiar force. To this powerful reason another of no less intensity
may be added: in American religion has, as it were, laid down its own
limits. Religious institutions have remained wholly distinct from political
institutions, so that former laws have been easily changed whilst former
belief has remained unshaken. Christianity has therefore retained a strong
hold on the public mind in America; and, I would more particularly remark,
that its sway is not only that of a philosophical doctrine which has been
adopted upon inquiry, but of a religion which is believed without
discussion. In the United States Christian sects are infinitely diversified and
perpetually modified; but Christianity itself is a fact so irresistibly
established, that no one undertakes either to attack or to defend it. The
Americans, having admitted the principal doctrines of the Christian religion
without inquiry, are obliged to accept in like manner a great number of
moral truths originating in it and connected with it. Hence the activity of
individual analysis is restrained within narrow limits, and many of the most
important of human opinions are removed from the range of its influence.
The second circumstance to which I have alluded is the following: the
social condition and the constitution of the Americans are democratic, but
they have not had a democratic revolution. They arrived upon the soil they
occupy in nearly the condition in which we see them at the present day; and
this is of very considerable importance.
There are no revolutions which do not shake existing belief, enervate
authority, and throw doubts over commonly received ideas. The effect of all
revolutions is therefore, more or less, to surrender men to their own
guidance, and to open to the mind of every man a void and almost unlimited
range of speculation. When equality of conditions succeeds a protracted
conflict between the different classes of which the elder society was
composed, envy, hatred, and uncharitableness, pride, and exaggerated self-
confidence are apt to seize upon the human heart, and plant their sway there

for a time. This, independently of equality itself, tends powerfully to divide
men—to lead them to mistrust the judgment of others, and to seek the light
of truth nowhere but in their own understandings. Everyone then attempts
to be his own sufficient guide, and makes it his boast to form his own
opinions on all subjects. Men are no longer bound together by ideas, but by
interests; and it would seem as if human opinions were reduced to a sort of
intellectual dust, scattered on every side, unable to collect, unable to cohere.
Thus, that independence of mind which equality supposes to exist, is
never so great, nor ever appears so excessive, as at the time when equality
is beginning to establish itself, and in the course of that painful labor by
which it is established. That sort of intellectual freedom which equality may
give ought, therefore, to be very carefully distinguished from the anarchy
which revolution brings. Each of these two things must be severally
considered, in order not to conceive exaggerated hopes or fears of the
future.
I believe that the men who will live under the new forms of society will
make frequent use of their private judgment; but I am far from thinking that
they will often abuse it. This is attributable to a cause of more general
application to all democratic countries, and which, in the long run, must
needs restrain in them the independence of individual speculation within
fixed, and sometimes narrow, limits. I shall proceed to point out this cause
in the next chapter.

Chapter II: Of The Principal Source Of Belief
Among Democratic Nations
At different periods dogmatical belief is more or less abundant. It arises
in different ways, and it may change its object or its form; but under no
circumstances will dogmatical belief cease to exist, or, in other words, men
will never cease to entertain some implicit opinions without trying them by
actual discussion. If everyone undertook to form his own opinions and to
seek for truth by isolated paths struck out by himself alone, it is not to be
supposed that any considerable number of men would ever unite in any
common belief. But obviously without such common belief no society can
prosper—say rather no society can subsist; for without ideas held in
common, there is no common action, and without common action, there
may still be men, but there is no social body. In order that society should
exist, and, a fortiori, that a society should prosper, it is required that all the
minds of the citizens should be rallied and held together by certain
predominant ideas; and this cannot be the case, unless each of them
sometimes draws his opinions from the common source, and consents to
accept certain matters of belief at the hands of the community.
If I now consider man in his isolated capacity, I find that dogmatical
belief is not less indispensable to him in order to live alone, than it is to
enable him to co-operate with his fellow-creatures. If man were forced to
demonstrate to himself all the truths of which he makes daily use, his task
would never end. He would exhaust his strength in preparatory exercises,
without advancing beyond them. As, from the shortness of his life, he has
not the time, nor, from the limits of his intelligence, the capacity, to
accomplish this, he is reduced to take upon trust a number of facts and
opinions which he has not had either the time or the power to verify
himself, but which men of greater ability have sought out, or which the
world adopts. On this groundwork he raises for himself the structure of his
own thoughts; nor is he led to proceed in this manner by choice so much as
he is constrained by the inflexible law of his condition. There is no
philosopher of such great parts in the world, but that he believes a million
of things on the faith of other people, and supposes a great many more

truths than he demonstrates. This is not only necessary but desirable. A man
who should undertake to inquire into everything for himself, could devote
to each thing but little time and attention. His task would keep his mind in
perpetual unrest, which would prevent him from penetrating to the depth of
any truth, or of grappling his mind indissolubly to any conviction. His
intellect would be at once independent and powerless. He must therefore
make his choice from amongst the various objects of human belief, and he
must adopt many opinions without discussion, in order to search the better
into that smaller number which he sets apart for investigation. It is true that
whoever receives an opinion on the word of another, does so far enslave his
mind; but it is a salutary servitude which allows him to make a good use of
freedom.
A principle of authority must then always occur, under all circumstances,
in some part or other of the moral and intellectual world. Its place is
variable, but a place it necessarily has. The independence of individual
minds may be greater, or it may be less: unbounded it cannot be. Thus the
question is, not to know whether any intellectual authority exists in the ages
of democracy, but simply where it resides and by what standard it is to be
measured.
I have shown in the preceding chapter how the equality of conditions
leads men to entertain a sort of instinctive incredulity of the supernatural,
and a very lofty and often exaggerated opinion of the human understanding.
The men who live at a period of social equality are not therefore easily led
to place that intellectual authority to which they bow either beyond or
above humanity. They commonly seek for the sources of truth in
themselves, or in those who are like themselves. This would be enough to
prove that at such periods no new religion could be established, and that all
schemes for such a purpose would be not only impious but absurd and
irrational. It may be foreseen that a democratic people will not easily give
credence to divine missions; that they will turn modern prophets to a ready
jest; and they that will seek to discover the chief arbiter of their belief
within, and not beyond, the limits of their kind.
When the ranks of society are unequal, and men unlike each other in
condition, there are some individuals invested with all the power of superior
intelligence, learning, and enlightenment, whilst the multitude is sunk in
ignorance and prejudice. Men living at these aristocratic periods are

therefore naturally induced to shape their opinions by the superior standard
of a person or a class of persons, whilst they are averse to recognize the
infallibility of the mass of the people.
The contrary takes place in ages of equality. The nearer the citizens are
drawn to the common level of an equal and similar condition, the less prone
does each man become to place implicit faith in a certain man or a certain
class of men. But his readiness to believe the multitude increases, and
opinion is more than ever mistress of the world. Not only is common
opinion the only guide which private judgment retains amongst a
democratic people, but amongst such a people it possesses a power
infinitely beyond what it has elsewhere. At periods of equality men have no
faith in one another, by reason of their common resemblance; but this very
resemblance gives them almost unbounded confidence in the judgment of
the public; for it would not seem probable, as they are all endowed with
equal means of judging, but that the greater truth should go with the greater
number.
When the inhabitant of a democratic country compares himself
individually with all those about him, he feels with pride that he is the equal
of any one of them; but when he comes to survey the totality of his fellows,
and to place himself in contrast to so huge a body, he is instantly
overwhelmed by the sense of his own insignificance and weakness. The
same equality which renders him independent of each of his fellow-citizens
taken severally, exposes him alone and unprotected to the influence of the
greater number. The public has therefore among a democratic people a
singular power, of which aristocratic nations could never so much as
conceive an idea; for it does not persuade to certain opinions, but it enforces
them, and infuses them into the faculties by a sort of enormous pressure of
the minds of all upon the reason of each.
In the United States the majority undertakes to supply a multitude of
ready-made opinions for the use of individuals, who are thus relieved from
the necessity of forming opinions of their own. Everybody there adopts
great numbers of theories, on philosophy, morals, and politics, without
inquiry, upon public trust; and if we look to it very narrowly, it will be
perceived that religion herself holds her sway there, much less as a doctrine
of revelation than as a commonly received opinion. The fact that the
political laws of the Americans are such that the majority rules the

community with sovereign sway, materially increases the power which that
majority naturally exercises over the mind. For nothing is more customary
in man than to recognize superior wisdom in the person of his oppressor.
This political omnipotence of the majority in the United States doubtless
augments the influence which public opinion would obtain without it over
the mind of each member of the community; but the foundations of that
influence do not rest upon it. They must be sought for in the principle of
equality itself, not in the more or less popular institutions which men living
under that condition may give themselves. The intellectual dominion of the
greater number would probably be less absolute amongst a democratic
people governed by a king than in the sphere of a pure democracy, but it
will always be extremely absolute; and by whatever political laws men are
governed in the ages of equality, it may be foreseen that faith in public
opinion will become a species of religion there, and the majority its
ministering prophet.
Thus intellectual authority will be different, but it will not be diminished;
and far from thinking that it will disappear, I augur that it may readily
acquire too much preponderance, and confine the action of private
judgment within narrower limits than are suited either to the greatness or
the happiness of the human race. In the principle of equality I very clearly
discern two tendencies; the one leading the mind of every man to untried
thoughts, the other inclined to prohibit him from thinking at all. And I
perceive how, under the dominion of certain laws, democracy would
extinguish that liberty of the mind to which a democratic social condition is
favorable; so that, after having broken all the bondage once imposed on it
by ranks or by men, the human mind would be closely fettered to the
general will of the greatest number.
If the absolute power of the majority were to be substituted by
democratic nations, for all the different powers which checked or retarded
overmuch the energy of individual minds, the evil would only have changed
its symptoms. Men would not have found the means of independent life;
they would simply have invented (no easy task) a new dress for servitude.
There is—and I cannot repeat it too often—there is in this matter for
profound reflection for those who look on freedom as a holy thing, and who
hate not only the despot, but despotism. For myself, when I feel the hand of
power lie heavy on my brow, I care but little to know who oppresses me;

and I am not the more disposed to pass beneath the yoke, because it is held
out to me by the arms of a million of men.

Chapter III: Why The Americans Display More
Readiness And More Taste For General Ideas
Than Their Forefathers, The English.
The Deity does not regard the human race collectively. He surveys at one
glance and severally all the beings of whom mankind is composed, and he
discerns in each man the resemblances which assimilate him to all his
fellows, and the differences which distinguish him from them. God,
therefore, stands in no need of general ideas; that is to say, he is never
sensible of the necessity of collecting a considerable number of analogous
objects under the same form for greater convenience in thinking. Such is,
however, not the case with man. If the human mind were to attempt to
examine and pass a judgment on all the individual cases before it, the
immensity of detail would soon lead it astray and bewilder its discernment:
in this strait, man has recourse to an imperfect but necessary expedient,
which at once assists and demonstrates his weakness. Having superficially
considered a certain number of objects, and remarked their resemblance, he
assigns to them a common name, sets them apart, and proceeds onwards.
General ideas are no proof of the strength, but rather of the insufficiency
of the human intellect; for there are in nature no beings exactly alike, no
things precisely identical, nor any rules indiscriminately and alike
applicable to several objects at once. The chief merit of general ideas is,
that they enable the human mind to pass a rapid judgment on a great many
objects at once; but, on the other hand, the notions they convey are never
otherwise than incomplete, and they always cause the mind to lose as much
in accuracy as it gains in comprehensiveness. As social bodies advance in
civilization, they acquire the knowledge of new facts, and they daily lay
hold almost unconsciously of some particular truths. The more truths of this
kind a man apprehends, the more general ideas is he naturally led to
conceive. A multitude of particular facts cannot be seen separately, without
at last discovering the common tie which connects them. Several
individuals lead to the perception of the species; several species to that of

the genus. Hence the habit and the taste for general ideas will always be
greatest amongst a people of ancient cultivation and extensive knowledge.
But there are other reasons which impel men to generalize their ideas, or
which restrain them from it.
The Americans are much more addicted to the use of general ideas than
the English, and entertain a much greater relish for them: this appears very
singular at first sight, when it is remembered that the two nations have the
same origin, that they lived for centuries under the same laws, and that they
still incessantly interchange their opinions and their manners. This contrast
becomes much more striking still, if we fix our eyes on our own part of the
world, and compare together the two most enlightened nations which
inhabit it. It would seem as if the mind of the English could only tear itself
reluctantly and painfully away from the observation of particular facts, to
rise from them to their causes; and that it only generalizes in spite of itself.
Amongst the French, on the contrary, the taste for general ideas would seem
to have grown to so ardent a passion, that it must be satisfied on every
occasion. I am informed, every morning when I wake, that some general
and eternal law has just been discovered, which I never heard mentioned
before. There is not a mediocre scribbler who does not try his hand at
discovering truths applicable to a great kingdom, and who is very ill pleased
with himself if he does not succeed in compressing the human race into the
compass of an article. So great a dissimilarity between two very enlightened
nations surprises me. If I again turn my attention to England, and observe
the events which have occurred there in the last half-century, I think I may
affirm that a taste for general ideas increases in that country in proportion as
its ancient constitution is weakened.
The state of civilization is therefore insufficient by itself to explain what
suggests to the human mind the love of general ideas, or diverts it from
them. When the conditions of men are very unequal, and inequality itself is
the permanent state of society, individual men gradually become so
dissimilar that each class assumes the aspect of a distinct race: only one of
these classes is ever in view at the same instant; and losing sight of that
general tie which binds them all within the vast bosom of mankind, the
observation invariably rests not on man, but on certain men. Those who live
in this aristocratic state of society never, therefore, conceive very general
ideas respecting themselves, and that is enough to imbue them with an

habitual distrust of such ideas, and an instinctive aversion of them. He, on
the contrary, who inhabits a democratic country, sees around him, one very
hand, men differing but little from each other; he cannot turn his mind to
any one portion of mankind, without expanding and dilating his thought till
it embrace the whole. All the truths which are applicable to himself, appear
to him equally and similarly applicable to each of his fellow-citizens and
fellow-men. Having contracted the habit of generalizing his ideas in the
study which engages him most, and interests him more than others, he
transfers the same habit to all his pursuits; and thus it is that the craving to
discover general laws in everything, to include a great number of objects
under the same formula, and to explain a mass of facts by a single cause,
becomes an ardent, and sometimes an undiscerning, passion in the human
mind.
Nothing shows the truth of this proposition more clearly than the
opinions of the ancients respecting their slaves. The most profound and
capacious minds of Rome and Greece were never able to reach the idea, at
once so general and so simple, of the common likeness of men, and of the
common birthright of each to freedom: they strove to prove that slavery was
in the order of nature, and that it would always exist. Nay, more, everything
shows that those of the ancients who had passed from the servile to the free
condition, many of whom have left us excellent writings, did themselves
regard servitude in no other light.
All the great writers of antiquity belonged to the aristocracy of masters,
or at least they saw that aristocracy established and uncontested before their
eyes. Their mind, after it had expanded itself in several directions, was
barred from further progress in this one; and the advent of Jesus Christ upon
earth was required to teach that all the members of the human race are by
nature equal and alike.
In the ages of equality all men are independent of each other, isolated and
weak. The movements of the multitude are not permanently guided by the
will of any individuals; at such times humanity seems always to advance of
itself. In order, therefore, to explain what is passing in the world, man is
driven to seek for some great causes, which, acting in the same manner on
all our fellow-creatures, thus impel them all involuntarily to pursue the
same track. This again naturally leads the human mind to conceive general
ideas, and superinduces a taste for them.

I have already shown in what way the equality of conditions leads every
man to investigate truths for himself. It may readily be perceived that a
method of this kind must insensibly beget a tendency to general ideas in the
human mind. When I repudiate the traditions of rank, profession, and birth;
when I escape from the authority of example, to seek out, by the single
effort of my reason, the path to be followed, I am inclined to derive the
motives of my opinions from human nature itself; which leads me
necessarily, and almost unconsciously, to adopt a great number of very
general notions.
All that I have here said explains the reasons for which the English
display much less readiness and taste or the generalization of ideas than
their American progeny, and still less again than their French neighbors;
and likewise the reason for which the English of the present day display
more of these qualities than their forefathers did. The English have long
been a very enlightened and a very aristocratic nation; their enlightened
condition urged them constantly to generalize, and their aristocratic habits
confined them to particularize. Hence arose that philosophy, at once bold
and timid, broad and narrow, which has hitherto prevailed in England, and
which still obstructs and stagnates in so many minds in that country.
Independently of the causes I have pointed out in what goes before,
others may be discerned less apparent, but no less efficacious, which
engender amongst almost every democratic people a taste, and frequently a
passion, for general ideas. An accurate distinction must be taken between
ideas of this kind. Some are the result of slow, minute, and conscientious
labor of the mind, and these extend the sphere of human knowledge; others
spring up at once from the first rapid exercise of the wits, and beget none
but very superficial and very uncertain notions. Men who live in ages of
equality have a great deal of curiosity and very little leisure; their life is so
practical, so confused, so excited, so active, that but little time remains to
them for thought. Such men are prone to general ideas because they spare
them the trouble of studying particulars; they contain, if I may so speak, a
great deal in a little compass, and give, in a little time, a great return. If
then, upon a brief and inattentive investigation, a common relation is
thought to be detected between certain obtects, inquiry is not pushed any
further; and without examining in detail how far these different objects
differ or agree, they are hastily arranged under one formulary, in order to
pass to another subject.

One of the distinguishing characteristics of a democratic period is the
taste all men have at such ties for easy success and present enjoyment. This
occurs in the pursuits of the intellect as well as in all others. Most of those
who live at a time of equality are full of an ambition at once aspiring and
relaxed: they would fain succeed brilliantly and at once, but they would be
dispensed from great efforts to obtain success. These conflicting tendencies
lead straight to the research of general ideas, by aid of which they flatter
themselves that they can figure very importantly at a small expense, and
draw the attention of the public with very little trouble. And I know not
whether they be wrong in thinking thus. For their readers are as much
averse to investigating anything to the bottom as they can be themselves;
and what is generally sought in the productions of the mind is easy pleasure
and information without labor.
If aristocratic nations do not make sufficient use of general ideas, and
frequently treat them with inconsiderate disdain, it is true, on the other
hand, that a democratic people is ever ready to carry ideas of this kind to
excess, and to espouse the with injudicious warmth.

Chapter IV: Why The Americans Have Never
Been So Eager As The French For General Ideas
In Political Matters
I observed in the last chapter, that the Americans show a less decided
taste for general ideas than the French; this is more especially true in
political matters. Although the Americans infuse into their legislation
infinitely more general ideas than the English, and although they pay much
more attention than the latter people to the adjustment of the practice of
affairs to theory, no political bodies in the United States have ever shown so
warm an attachment to general ideas as the Constituent Assembly and the
Convention in France. At no time has the American people laid hold on
ideas of this kind with the passionate energy of the French people in the
eighteenth century, or displayed the same blind confidence in the value and
absolute truth of any theory. This difference between the Americans and the
French originates in several causes, but principally in the following one.
The Americans form a democratic people, which has always itself directed
public affairs. The French are a democratic people, who, for a long time,
could only speculate on the best manner of conducting them. The social
condition of France led that people to conceive very general ideas on the
subject of government, whilst its political constitution prevented it from
correcting those ideas by experiment, and from gradually detecting their
insufficiency; whereas in America the two things constantly balance and
correct each other.
It may seem, at first sight, that this is very much opposed to what I have
said before, that democratic nations derive their love of theory from the
excitement of their active life. A more attentive examination will show that
there is nothing contradictory in the proposition. Men living in democratic
countries eagerly lay hold of general ideas because they have but little
leisure, and because these ideas spare them the trouble of studying
particulars. This is true; but it is only to be understood to apply to those
matters which are not the necessary and habitual subjects of their thoughts.
Mercantile men will take up very eagerly, and without any very close

scrutiny, all the general ideas on philosophy, politics, science, or the arts,
which may be presented to them; but for such as relate to commerce, they
will not receive them without inquiry, or adopt them without reserve. The
same thing applies to statesmen with regard to general ideas in politics. If,
then, there be a subject upon which a democratic people is peculiarly liable
to abandon itself, blindly and extravagantly, to general ideas, the best
corrective that can be used will be to make that subject a part of the daily
practical occupation of that people. The people will then be compelled to
enter upon its details, and the details will teach them the weak points of the
theory. This remedy may frequently be a painful one, but its effect is
certain.
Thus it happens, that the democratic institutions which compel every
citizen to take a practical part in the government, moderate that excessive
taste for general theories in politics which the principle of equality suggests.

Chapter V: Of The Manner In Which Religion In
The United States Avails Itself Of Democratic
Tendencies
I have laid it down in a preceding chapter that men cannot do without
dogmatical belief; and even that it is very much to be desired that such
belief should exist amongst them. I now add, that of all the kinds of
dogmatical belief the most desirable appears to me to be dogmatical belief
in matters of religion; and this is a very clear inference, even from no higher
consideration than the interests of this world. There is hardly any human
action, however particular a character be assigned to it, which does not
originate in some very general idea men have conceived of the Deity, of his
relation to mankind, of the nature of their own souls, and of their duties to
their fellow-creatures. Nor can anything prevent these ideas from being the
common spring from which everything else emanates. Men are therefore
immeasurably interested in acquiring fixed ideas of God, of the soul, and of
their common duties to their Creator and to their fellow-men; for doubt on
these first principles would abandon all their actions to the impulse of
chance, and would condemn them to live, to a certain extent, powerless and
undisciplined.
This is then the subject on which it is most important for each of us to
entertain fixed ideas; and unhappily it is also the subject on which it is most
difficult for each of us, left to himself, to settle his opinions by the sole
force of his reason. None but minds singularly free from the ordinary
anxieties of life—minds at once penetrating, subtle, and trained by thinking
—can even with the assistance of much time and care, sound the depth of
these most necessary truths. And, indeed, we see that these philosophers are
themselves almost always enshrouded in uncertainties; that at every step the
natural light which illuminates their path grows dimmer and less secure;
and that, in spite of all their efforts, they have as yet only discovered a small
number of conflicting notions, on which the mind of man has been tossed
about for thousands of years, without either laying a firmer grasp on truth,
or finding novelty even in its errors. Studies of this nature are far above the

average capacity of men; and even if the majority of mankind were capable
of such pursuits, it is evident that leisure to cultivate them would still be
wanting. Fixed ideas of God and human nature are indispensable to the
daily practice of men's lives; but the practice of their lives prevents them
from acquiring such ideas.
The difficulty appears to me to be without a parallel. Amongst the
sciences there are some which are useful to the mass of mankind, and which
are within its reach; others can only be approached by the few, and are not
cultivated by the many, who require nothing beyond their more remote
applications: but the daily practice of the science I speak of is indispensable
to all, although the study of it is inaccessible to the far greater number.
General ideas respecting God and human nature are therefore the ideas
above all others which it is most suitable to withdraw from the habitual
action of private judgment, and in which there is most to gain and least to
lose by recognizing a principle of authority. The first object and one of the
principal advantages of religions, is to furnish to each of these fundamental
questions a solution which is at once clear, precise, intelligible to the mass
of mankind, and lasting. There are religions which are very false and very
absurd; but it may be affirmed, that any religion which remains within the
circle I have just traced, without aspiring to go beyond it (as many religions
have attempted to do, for the purpose of enclosing on every side the free
progress of the human mind), imposes a salutary restraint on the intellect;
and it must be admitted that, if it do not save men in another world, such
religion is at least very conducive to their happiness and their greatness in
this. This is more especially true of men living in free countries. When the
religion of a people is destroyed, doubt gets hold of the highest portions of
the intellect, and half paralyzes all the rest of its powers. Every man
accustoms himself to entertain none but confused and changing notions on
the subjects most interesting to his fellow-creatures and himself. His
opinions are ill-defended and easily abandoned: and, despairing of ever
resolving by himself the hardest problems of the destiny of man, he ignobly
submits to think no more about them. Such a condition cannot but enervate
the soul, relax the springs of the will, and prepare a people for servitude.
Nor does it only happen, in such a case, that they allow their freedom to be
wrested from them; they frequently themselves surrender it. When there is
no longer any principle of authority in religion any more than in politics,
men are speedily frightened at the aspect of this unbounded independence.

The constant agitation of all surrounding things alarms and exhausts them.
As everything is at sea in the sphere of the intellect, they determine at least
that the mechanism of society should be firm and fixed; and as they cannot
resume their ancient belief, they assume a master.
For my own part, I doubt whether man can ever support at the same time
complete religious independence and entire public freedom. And I am
inclined to think, that if faith be wanting in him, he must serve; and if he be
free, he must believe.
Perhaps, however, this great utility of religions is still more obvious
amongst nations where equality of conditions prevails than amongst others.
It must be acknowledged that equality, which brings great benefits into the
world, nevertheless suggests to men (as will be shown hereafter) some very
dangerous propensities. It tends to isolate them from each other, to
concentrate every man's attention upon himself; and it lays open the soul to
an inordinate love of material gratification. The greatest advantage of
religion is to inspire diametrically contrary principles. There is no religion
which does not place the object of man's desires above and beyond the
treasures of earth, and which does not naturally raise his soul to regions far
above those of the senses. Nor is there any which does not impose on man
some sort of duties to his kind, and thus draws him at times from the
contemplation of himself. This occurs in religions the most false and
dangerous. Religious nations are therefore naturally strong on the very point
on which democratic nations are weak; which shows of what importance it
is for men to preserve their religion as their conditions become more equal.
I have neither the right nor the intention of examining the supernatural
means which God employs to infuse religious belief into the heart of man. I
am at this moment considering religions in a purely human point of view:
my object is to inquire by what means they may most easily retain their
sway in the democratic ages upon which we are entering. It has been shown
that, at times of general cultivation and equality, the human mind does not
consent to adopt dogmatical opinions without reluctance, and feels their
necessity acutely in spiritual matters only. This proves, in the first place,
that at such times religions ought, more cautiously than at any other, to
confine themselves within their own precincts; for in seeking to extend their
power beyond religious matters, they incur a risk of not being believed at
all. The circle within which they seek to bound the human intellect ought

therefore to be carefully traced, and beyond its verge the mind should be
left in entire freedom to its own guidance. Mahommed professed to derive
from Heaven, and he has inserted in the Koran, not only a body of religious
doctrines, but political maxims, civil and criminal laws, and theories of
science. The gospel, on the contrary, only speaks of the general relations of
men to God and to each other—beyond which it inculcates and imposes no
point of faith. This alone, besides a thousand other reasons, would suffice to
prove that the former of these religions will never long predominate in a
cultivated and democratic age, whilst the latter is destined to retain its sway
at these as at all other periods.
But in continuation of this branch of the subject, I find that in order for
religions to maintain their authority, humanly speaking, in democratic ages,
they must not only confine themselves strictly within the circle of spiritual
matters: their power also depends very much on the nature of the belief they
inculcate, on the external forms they assume, and on the obligations they
impose. The preceding observation, that equality leads men to very general
and very extensive notions, is principally to be understood as applied to the
question of religion. Men living in a similar and equal condition in the
world readily conceive the idea of the one God, governing every man by the
same laws, and granting to every man future happiness on the same
conditions. The idea of the unity of mankind constantly leads them back to
the idea of the unity of the Creator; whilst, on the contrary, in a state of
society where men are broken up into very unequal ranks, they are apt to
devise as many deities as there are nations, castes, classes, or families, and
to trace a thousand private roads to heaven.
It cannot be denied that Christianity itself has felt, to a certain extent, the
influence which social and political conditions exercise on religious
opinions. At the epoch at which the Christian religion appeared upon earth,
Providence, by whom the world was doubtless prepared for its coming, had
gathered a large portion of the human race, like an immense flock, under
the sceptre of the Caesars. The men of whom this multitude was composed
were distinguished by numerous differences; but they had thus much in
common, that they all obeyed the same laws, and that every subject was so
weak and insignificant in relation to the imperial potentate, that all appeared
equal when their condition was contrasted with his. This novel and peculiar
state of mankind necessarily predisposed men to listen to the general truths
which Christianity teaches, and may serve to explain the facility and

rapidity with which they then penetrated into the human mind. The
counterpart of this state of things was exhibited after the destruction of the
empire. The Roman world being then as it were shattered into a thousand
fragments, each nation resumed its pristine individuality. An infinite scale
of ranks very soon grew up in the bosom of these nations; the different
races were more sharply defined, and each nation was divided by castes into
several peoples. In the midst of this common effort, which seemed to be
urging human society to the greatest conceivable amount of voluntary
subdivision, Christianity did not lose sight of the leading general ideas
which it had brought into the world. But it appeared, nevertheless, to lend
itself, as much as was possible, to those new tendencies to which the
fractional distribution of mankind had given birth. Men continued to
worship an only God, the Creator and Preserver of all things; but every
people, every city, and, so to speak, every man, thought to obtain some
distinct privilege, and win the favor of an especial patron at the foot of the
Throne of Grace. Unable to subdivide the Deity, they multiplied and
improperly enhanced the importance of the divine agents. The homage due
to saints and angels became an almost idolatrous worship amongst the
majority of the Christian world; and apprehensions might be entertained for
a moment lest the religion of Christ should retrograde towards the
superstitions which it had subdued. It seems evident, that the more the
barriers are removed which separate nation from nation amongst mankind,
and citizen from citizen amongst a people, the stronger is the bent of the
human mind, as if by its own impulse, towards the idea of an only and all-
powerful Being, dispensing equal laws in the same manner to every man. In
democratic ages, then, it is more particularly important not to allow the
homage paid to secondary agents to be confounded with the worship due to
the Creator alone.
Another truth is no less clear—that religions ought to assume fewer
external observances in democratic periods than at any others. In speaking
of philosophical method among the Americans, I have shown that nothing is
more repugnant to the human mind in an age of equality than the idea of
subjection to forms. Men living at such times are impatient of figures; to
their eyes symbols appear to be the puerile artifice which is used to conceal
or to set off truths, which should more naturally be bared to the light of
open day: they are unmoved by ceremonial observances, and they are
predisposed to attach a secondary importance to the details of public

worship. Those whose care it is to regulate the external forms of religion in
a democratic age should pay a close attention to these natural propensities
of the human mind, in order not unnecessarily to run counter to them. I
firmly believe in the necessity of forms, which fix the human mind in the
contemplation of abstract truths, and stimulate its ardor in the pursuit of
them, whilst they invigorate its powers of retaining them steadfastly. Nor do
I suppose that it is possible to maintain a religion without external
observances; but, on the other hand, I am persuaded that, in the ages upon
which we are entering, it would be peculiarly dangerous to multiply them
beyond measure; and that they ought rather to be limited to as much as is
absolutely necessary to perpetuate the doctrine itself, which is the substance
of religions of which the ritual is only the form. *a A religion which should
become more minute, more peremptory, and more surcharged with small
observances at a time in which men are becoming more equal, would soon
find itself reduced to a band of fanatical zealots in the midst of an infidel
people.
a
[ In all religions there are some ceremonies which are
inherent in the substance of the faith itself, and in these
nothing should, on any account, be changed. This is
especially the case with Roman Catholicism, in which the
doctrine and the form are frequently so closely united as to
form one point of belief.]
I anticipate the objection, that as all religions have general and eternal
truths for their object, they cannot thus shape themselves to the shifting
spirit of every age without forfeiting their claim to certainty in the eyes of
mankind. To this I reply again, that the principal opinions which constitute
belief, and which theologians call articles of faith, must be very carefully
distinguished from the accessories connected with them. Religions are
obliged to hold fast to the former, whatever be the peculiar spirit of the age;
but they should take good care not to bind themselves in the same manner
to the latter at a time when everything is in transition, and when the mind,
accustomed to the moving pageant of human affairs, reluctantly endures the
attempt to fix it to any given point. The fixity of external and secondary
things can only afford a chance of duration when civil society is itself fixed;
under any other circumstances I hold it to be perilous.
We shall have occasion to see that, of all the passions which originate in,
or are fostered by, equality, there is one which it renders peculiarly intense,

and which it infuses at the same time into the heart of every man: I mean
the love of well-being. The taste for well-being is the prominent and
indelible feature of democratic ages. It may be believed that a religion
which should undertake to destroy so deep seated a passion, would meet its
own destruction thence in the end; and if it attempted to wean men entirely
from the contemplation of the good things of this world, in order to devote
their faculties exclusively to the thought of another, it may be foreseen that
the soul would at length escape from its grasp, to plunge into the exclusive
enjoyment of present and material pleasures. The chief concern of religions
is to purify, to regulate, and to restrain the excessive and exclusive taste for
well-being which men feel at periods of equality; but they would err in
attempting to control it completely or to eradicate it. They will not succeed
in curing men of the love of riches: but they may still persuade men to
enrich themselves by none but honest means.
This brings me to a final consideration, which comprises, as it were, all
the others. The more the conditions of men are equalized and assimilated to
each other, the more important is it for religions, whilst they carefully
abstain from the daily turmoil of secular affairs, not needlessly to run
counter to the ideas which generally prevail, and the permanent interests
which exist in the mass of the people. For as public opinion grows to be
more and more evidently the first and most irresistible of existing powers,
the religious principle has no external support strong enough to enable it
long to resist its attacks. This is not less true of a democratic people, ruled
by a despot, than in a republic. In ages of equality, kings may often
command obedience, but the majority always commands belief: to the
majority, therefore, deference is to be paid in whatsoever is not contrary to
the faith.
I showed in my former volumes how the American clergy stand aloof
from secular affairs. This is the most obvious, but it is not the only, example
of their self-restraint. In America religion is a distinct sphere, in which the
priest is sovereign, but out of which he takes care never to go. Within its
limits he is the master of the mind; beyond them, he leaves men to
themselves, and surrenders them to the independence and instability which
belong to their nature and their age. I have seen no country in which
Christianity is clothed with fewer forms, figures, and observances than in
the United States; or where it presents more distinct, more simple, or more
general notions to the mind. Although the Christians of America are divided

into a multitude of sects, they all look upon their religion in the same light.
This applies to Roman Catholicism as well as to the other forms of belief.
There are no Romish priests who show less taste for the minute individual
observances for extraordinary or peculiar means of salvation, or who cling
more to the spirit, and less to the letter of the law, than the Roman Catholic
priests of the United States. Nowhere is that doctrine of the Church, which
prohibits the worship reserved to God alone from being offered to the
saints, more clearly inculcated or more generally followed. Yet the Roman
Catholics of America are very submissive and very sincere.
Another remark is applicable to the clergy of every communion. The
American ministers of the gospel do not attempt to draw or to fix all the
thoughts of man upon the life to come; they are willing to surrender a
portion of his heart to the cares of the present; seeming to consider the
goods of this world as important, although as secondary, objects. If they
take no part themselves in productive labor, they are at least interested in its
progression, and ready to applaud its results; and whilst they never cease to
point to the other world as the great object of the hopes and fears of the
believer, they do not forbid him honestly to court prosperity in this. Far
from attempting to show that these things are distinct and contrary to one
another, they study rather to find out on what point they are most nearly and
closely connected.
All the American clergy know and respect the intellectual supremacy
exercised by the majority; they never sustain any but necessary conflicts
with it. They take no share in the altercations of parties, but they readily
adopt the general opinions of their country and their age; and they allow
themselves to be borne away without opposition in the current of feeling
and opinion by which everything around them is carried along. They
endeavor to amend their contemporaries, but they do not quit fellowship
with them. Public opinion is therefore never hostile to them; it rather
supports and protects them; and their belief owes its authority at the same
time to the strength which is its own, and to that which they borrow from
the opinions of the majority. Thus it is that, by respecting all democratic
tendencies not absolutely contrary to herself, and by making use of several
of them for her own purposes, religion sustains an advantageous struggle
with that spirit of individual independence which is her most dangerous
antagonist.

Chapter VI: Of The Progress Of Roman
Catholicism In The United States
America is the most democratic country in the world, and it is at the same
time (according to reports worthy of belief) the country in which the Roman
Catholic religion makes most progress. At first sight this is surprising. Two
things must here be accurately distinguished: equality inclines men to wish
to form their own opinions; but, on the other hand, it imbues them with the
taste and the idea of unity, simplicity, and impartiality in the power which
governs society. Men living in democratic ages are therefore very prone to
shake off all religious authority; but if they consent to subject themselves to
any authority of this kind, they choose at least that it should be single and
uniform. Religious powers not radiating from a common centre are
naturally repugnant to their minds; and they almost as readily conceive that
there should be no religion, as that there should be several. At the present
time, more than in any preceding one, Roman Catholics are seen to lapse
into infidelity, and Protestants to be converted to Roman Catholicism. If the
Roman Catholic faith be considered within the pale of the church, it would
seem to be losing ground; without that pale, to be gaining it. Nor is this
circumstance difficult of explanation. The men of our days are naturally
disposed to believe; but, as soon as they have any religion, they
immediately find in themselves a latent propensity which urges them
unconsciously towards Catholicism. Many of the doctrines and the practices
of the Romish Church astonish them; but they feel a secret admiration for
its discipline, and its great unity attracts them. If Catholicism could at
length withdraw itself from the political animosities to which it has given
rise, I have hardly any doubt but that the same spirit of the age, which
appears to be so opposed to it, would become so favorable as to admit of its
great and sudden advancement. One of the most ordinary weaknesses of the
human intellect is to seek to reconcile contrary principles, and to purchase
peace at the expense of logic. Thus there have ever been, and will ever be,
men who, after having submitted some portion of their religious belief to
the principle of authority, will seek to exempt several other parts of their
faith from its influence, and to keep their minds floating at random between

liberty and obedience. But I am inclined to believe that the number of these
thinkers will be less in democratic than in other ages; and that our posterity
will tend more and more to a single division into two parts—some
relinquishing Christianity entirely, and others returning to the bosom of the
Church of Rome.

Chapter VII: Of The Cause Of A Leaning To
Pantheism Amongst Democratic Nations
I shall take occasion hereafter to show under what form the
preponderating taste of a democratic people for very general ideas
manifests itself in politics; but I would point out, at the present stage of my
work, its principal effect on philosophy. It cannot be denied that pantheism
has made great progress in our age. The writings of a part of Europe bear
visible marks of it: the Germans introduce it into philosophy, and the
French into literature. Most of the works of imagination published in France
contain some opinions or some tinge caught from pantheistical doctrines, or
they disclose some tendency to such doctrines in their authors. This appears
to me not only to proceed from an accidental, but from a permanent cause.
When the conditions of society are becoming more equal, and each
individual man becomes more like all the rest, more weak and more
insignificant, a habit grows up of ceasing to notice the citizens to consider
only the people, and of overlooking individuals to think only of their kind.
At such times the human mind seeks to embrace a multitude of different
objects at once; and it constantly strives to succeed in connecting a variety
of consequences with a single cause. The idea of unity so possesses itself of
man, and is sought for by him so universally, that if he thinks he has found
it, he readily yields himself up to repose in that belief. Nor does he content
himself with the discovery that nothing is in the world but a creation and a
Creator; still embarrassed by this primary division of things, he seeks to
expand and to simplify his conception by including God and the universe in
one great whole. If there be a philosophical system which teaches that all
things material and immaterial, visible and invisible, which the world
contains, are only to be considered as the several parts of an immense
Being, which alone remains unchanged amidst the continual change and
ceaseless transformation of all that constitutes it, we may readily infer that
such a system, although it destroy the individuality of man—nay, rather
because it destroys that individuality—will have secret charms for men
living in democracies. All their habits of thought prepare them to conceive
it, and predispose them to adopt it. It naturally attracts and fixes their

imagination; it fosters the pride, whilst it soothes the indolence, of their
minds. Amongst the different systems by whose aid philosophy endeavors
to explain the universe, I believe pantheism to be one of those most fitted to
seduce the human mind in democratic ages. Against it all who abide in their
attachment to the true greatness of man should struggle and combine.

Chapter VIII: The Principle Of Equality Suggests
To The Americans The Idea Of The Indefinite
Perfectibility Of Man
Equality suggests to the human mind several ideas which would not have
originated from any other source, and it modifies almost all those
previously entertained. I take as an example the idea of human
perfectibility, because it is one of the principal notions that the intellect can
conceive, and because it constitutes of itself a great philosophical theory,
which is every instant to be traced by its consequences in the practice of
human affairs. Although man has many points of resemblance with the
brute creation, one characteristic is peculiar to himself—he improves: they
are incapable of improvement. Mankind could not fail to discover this
difference from its earliest period. The idea of perfectibility is therefore as
old as the world; equality did not give birth to it, although it has imparted to
it a novel character.
When the citizens of a community are classed according to their rank,
their profession, or their birth, and when all men are constrained to follow
the career which happens to open before them, everyone thinks that the
utmost limits of human power are to be discerned in proximity to himself,
and none seeks any longer to resist the inevitable law of his destiny. Not
indeed that an aristocratic people absolutely contests man's faculty of self-
improvement, but they do not hold it to be indefinite; amelioration they
conceive, but not change: they imagine that the future condition of society
may be better, but not essentially different; and whilst they admit that
mankind has made vast strides in improvement, and may still have some to
make, they assign to it beforehand certain impassable limits. Thus they do
not presume that they have arrived at the supreme good or at absolute truth
(what people or what man was ever wild enough to imagine it?) but they
cherish a persuasion that they have pretty nearly reached that degree of
greatness and knowledge which our imperfect nature admits of; and as
nothing moves about them they are willing to fancy that everything is in its
fit place. Then it is that the legislator affects to lay down eternal laws; that

kings and nations will raise none but imperishable monuments; and that the
present generation undertakes to spare generations to come the care of
regulating their destinies.
In proportion as castes disappear and the classes of society approximate
—as manners, customs, and laws vary, from the tumultuous intercourse of
men—as new facts arise—as new truths are brought to light—as ancient
opinions are dissipated, and others take their place—the image of an ideal
perfection, forever on the wing, presents itself to the human mind.
Continual changes are then every instant occurring under the observation of
every man: the position of some is rendered worse; and he learns but too
well, that no people and no individual, how enlightened soever they may be,
can lay claim to infallibility;—the condition of others is improved; whence
he infers that man is endowed with an indefinite faculty of improvement.
His reverses teach him that none may hope to have discovered absolute
good—his success stimulates him to the never-ending pursuit of it. Thus,
forever seeking—forever falling, to rise again—often disappointed, but not
discouraged—he tends unceasingly towards that unmeasured greatness so
indistinctly visible at the end of the long track which humanity has yet to
tread. It can hardly be believed how many facts naturally flow from the
philosophical theory of the indefinite perfectibility of man, or how strong
an influence it exercises even on men who, living entirely for the purposes
of action and not of thought, seem to conform their actions to it, without
knowing anything about it. I accost an American sailor, and I inquire why
the ships of his country are built so as to last but for a short time; he
answers without hesitation that the art of navigation is every day making
such rapid progress, that the finest vessel would become almost useless if it
lasted beyond a certain number of years. In these words, which fell
accidentally and on a particular subject from a man of rude attainments, I
recognize the general and systematic idea upon which a great people directs
all its concerns.
Aristocratic nations are naturally too apt to narrow the scope of human
perfectibility; democratic nations to expand it beyond compass.

Chapter IX: The Example Of The Americans Does
Not Prove That A Democratic People Can Have
No Aptitude And No Taste For Science, Literature,
Or Art
It must be acknowledged that amongst few of the civilized nations of our
time have the higher sciences made less progress than in the United States;
and in few have great artists, fine poets, or celebrated writers been more
rare. Many Europeans, struck by this fact, have looked upon it as a natural
and inevitable result of equality; and they have supposed that if a
democratic state of society and democratic institutions were ever to prevail
over the whole earth, the human mind would gradually find its beacon-
lights grow dim, and men would relapse into a period of darkness. To
reason thus is, I think, to confound several ideas which it is important to
divide and to examine separately: it is to mingle, unintentionally, what is
democratic with what is only American.
The religion professed by the first emigrants, and bequeathed by them to
their descendants, simple in its form of worship, austere and almost harsh in
its principles, and hostile to external symbols and to ceremonial pomp, is
naturally unfavorable to the fine arts, and only yields a reluctant sufferance
to the pleasures of literature. The Americans are a very old and a very
enlightened people, who have fallen upon a new and unbounded country,
where they may extend themselves at pleasure, and which they may fertilize
without difficulty. This state of things is without a parallel in the history of
the world. In America, then, every one finds facilities, unknown elsewhere,
for making or increasing his fortune. The spirit of gain is always on the
stretch, and the human mind, constantly diverted from the pleasures of
imagination and the labors of the intellect, is there swayed by no impulse
but the pursuit of wealth. Not only are manufacturing and commercial
classes to be found in the United States, as they are in all other countries;
but what never occurred elsewhere, the whole community is simultaneously
engaged in productive industry and commerce. I am convinced that, if the
Americans had been alone in the world, with the freedom and the

knowledge acquired by their forefathers, and the passions which are their
own, they would not have been slow to discover that progress cannot long
be made in the application of the sciences without cultivating the theory of
them; that all the arts are perfected by one another: and, however absorbed
they might have been by the pursuit of the principal object of their desires,
they would speedily have admitted, that it is necessary to turn aside from it
occasionally, in order the better to attain it in the end.
The taste for the pleasures of the mind is moreover so natural to the heart
of civilized man, that amongst the polite nations, which are least disposed
to give themselves up to these pursuits, a certain number of citizens are
always to be found who take part in them. This intellectual craving, when
once felt, would very soon have been satisfied. But at the very time when
the Americans were naturally inclined to require nothing of science but its
special applications to the useful arts and the means of rendering life
comfortable, learned and literary Europe was engaged in exploring the
common sources of truth, and in improving at the same time all that can
minister to the pleasures or satisfy the wants of man. At the head of the
enlightened nations of the Old World the inhabitants of the United States
more particularly distinguished one, to which they were closely united by a
common origin and by kindred habits. Amongst this people they found
distinguished men of science, artists of skill, writers of eminence, and they
were enabled to enjoy the treasures of the intellect without requiring to
labor in amassing them. I cannot consent to separate America from Europe,
in spite of the ocean which intervenes. I consider the people of the United
States as that portion of the English people which is commissioned to
explore the wilds of the New World; whilst the rest of the nation, enjoying
more leisure and less harassed by the drudgery of life, may devote its
energies to thought, and enlarge in all directions the empire of the mind.
The position of the Americans is therefore quite exceptional, and it may be
believed that no democratic people will ever be placed in a similar one.
Their strictly Puritanical origin—their exclusively commercial habits—
even the country they inhabit, which seems to divert their minds from the
pursuit of science, literature, and the arts—the proximity of Europe, which
allows them to neglect these pursuits without relapsing into barbarism—a
thousand special causes, of which I have only been able to point out the
most important—have singularly concurred to fix the mind of the American
upon purely practical objects. His passions, his wants, his education, and

everything about him seem to unite in drawing the native of the United
States earthward: his religion alone bids him turn, from time to time, a
transient and distracted glance to heaven. Let us cease then to view all
democratic nations under the mask of the American people, and let us
attempt to survey them at length with their own proper features.
It is possible to conceive a people not subdivided into any castes or scale
of ranks; in which the law, recognizing no privileges, should divide
inherited property into equal shares; but which, at the same time, should be
without knowledge and without freedom. Nor is this an empty hypothesis: a
despot may find that it is his interest to render his subjects equal and to
leave them ignorant, in order more easily to keep them slaves. Not only
would a democratic people of this kind show neither aptitude nor taste for
science, literature, or art, but it would probably never arrive at the
possession of them. The law of descent would of itself provide for the
destruction of fortunes at each succeeding generation; and new fortunes
would be acquired by none. The poor man, without either knowledge or
freedom, would not so much as conceive the idea of raising himself to
wealth; and the rich man would allow himself to be degraded to poverty,
without a notion of self-defence. Between these two members of the
community complete and invincible equality would soon be established.
No one would then have time or taste to devote himself to the pursuits or
pleasures of the intellect; but all men would remain paralyzed by a state of
common ignorance and equal servitude. When I conceive a democratic
society of this kind, I fancy myself in one of those low, close, and gloomy
abodes, where the light which breaks in from without soon faints and fades
away. A sudden heaviness overpowers me, and I grope through the
surrounding darkness, to find the aperture which will restore me to daylight
and the air.
But all this is not applicable to men already enlightened who retain their
freedom, after having abolished from amongst them those peculiar and
hereditary rights which perpetuated the tenure of property in the hands of
certain individuals or certain bodies. When men living in a democratic state
of society are enlightened, they readily discover that they are confined and
fixed within no limits which constrain them to take up with their present
fortune. They all therefore conceive the idea of increasing it; if they are
free, they all attempt it, but all do not succeed in the same manner. The

legislature, it is true, no longer grants privileges, but they are bestowed by
nature. As natural inequality is very great, fortunes become unequal as soon
as every man exerts all his faculties to get rich. The law of descent prevents
the establishment of wealthy families; but it does not prevent the existence
of wealthy individuals. It constantly brings back the members of the
community to a common level, from which they as constantly escape: and
the inequality of fortunes augments in proportion as knowledge is diffused
and liberty increased.
A sect which arose in our time, and was celebrated for its talents and its
extravagance, proposed to concentrate all property into the hands of a
central power, whose function it should afterwards be to parcel it out to
individuals, according to their capacity. This would have been a method of
escaping from that complete and eternal equality which seems to threaten
democratic society. But it would be a simpler and less dangerous remedy to
grant no privilege to any, giving to all equal cultivation and equal
independence, and leaving everyone to determine his own position. Natural
inequality will very soon make way for itself, and wealth will
spontaneously pass into the hands of the most capable.
Free and democratic communities, then, will always contain a
considerable number of people enjoying opulence or competency. The
wealthy will not be so closely linked to each other as the members of the
former aristocratic class of society: their propensities will be different, and
they will scarcely ever enjoy leisure as secure or as complete: but they will
be far more numerous than those who belonged to that class of society
could ever be. These persons will not be strictly confined to the cares of
practical life, and they will still be able, though in different degrees, to
indulge in the pursuits and pleasures of the intellect. In those pleasures they
will indulge; for if it be true that the human mind leans on one side to the
narrow, the practical, and the useful, it naturally rises on the other to the
infinite, the spiritual, and the beautiful. Physical wants confine it to the
earth; but, as soon as the tie is loosened, it will unbend itself again.
Not only will the number of those who can take an interest in the
productions of the mind be enlarged, but the taste for intellectual enjoyment
will descend, step by step, even to those who, in aristocratic societies, seem
to have neither time nor ability to in indulge in them. When hereditary
wealth, the privileges of rank, and the prerogatives of birth have ceased to

be, and when every man derives his strength from himself alone, it becomes
evident that the chief cause of disparity between the fortunes of men is the
mind. Whatever tends to invigorate, to extend, or to adorn the mind,
instantly rises to great value. The utility of knowledge becomes singularly
conspicuous even to the eyes of the multitude: those who have no taste for
its charms set store upon its results, and make some efforts to acquire it. In
free and enlightened democratic ages, there is nothing to separate men from
each other or to retain them in their peculiar sphere; they rise or sink with
extreme rapidity. All classes live in perpetual intercourse from their great
proximity to each other. They communicate and intermingle every day—
they imitate and envy one other: this suggests to the people many ideas,
notions, and desires which it would never have entertained if the
distinctions of rank had been fixed and society at rest. In such nations the
servant never considers himself as an entire stranger to the pleasures and
toils of his master, nor the poor man to those of the rich; the rural
population assimilates itself to that of the towns, and the provinces to the
capital. No one easily allows himself to be reduced to the mere material
cares of life; and the humblest artisan casts at times an eager and a furtive
glance into the higher regions of the intellect. People do not read with the
same notions or in the same manner as they do in an aristocratic
community; but the circle of readers is unceasingly expanded, till it
includes all the citizens.
As soon as the multitude begins to take an interest in the labors of the
mind, it finds out that to excel in some of them is a powerful method of
acquiring fame, power, or wealth. The restless ambition which equality
begets instantly takes this direction as it does all others. The number of
those who cultivate science, letters, and the arts, becomes immense. The
intellectual world starts into prodigious activity: everyone endeavors to
open for himself a path there, and to draw the eyes of the public after him.
Something analogous occurs to what happens in society in the United
States, politically considered. What is done is often imperfect, but the
attempts are innumerable; and, although the results of individual effort are
commonly very small, the total amount is always very large.
It is therefore not true to assert that men living in democratic ages are
naturally indifferent to science, literature, and the arts: only it must be
acknowledged that they cultivate them after their own fashion, and bring to
the task their own peculiar qualifications and deficiencies.

Chapter X: Why The Americans Are More
Addicted To Practical Than To Theoretical
Science
If a democratic state of society and democratic institutions do not stop
the career of the human mind, they incontestably guide it in one direction in
preference to another. Their effects, thus circumscribed, are still
exceedingly great; and I trust I may be pardoned if I pause for a moment to
survey them. We had occasion, in speaking of the philosophical method of
the American people, to make several remarks which must here be turned to
account.
Equality begets in man the desire of judging of everything for himself: it
gives him, in all things, a taste for the tangible and the real, a contempt for
tradition and for forms. These general tendencies are principally discernible
in the peculiar subject of this chapter. Those who cultivate the sciences
amongst a democratic people are always afraid of losing their way in
visionary speculation. They mistrust systems; they adhere closely to facts
and the study of facts with their own senses. As they do not easily defer to
the mere name of any fellow-man, they are never inclined to rest upon any
man's authority; but, on the contrary, they are unremitting in their efforts to
point out the weaker points of their neighbors' opinions. Scientific
precedents have very little weight with them; they are never long detained
by the subtilty of the schools, nor ready to accept big words for sterling
coin; they penetrate, as far as they can, into the principal parts of the subject
which engages them, and they expound them in the vernacular tongue.
Scientific pursuits then follow a freer and a safer course, but a less lofty
one.
The mind may, as it appears to me, divide science into three parts. The
first comprises the most theoretical principles, and those more abstract
notions whose application is either unknown or very remote. The second is
composed of those general truths which still belong to pure theory, but lead,
nevertheless, by a straight and short road to practical results. Methods of
application and means of execution make up the third. Each of these

different portions of science may be separately cultivated, although reason
and experience show that none of them can prosper long, if it be absolutely
cut off from the two others.
In America the purely practical part of science is admirably understood,
and careful attention is paid to the theoretical portion which is immediately
requisite to application. On this head the Americans always display a clear,
free, original, and inventive power of mind. But hardly anyone in the
United States devotes himself to the essentially theoretical and abstract
portion of human knowledge. In this respect the Americans carry to excess
a tendency which is, I think, discernible, though in a less degree, amongst
all democratic nations.
Nothing is more necessary to the culture of the higher sciences, or of the
more elevated departments of science, than meditation; and nothing is less
suited to meditation than the structure of democratic society. We do not find
there, as amongst an aristocratic people, one class which clings to a state of
repose because it is well off; and another which does not venture to stir
because it despairs of improving its condition. Everyone is actively in
motion: some in quest of power, others of gain. In the midst of this
universal tumult—this incessant conflict of jarring interests—this continual
stride of men after fortune—where is that calm to be found which is
necessary for the deeper combinations of the intellect? How can the mind
dwell upon any single point, when everything whirls around it, and man
himself is swept and beaten onwards by the heady current which rolls all
things in its course? But the permanent agitation which subsists in the
bosom of a peaceable and established democracy, must be distinguished
from the tumultuous and revolutionary movements which almost always
attend the birth and growth of democratic society. When a violent
revolution occurs amongst a highly civilized people, it cannot fail to give a
sudden impulse to their feelings and their opinions. This is more
particularly true of democratic revolutions, which stir up all the classes of
which a people is composed, and beget, at the same time, inordinate
ambition in the breast of every member of the community. The French
made most surprising advances in the exact sciences at the very time at
which they were finishing the destruction of the remains of their former
feudal society; yet this sudden fecundity is not to be attributed to
democracy, but to the unexampled revolution which attended its growth.
What happened at that period was a special incident, and it would be

unwise to regard it as the test of a general principle. Great revolutions are
not more common amongst democratic nations than amongst others: I am
even inclined to believe that they are less so. But there prevails amongst
those populations a small distressing motion—a sort of incessant jostling of
men—which annoys and disturbs the mind, without exciting or elevating it.
Men who live in democratic communities not only seldom indulge in
meditation, but they naturally entertain very little esteem for it. A
democratic state of society and democratic institutions plunge the greater
part of men in constant active life; and the habits of mind which are suited
to an active life, are not always suited to a contemplative one. The man of
action is frequently obliged to content himself with the best he can get,
because he would never accomplish his purpose if he chose to carry every
detail to perfection. He has perpetually occasion to rely on ideas which he
has not had leisure to search to the bottom; for he is much more frequently
aided by the opportunity of an idea than by its strict accuracy; and, in the
long run, he risks less in making use of some false principles, than in
spending his time in establishing all his principles on the basis of truth. The
world is not led by long or learned demonstrations; a rapid glance at
particular incidents, the daily study of the fleeting passions of the multitude,
the accidents of the time, and the art of turning them to account, decide all
its affairs.
In the ages in which active life is the condition of almost everyone, men
are therefore generally led to attach an excessive value to the rapid bursts
and superficial conceptions of the intellect; and, on the other hand, to
depreciate below their true standard its slower and deeper labors. This
opinion of the public influences the judgment of the men who cultivate the
sciences; they are persuaded that they may succeed in those pursuits
without meditation, or deterred from such pursuits as demand it.
There are several methods of studying the sciences. Amongst a multitude
of men you will find a selfish, mercantile, and trading taste for the
discoveries of the mind, which must not be confounded with that
disinterested passion which is kindled in the heart of the few. A desire to
utilize knowledge is one thing; the pure desire to know is another. I do not
doubt that in a few minds and far between, an ardent, inexhaustible love of
truth springs up, self-supported, and living in ceaseless fruition without ever
attaining the satisfaction which it seeks. This ardent love it is—this proud,
disinterested love of what is true—which raises men to the abstract sources

of truth, to draw their mother-knowledge thence. If Pascal had had nothing
in view but some large gain, or even if he had been stimulated by the love
of fame alone, I cannot conceive that he would ever have been able to rally
all the powers of his mind, as he did, for the better discovery of the most
hidden things of the Creator. When I see him, as it were, tear his soul from
the midst of all the cares of life to devote it wholly to these researches, and,
prematurely snapping the links which bind the frame to life, die of old age
before forty, I stand amazed, and I perceive that no ordinary cause is at
work to produce efforts so extra-ordinary.
The future will prove whether these passions, at once so rare and so
productive, come into being and into growth as easily in the midst of
democratic as in aristocratic communities. For myself, I confess that I am
slow to believe it. In aristocratic society, the class which gives the tone to
opinion, and has the supreme guidance of affairs, being permanently and
hereditarily placed above the multitude, naturally conceives a lofty idea of
itself and of man. It loves to invent for him noble pleasures, to carve out
splendid objects for his ambition. Aristocracies often commit very
tyrannical and very inhuman actions; but they rarely entertain grovelling
thoughts; and they show a kind of haughty contempt of little pleasures, even
whilst they indulge in them. The effect is greatly to raise the general pitch
of society. In aristocratic ages vast ideas are commonly entertained of the
dignity, the power, and the greatness of man. These opinions exert their
influence on those who cultivate the sciences, as well as on the rest of the
community. They facilitate the natural impulse of the mind to the highest
regions of thought, and they naturally prepare it to conceive a sublime—
nay, almost a divine—love of truth. Men of science at such periods are
consequently carried away by theory; and it even happens that they
frequently conceive an inconsiderate contempt for the practical part of
learning. "Archimedes," says Plutarch, "was of so lofty a spirit, that he
never condescended to write any treatise on the manner of constructing all
these engines of offence and defence. And as he held this science of
inventing and putting together engines, and all arts generally speaking
which tended to any useful end in practice, to be vile, low, and mercenary,
he spent his talents and his studious hours in writing of those things only
whose beauty and subtilty had in them no admixture of necessity." Such is
the aristocratic aim of science; in democratic nations it cannot be the same.

The greater part of the men who constitute these nations are extremely
eager in the pursuit of actual and physical gratification. As they are always
dissatisfied with the position which they occupy, and are always free to
leave it, they think of nothing but the means of changing their fortune, or of
increasing it. To minds thus predisposed, every new method which leads by
a shorter road to wealth, every machine which spares labor, every
instrument which diminishes the cost of production, every discovery which
facilitates pleasures or augments them, seems to be the grandest effort of
the human intellect. It is chiefly from these motives that a democratic
people addicts itself to scientific pursuits—that it understands, and that it
respects them. In aristocratic ages, science is more particularly called upon
to furnish gratification to the mind; in democracies, to the body. You may
be sure that the more a nation is democratic, enlightened, and free, the
greater will be the number of these interested promoters of scientific genius,
and the more will discoveries immediately applicable to productive industry
confer gain, fame, and even power on their authors. For in democracies the
working class takes a part in public affairs; and public honors, as well as
pecuniary remuneration, may be awarded to those who deserve them. In a
community thus organized it may easily be conceived that the human mind
may be led insensibly to the neglect of theory; and that it is urged, on the
contrary, with unparalleled vehemence to the applications of science, or at
least to that portion of theoretical science which is necessary to those who
make such applications. In vain will some innate propensity raise the mind
towards the loftier spheres of the intellect; interest draws it down to the
middle zone. There it may develop all its energy and restless activity, there
it may engender all its wonders. These very Americans, who have not
discovered one of the general laws of mechanics, have introduced into
navigation an engine which changes the aspect of the world.
Assuredly I do not content that the democratic nations of our time are
destined to witness the extinction of the transcendent luminaries of man's
intelligence, nor even that no new lights will ever start into existence. At the
age at which the world has now arrived, and amongst so many cultivated
nations, perpetually excited by the fever of productive industry, the bonds
which connect the different parts of science together cannot fail to strike the
observation; and the taste for practical science itself, if it be enlightened,
ought to lead men not to neglect theory. In the midst of such numberless
attempted applications of so many experiments, repeated every day, it is

almost impossible that general laws should not frequently be brought to
light; so that great discoveries would be frequent, though great inventors be
rare. I believe, moreover, in the high calling of scientific minds. If the
democratic principle does not, on the one hand, induce men to cultivate
science for its own sake, on the other it enormously increases the number of
those who do cultivate it. Nor is it credible that, from amongst so great a
multitude no speculative genius should from time to time arise, inflamed by
the love of truth alone. Such a one, we may be sure, would dive into the
deepest mysteries of nature, whatever be the spirit of his country or his age.
He requires no assistance in his course—enough that he be not checked in
it.
All that I mean to say is this:—permanent inequality of conditions leads
men to confine themselves to the arrogant and sterile research of abstract
truths; whilst the social condition and the institutions of democracy prepare
them to seek the immediate and useful practical results of the sciences. This
tendency is natural and inevitable: it is curious to be acquainted with it, and
it may be necessary to point it out. If those who are called upon to guide the
nations of our time clearly discerned from afar off these new tendencies,
which will soon be irresistible, they would understand that, possessing
education and freedom, men living in democratic ages cannot fail to
improve the industrial part of science; and that henceforward all the efforts
of the constituted authorities ought to be directed to support the highest
branches of learning, and to foster the nobler passion for science itself. In
the present age the human mind must be coerced into theoretical studies; it
runs of its own accord to practical applications; and, instead of perpetually
referring it to the minute examination of secondary effects, it is well to
divert it from them sometimes, in order to raise it up to the contemplation of
primary causes. Because the civilization of ancient Rome perished in
consequence of the invasion of the barbarians, we are perhaps too apt to
think that civilization cannot perish in any other manner. If the light by
which we are guided is ever extinguished, it will dwindle by degrees, and
expire of itself. By dint of close adherence to mere applications, principles
would be lost sight of; and when the principles were wholly forgotten, the
methods derived from them would be ill-pursued. New methods could no
longer be invented, and men would continue to apply, without intelligence,
and without art, scientific processes no longer understood.

When Europeans first arrived in China, three hundred years ago, they
found that almost all the arts had reached a certain degree of perfection
there; and they were surprised that a people which had attained this point
should not have gone beyond it. At a later period they discovered some
traces of the higher branches of science which were lost. The nation was
absorbed in productive industry: the greater part of its scientific processes
had been preserved, but science itself no longer existed there. This served to
explain the strangely motionless state in which they found the minds of this
people. The Chinese, in following the track of their forefathers, had
forgotten the reasons by which the latter had been guided. They still used
the formula, without asking for its meaning: they retained the instrument,
but they no longer possessed the art of altering or renewing it. The Chinese,
then, had lost the power of change; for them to improve was impossible.
They were compelled, at all times and in all points, to imitate their
predecessors, lest they should stray into utter darkness, by deviating for an
instant from the path already laid down for them. The source of human
knowledge was all but dry; and though the stream still ran on, it could
neither swell its waters nor alter its channel. Notwithstanding this, China
had subsisted peaceably for centuries. The invaders who had conquered the
country assumed the manners of the inhabitants, and order prevailed there.
A sort of physical prosperity was everywhere discernible: revolutions were
rare, and war was, so to speak, unknown.
It is then a fallacy to flatter ourselves with the reflection that the
barbarians are still far from us; for if there be some nations which allow
civilization to be torn from their grasp, there are others who trample it
themselves under their feet.

Chapter XI: Of The Spirit In Which The
Americans Cultivate The Arts
It would be to waste the time of my readers and my own if I strove to
demonstrate how the general mediocrity of fortunes, the absence of
superfluous wealth, the universal desire of comfort, and the constant efforts
by which everyone attempts to procure it, make the taste for the useful
predominate over the love of the beautiful in the heart of man. Democratic
nations, amongst which all these things exist, will therefore cultivate the
arts which serve to render life easy, in preference to those whose object is to
adorn it. They will habitually prefer the useful to the beautiful, and they will
require that the beautiful should be useful. But I propose to go further; and
after having pointed out this first feature, to sketch several others.
It commonly happens that in the ages of privilege the practice of almost
all the arts becomes a privilege; and that every profession is a separate
walk, upon which it is not allowable for everyone to enter. Even when
productive industry is free, the fixed character which belongs to aristocratic
nations gradually segregates all the persons who practise the same art, till
they form a distinct class, always composed of the same families, whose
members are all known to each other, and amongst whom a public opinion
of their own and a species of corporate pride soon spring up. In a class or
guild of this kind, each artisan has not only his fortune to make, but his
reputation to preserve. He is not exclusively swayed by his own interest, or
even by that of his customer, but by that of the body to which he belongs;
and the interest of that body is, that each artisan should produce the best
possible workmanship. In aristocratic ages, the object of the arts is therefore
to manufacture as well as possible—not with the greatest despatch, or at the
lowest rate.
When, on the contrary, every profession is open to all—when a multitude
of persons are constantly embracing and abandoning it—and when its
several members are strangers to each other, indifferent, and from their
numbers hardly seen amongst themselves; the social tie is destroyed, and
each workman, standing alone, endeavors simply to gain the greatest

possible quantity of money at the least possible cost. The will of the
customer is then his only limit. But at the same time a corresponding
revolution takes place in the customer also. In countries in which riches as
well as power are concentrated and retained in the hands of the few, the use
of the greater part of this world's goods belongs to a small number of
individuals, who are always the same. Necessity, public opinion, or
moderate desires exclude all others from the enjoyment of them. As this
aristocratic class remains fixed at the pinnacle of greatness on which it
stands, without diminution or increase, it is always acted upon by the same
wants and affected by them in the same manner. The men of whom it is
composed naturally derive from their superior and hereditary position a
taste for what is extremely well made and lasting. This affects the general
way of thinking of the nation in relation to the arts. It often occurs, among
such a people, that even the peasant will rather go without the object he
covets, than procure it in a state of imperfection. In aristocracies, then, the
handicraftsmen work for only a limited number of very fastidious
customers: the profit they hope to make depends principally on the
perfection of their workmanship.
Such is no longer the case when, all privileges being abolished, ranks are
intermingled, and men are forever rising or sinking upon the ladder of
society. Amongst a democratic people a number of citizens always exist
whose patrimony is divided and decreasing. They have contracted, under
more prosperous circumstances, certain wants, which remain after the
means of satisfying such wants are gone; and they are anxiously looking out
for some surreptitious method of providing for them. On the other hand,
there are always in democracies a large number of men whose fortune is
upon the increase, but whose desires grow much faster than their fortunes:
and who gloat upon the gifts of wealth in anticipation, long before they
have means to command them. Such men eager to find some short cut to
these gratifications, already almost within their reach. From the
combination of these causes the result is, that in democracies there are
always a multitude of individuals whose wants are above their means, and
who are very willing to take up with imperfect satisfaction rather than
abandon the object of their desires.
The artisan readily understands these passions, for he himself partakes in
them: in an aristocracy he would seek to sell his workmanship at a high
price to the few; he now conceives that the more expeditious way of getting

rich is to sell them at a low price to all. But there are only two ways of
lowering the price of commodities. The first is to discover some better,
shorter, and more ingenious method of producing them: the second is to
manufacture a larger quantity of goods, nearly similar, but of less value.
Amongst a democratic population, all the intellectual faculties of the
workman are directed to these two objects: he strives to invent methods
which may enable him not only to work better, but quicker and cheaper; or,
if he cannot succeed in that, to diminish the intrinsic qualities of the thing
he makes, without rendering it wholly unfit for the use for which it is
intended. When none but the wealthy had watches, they were almost all
very good ones: few are now made which are worth much, but everybody
has one in his pocket. Thus the democratic principle not only tends to direct
the human mind to the useful arts, but it induces the artisan to produce with
greater rapidity a quantity of imperfect commodities, and the consumer to
content himself with these commodities.
Not that in democracies the arts are incapable of producing very
commendable works, if such be required. This may occasionally be the
case, if customers appear who are ready to pay for time and trouble. In this
rivalry of every kind of industry—in the midst of this immense competition
and these countless experiments, some excellent workmen are formed who
reach the utmost limits of their craft. But they have rarely an opportunity of
displaying what they can do; they are scrupulously sparing of their powers;
they remain in a state of accomplished mediocrity, which condemns itself,
and, though it be very well able to shoot beyond the mark before it, aims
only at what it hits. In aristocracies, on the contrary, workmen always do all
they can; and when they stop, it is because they have reached the limit of
their attainments.
When I arrive in a country where I find some of the finest productions of
the arts, I learn from this fact nothing of the social condition or of the
political constitution of the country. But if I perceive that the productions of
the arts are generally of an inferior quality, very abundant and very cheap, I
am convinced that, amongst the people where this occurs, privilege is on
the decline, and that ranks are beginning to intermingle, and will soon be
confounded together.
The handicraftsmen of democratic ages endeavor not only to bring their
useful productions within the reach of the whole community, but they strive

to give to all their commodities attractive qualities which they do not in
reality possess. In the confusion of all ranks everyone hopes to appear what
he is not, and makes great exertions to succeed in this object. This
sentiment indeed, which is but too natural to the heart of man, does not
originate in the democratic principle; but that principle applies it to material
objects. To mimic virtue is of every age; but the hypocrisy of luxury
belongs more particularly to the ages of democracy.
To satisfy these new cravings of human vanity the arts have recourse to
every species of imposture: and these devices sometimes go so far as to
defeat their own purpose. Imitation diamonds are now made which may be
easily mistaken for real ones; as soon as the art of fabricating false
diamonds shall have reached so high a degree of perfection that they cannot
be distinguished from real ones, it is probable that both one and the other
will be abandoned, and become mere pebbles again.
This leads me to speak of those arts which are called the fine arts, by way
of distinction. I do not believe that it is a necessary effect of a democratic
social condition and of democratic institutions to diminish the number of
men who cultivate the fine arts; but these causes exert a very powerful
influence on the manner in which these arts are cultivated. Many of those
who had already contracted a taste for the fine arts are impoverished: on the
other hand, many of those who are not yet rich begin to conceive that taste,
at least by imitation; and the number of consumers increases, but opulent
and fastidious consumers become more scarce. Something analogous to
what I have already pointed out in the useful arts then takes place in the fine
arts; the productions of artists are more numerous, but the merit of each
production is diminished. No longer able to soar to what is great, they
cultivate what is pretty and elegant; and appearance is more attended to
than reality. In aristocracies a few great pictures are produced; in
democratic countries, a vast number of insignificant ones. In the former,
statues are raised of bronze; in the latter, they are modelled in plaster.
When I arrived for the first time at New York, by that part of the Atlantic
Ocean which is called the Narrows, I was surprised to perceive along the
shore, at some distance from the city, a considerable number of little palaces
of white marble, several of which were built after the models of ancient
architecture. When I went the next day to inspect more closely the building
which had particularly attracted my notice, I found that its walls were of

whitewashed brick, and its columns of painted wood. All the edifices which
I had admired the night before were of the same kind.
The social condition and the institutions of democracy impart, moreover,
certain peculiar tendencies to all the imitative arts, which it is easy to point
out. They frequently withdraw them from the delineation of the soul to fix
them exclusively on that of the body: and they substitute the representation
of motion and sensation for that of sentiment and thought: in a word, they
put the real in the place of the ideal. I doubt whether Raphael studied the
minutest intricacies of the mechanism of the human body as thoroughly as
the draughtsmen of our own time. He did not attach the same importance to
rigorous accuracy on this point as they do, because he aspired to surpass
nature. He sought to make of man something which should be superior to
man, and to embellish beauty's self. David and his scholars were, on the
contrary, as good anatomists as they were good painters. They wonderfully
depicted the models which they had before their eyes, but they rarely
imagined anything beyond them: they followed nature with fidelity: whilst
Raphael sought for something better than nature. They have left us an exact
portraiture of man; but he discloses in his works a glimpse of the Divinity.
This remark as to the manner of treating a subject is no less applicable to
the choice of it. The painters of the Middle Ages generally sought far above
themselves, and away from their own time, for mighty subjects, which left
to their imagination an unbounded range. Our painters frequently employ
their talents in the exact imitation of the details of private life, which they
have always before their eyes; and they are forever copying trivial objects,
the originals of which are only too abundant in nature.

Chapter XII: Why The Americans Raise Some
Monuments So Insignificant, And Others So
Important
I have just observed, that in democratic ages monuments of the arts tend
to become more numerous and less important. I now hasten to point out the
exception to this rule. In a democratic community individuals are very
powerless; but the State which represents them all, and contains them all in
its grasp, is very powerful. Nowhere do citizens appear so insignificant as
in a democratic nation; nowhere does the nation itself appear greater, or
does the mind more easily take in a wide general survey of it. In democratic
communities the imagination is compressed when men consider
themselves; it expands indefinitely when they think of the State. Hence it is
that the same men who live on a small scale in narrow dwellings, frequently
aspire to gigantic splendor in the erection of their public monuments.
The Americans traced out the circuit of an immense city on the site which
they intended to make their capital, but which, up to the present time, is
hardly more densely peopled than Pontoise, though, according to them, it
will one day contain a million of inhabitants. They have already rooted up
trees for ten miles round, lest they should interfere with the future citizens
of this imaginary metropolis. They have erected a magnificent palace for
Congress in the centre of the city, and have given it the pompous name of
the Capitol. The several States of the Union are every day planning and
erecting for themselves prodigious undertakings, which would astonish the
engineers of the great European nations. Thus democracy not only leads
men to a vast number of inconsiderable productions; it also leads them to
raise some monuments on the largest scale: but between these two extremes
there is a blank. A few scattered remains of enormous buildings can
therefore teach us nothing of the social condition and the institutions of the
people by whom they were raised. I may add, though the remark leads me
to step out of my subject, that they do not make us better acquainted with its
greatness, its civilization, and its real prosperity. Whensoever a power of
any kind shall be able to make a whole people co-operate in a single

undertaking, that power, with a little knowledge and a great deal of time,
will succeed in obtaining something enormous from the co-operation of
efforts so multiplied. But this does not lead to the conclusion that the people
was very happy, very enlightened, or even very strong.
The Spaniards found the City of Mexico full of magnificent temples and
vast palaces; but that did not prevent Cortes from conquering the Mexican
Empire with 600 foot soldiers and sixteen horses. If the Romans had been
better acquainted with the laws of hydraulics, they would not have
constructed all the aqueducts which surround the ruins of their cities—they
would have made a better use of their power and their wealth. If they had
invented the steam-engine, perhaps they would not have extended to the
extremities of their empire those long artificial roads which are called
Roman roads. These things are at once the splendid memorials of their
ignorance and of their greatness. A people which should leave no other
vestige of its track than a few leaden pipes in the earth and a few iron rods
upon its surface, might have been more the master of nature than the
Romans.

Chapter XIII: Literary Characteristics Of
Democratic Ages
When a traveller goes into a bookseller's shop in the United States, and
examines the American books upon the shelves, the number of works
appears extremely great; whilst that of known authors appears, on the
contrary, to be extremely small. He will first meet with a number of
elementary treatises, destined to teach the rudiments of human knowledge.
Most of these books are written in Europe; the Americans reprint them,
adapting them to their own country. Next comes an enormous quantity of
religious works, Bibles, sermons, edifying anecdotes, controversial divinity,
and reports of charitable societies; lastly, appears the long catalogue of
political pamphlets. In America, parties do not write books to combat each
others' opinions, but pamphlets which are circulated for a day with
incredible rapidity, and then expire. In the midst of all these obscure
productions of the human brain are to be found the more remarkable works
of that small number of authors, whose names are, or ought to be, known to
Europeans.
Although America is perhaps in our days the civilized country in which
literature is least attended to, a large number of persons are nevertheless to
be found there who take an interest in the productions of the mind, and who
make them, if not the study of their lives, at least the charm of their leisure
hours. But England supplies these readers with the larger portion of the
books which they require. Almost all important English books are
republished in the United States. The literary genius of Great Britain still
darts its rays into the recesses of the forests of the New World. There is
hardly a pioneer's hut which does not contain a few odd volumes of
Shakespeare. I remember that I read the feudal play of Henry V for the first
time in a loghouse.
Not only do the Americans constantly draw upon the treasures of English
literature, but it may be said with truth that they find the literature of
England growing on their own soil. The larger part of that small number of
men in the United States who are engaged in the composition of literary

works are English in substance, and still more so in form. Thus they
transport into the midst of democracy the ideas and literary fashions which
are current amongst the aristocratic nation they have taken for their model.
They paint with colors borrowed from foreign manners; and as they hardly
ever represent the country they were born in as it really is, they are seldom
popular there. The citizens of the United States are themselves so convinced
that it is not for them that books are published, that before they can make up
their minds upon the merit of one of their authors, they generally wait till
his fame has been ratified in England, just as in pictures the author of an
original is held to be entitled to judge of the merit of a copy. The inhabitants
of the United States have then at present, properly speaking, no literature.
The only authors whom I acknowledge as American are the journalists.
They indeed are not great writers, but they speak the language of their
countrymen, and make themselves heard by them. Other authors are aliens;
they are to the Americans what the imitators of the Greeks and Romans
were to us at the revival of learning—an object of curiosity, not of general
sympathy. They amuse the mind, but they do not act upon the manners of
the people.
I have already said that this state of things is very far from originating in
democracy alone, and that the causes of it must be sought for in several
peculiar circumstances independent of the democratic principle. If the
Americans, retaining the same laws and social condition, had had a
different origin, and had been transported into another country, I do not
question that they would have had a literature. Even as they now are, I am
convinced that they will ultimately have one; but its character will be
different from that which marks the American literary productions of our
time, and that character will be peculiarly its own. Nor is it impossible to
trace this character beforehand.
I suppose an aristocratic people amongst whom letters are cultivated; the
labors of the mind, as well as the affairs of state, are conducted by a ruling
class in society. The literary as well as the political career is almost entirely
confined to this class, or to those nearest to it in rank. These premises
suffice to give me a key to all the rest. When a small number of the same
men are engaged at the same time upon the same objects, they easily
concert with one another, and agree upon certain leading rules which are to
govern them each and all. If the object which attracts the attention of these
men is literature, the productions of the mind will soon be subjected by

them to precise canons, from which it will no longer be allowable to depart.
If these men occupy a hereditary position in the country, they will be
naturally inclined, not only to adopt a certain number of fixed rules for
themselves, but to follow those which their forefathers laid down for their
own guidance; their code will be at once strict and traditional. As they are
not necessarily engrossed by the cares of daily life—as they have never
been so, any more than their fathers were before them—they have learned
to take an interest, for several generations back, in the labors of the mind.
They have learned to understand literature as an art, to love it in the end for
its own sake, and to feel a scholar-like satisfaction in seeing men conform
to its rules. Nor is this all: the men of whom I speak began and will end
their lives in easy or in affluent circumstances; hence they have naturally
conceived a taste for choice gratifications, and a love of refined and delicate
pleasures. Nay more, a kind of indolence of mind and heart, which they
frequently contract in the midst of this long and peaceful enjoyment of so
much welfare, leads them to put aside, even from their pleasures, whatever
might be too startling or too acute. They had rather be amused than
intensely excited; they wish to be interested, but not to be carried away.
Now let us fancy a great number of literary performances executed by the
men, or for the men, whom I have just described, and we shall readily
conceive a style of literature in which everything will be regular and
prearranged. The slightest work will be carefully touched in its least details;
art and labor will be conspicuous in everything; each kind of writing will
have rules of its own, from which it will not be allowed to swerve, and
which distinguish it from all others. Style will be thought of almost as much
importance as thought; and the form will be no less considered than the
matter: the diction will be polished, measured, and uniform. The tone of the
mind will be always dignified, seldom very animated; and writers will care
more to perfect what they produce than to multiply their productions. It will
sometimes happen that the members of the literary class, always living
amongst themselves and writing for themselves alone, will lose sight of the
rest of the world, which will infect them with a false and labored style; they
will lay down minute literary rules for their exclusive use, which will
insensibly lead them to deviate from common-sense, and finally to
transgress the bounds of nature. By dint of striving after a mode of parlance
different from the vulgar, they will arrive at a sort of aristocratic jargon,
which is hardly less remote from pure language than is the coarse dialect of

the people. Such are the natural perils of literature amongst aristocracies.
Every aristocracy which keeps itself entirely aloof from the people becomes
impotent—a fact which is as true in literature as it is in politics. *a
a
[ All this is especially true of the aristocratic countries which
have been long and peacefully subject to a monarchical
government. When liberty prevails in an aristocracy, the
higher ranks are constantly obliged to make use of the lower
classes; and when they use, they approach them. This
frequently introduces something of a democratic spirit into
an aristocratic community. There springs up, moreover, in a
privileged body, governing with energy and an habitually
bold policy, a taste for stir and excitement which must
infallibly affect all literary performances.]
Let us now turn the picture and consider the other side of it; let us
transport ourselves into the midst of a democracy, not unprepared by
ancient traditions and present culture to partake in the pleasures of the
mind. Ranks are there intermingled and confounded; knowledge and power
are both infinitely subdivided, and, if I may use the expression, scattered on
every side. Here then is a motley multitude, whose intellectual wants are to
be supplied. These new votaries of the pleasures of the mind have not all
received the same education; they do not possess the same degree of culture
as their fathers, nor any resemblance to them—nay, they perpetually differ
from themselves, for they live in a state of incessant change of place,
feelings, and fortunes. The mind of each member of the community is
therefore unattached to that of his fellow-citizens by tradition or by
common habits; and they have never had the power, the inclination, nor the
time to concert together. It is, however, from the bosom of this
heterogeneous and agitated mass that authors spring; and from the same
source their profits and their fame are distributed. I can without difficulty
understand that, under these circumstances, I must expect to meet in the
literature of such a people with but few of those strict conventional rules
which are admitted by readers and by writers in aristocratic ages. If it
should happen that the men of some one period were agreed upon any such
rules, that would prove nothing for the following period; for amongst
democratic nations each new generation is a new people. Amongst such
nations, then, literature will not easily be subjected to strict rules, and it is
impossible that any such rules should ever be permanent.

In democracies it is by no means the case that all the men who cultivate
literature have received a literary education; and most of those who have
some tinge of belles-lettres are either engaged in politics, or in a profession
which only allows them to taste occasionally and by stealth the pleasures of
the mind. These pleasures, therefore, do not constitute the principal charm
of their lives; but they are considered as a transient and necessary recreation
amidst the serious labors of life. Such man can never acquire a sufficiently
intimate knowledge of the art of literature to appreciate its more delicate
beauties; and the minor shades of expression must escape them. As the time
they can devote to letters is very short, they seek to make the best use of the
whole of it. They prefer books which may be easily procured, quickly read,
and which require no learned researches to be understood. They ask for
beauties, self-proffered and easily enjoyed; above all, they must have what
is unexpected and new. Accustomed to the struggle, the crosses, and the
monotony of practical life, they require rapid emotions, startling passages—
truths or errors brilliant enough to rouse them up, and to plunge them at
once, as if by violence, into the midst of a subject.
Why should I say more? or who does not understand what is about to
follow, before I have expressed it? Taken as a whole, literature in
democratic ages can never present, as it does in the periods of aristocracy,
an aspect of order, regularity, science, and art; its form will, on the contrary,
ordinarily be slighted, sometimes despised. Style will frequently be
fantastic, incorrect, overburdened, and loose—almost always vehement and
bold. Authors will aim at rapidity of execution, more than at perfection of
detail. Small productions will be more common than bulky books; there
will be more wit than erudition, more imagination than profundity; and
literary performances will bear marks of an untutored and rude vigor of
thought—frequently of great variety and singular fecundity. The object of
authors will be to astonish rather than to please, and to stir the passions
more than to charm the taste. Here and there, indeed, writers will doubtless
occur who will choose a different track, and who will, if they are gifted with
superior abilities, succeed in finding readers, in spite of their defects or their
better qualities; but these exceptions will be rare, and even the authors who
shall so depart from the received practice in the main subject of their works,
will always relapse into it in some lesser details.
I have just depicted two extreme conditions: the transition by which a
nation passes from the former to the latter is not sudden but gradual, and

marked with shades of very various intensity. In the passage which
conducts a lettered people from the one to the other, there is almost always
a moment at which the literary genius of democratic nations has its
confluence with that of aristocracies, and both seek to establish their joint
sway over the human mind. Such epochs are transient, but very brilliant:
they are fertile without exuberance, and animated without confusion. The
French literature of the eighteenth century may serve as an example.
I should say more than I mean if I were to assert that the literature of a
nation is always subordinate to its social condition and its political
constitution. I am aware that, independently of these causes, there are
several others which confer certain characteristics on literary productions;
but these appear to me to be the chief. The relations which exist between
the social and political condition of a people and the genius of its authors
are always very numerous: whoever knows the one is never completely
ignorant of the other.

Chapter XIV: The Trade Of Literature
Democracy not only infuses a taste for letters among the trading classes,
but introduces a trading spirit into literature. In aristocracies, readers are
fastidious and few in number; in democracies, they are far more numerous
and far less difficult to please. The consequence is, that among aristocratic
nations, no one can hope to succeed without immense exertions, and that
these exertions may bestow a great deal of fame, but can never earn much
money; whilst among democratic nations, a writer may flatter himself that
he will obtain at a cheap rate a meagre reputation and a large fortune. For
this purpose he need not be admired; it is enough that he is liked. The ever-
increasing crowd of readers, and their continual craving for something new,
insure the sale of books which nobody much esteems.
In democratic periods the public frequently treat authors as kings do their
courtiers; they enrich, and they despise them. What more is needed by the
venal souls which are born in courts, or which are worthy to live there?
Democratic literature is always infested with a tribe of writers who look
upon letters as a mere trade: and for some few great authors who adorn it
you may reckon thousands of idea-mongers.

Chapter XV: The Study Of Greek And Latin
Literature Peculiarly Useful In Democratic
Communities
What was called the People in the most democratic republics of antiquity,
was very unlike what we designate by that term. In Athens, all the citizens
took part in public affairs; but there were only 20,000 citizens to more than
350,000 inhabitants. All the rest were slaves, and discharged the greater part
of those duties which belong at the present day to the lower or even to the
middle classes. Athens, then, with her universal suffrage, was after all
merely an aristocratic republic in which all the nobles had an equal right to
the government. The struggle between the patricians and plebeians of Rome
must be considered in the same light: it was simply an intestine feud
between the elder and younger branches of the same family. All the citizens
belonged, in fact, to the aristocracy, and partook of its character.
It is moreover to be remarked, that amongst the ancients books were
always scarce and dear; and that very great difficulties impeded their
publication and circulation. These circumstances concentrated literary tastes
and habits amongst a small number of men, who formed a small literary
aristocracy out of the choicer spirits of the great political aristocracy.
Accordingly nothing goes to prove that literature was ever treated as a trade
amongst the Greeks and Romans.
These peoples, which not only constituted aristocracies, but very polished
and free nations, of course imparted to their literary productions the defects
and the merits which characterize the literature of aristocratic ages. And
indeed a very superficial survey of the literary remains of the ancients will
suffice to convince us, that if those writers were sometimes deficient in
variety, or fertility in their subjects, or in boldness, vivacity, or power of
generalization in their thoughts, they always displayed exquisite care and
skill in their details. Nothing in their works seems to be done hastily or at
random: every line is written for the eye of the connoisseur, and is shaped
after some conception of ideal beauty. No literature places those fine
qualities, in which the writers of democracies are naturally deficient, in

bolder relief than that of the ancients; no literature, therefore, ought to be
more studied in democratic ages. This study is better suited than any other
to combat the literary defects inherent in those ages; as for their more
praiseworthy literary qualities, they will spring up of their own accord,
without its being necessary to learn to acquire them.
It is important that this point should be clearly understood. A particular
study may be useful to the literature of a people, without being appropriate
to its social and political wants. If men were to persist in teaching nothing
but the literature of the dead languages in a community where everyone is
habitually led to make vehement exertions to augment or to maintain his
fortune, the result would be a very polished, but a very dangerous, race of
citizens. For as their social and political condition would give them every
day a sense of wants which their education would never teach them to
supply, they would perturb the State, in the name of the Greeks and
Romans, instead of enriching it by their productive industry.
It is evident that in democratic communities the interest of individuals, as
well as the security of the commonwealth, demands that the education of
the greater number should be scientific, commercial, and industrial, rather
than literary. Greek and Latin should not be taught in all schools; but it is
important that those who by their natural disposition or their fortune are
destined to cultivate letters or prepared to relish them, should find schools
where a complete knowledge of ancient literature may be acquired, and
where the true scholar may be formed. A few excellent universities would
do more towards the attainment of this object than a vast number of bad
grammar schools, where superfluous matters, badly learned, stand in the
way of sound instruction in necessary studies.
All who aspire to literary excellence in democratic nations, ought
frequently to refresh themselves at the springs of ancient literature: there is
no more wholesome course for the mind. Not that I hold the literary
productions of the ancients to be irreproachable; but I think that they have
some especial merits, admirably calculated to counterbalance our peculiar
defects. They are a prop on the side on which we are in most danger of
falling.

Chapter XVI: The Effect Of Democracy On
Language
If the reader has rightly understood what I have already said on the
subject of literature in general, he will have no difficulty in comprehending
that species of influence which a democratic social condition and
democratic institutions may exercise over language itself, which is the chief
instrument of thought.
American authors may truly be said to live more in England than in their
own country; since they constantly study the English writers, and take them
every day for their models. But such is not the case with the bulk of the
population, which is more immediately subjected to the peculiar causes
acting upon the United States. It is not then to the written, but to the spoken
language that attention must be paid, if we would detect the modifications
which the idiom of an aristocratic people may undergo when it becomes the
language of a democracy.
Englishmen of education, and more competent judges than I can be
myself of the nicer shades of expression, have frequently assured me that
the language of the educated classes in the United States is notably different
from that of the educated classes in Great Britain. They complain not only
that the Americans have brought into use a number of new words—the
difference and the distance between the two countries might suffice to
explain that much—but that these new words are more especially taken
from the jargon of parties, the mechanical arts, or the language of trade.
They assert, in addition to this, that old English words are often used by the
Americans in new acceptations; and lastly, that the inhabitants of the United
States frequently intermingle their phraseology in the strangest manner, and
sometimes place words together which are always kept apart in the
language of the mother-country. These remarks, which were made to me at
various times by persons who appeared to be worthy of credit, led me to
reflect upon the subject; and my reflections brought me, by theoretical
reasoning, to the same point at which my informants had arrived by
practical observation.

In aristocracies, language must naturally partake of that state of repose in
which everything remains. Few new words are coined, because few new
things are made; and even if new things were made, they would be
designated by known words, whose meaning has been determined by
tradition. If it happens that the human mind bestirs itself at length, or is
roused by light breaking in from without, the novel expressions which are
introduced are characterized by a degree of learning, intelligence, and
philosophy, which shows that they do not originate in a democracy. After
the fall of Constantinople had turned the tide of science and literature
towards the west, the French language was almost immediately invaded by
a multitude of new words, which had all Greek or Latin roots. An erudite
neologism then sprang up in France which was confined to the educated
classes, and which produced no sensible effect, or at least a very gradual
one, upon the people. All the nations of Europe successively exhibited the
same change. Milton alone introduced more than six hundred words into the
English language, almost all derived from the Latin, the Greek, or the
Hebrew. The constant agitation which prevails in a democratic community
tends unceasingly, on the contrary, to change the character of the language,
as it does the aspect of affairs. In the midst of this general stir and
competition of minds, a great number of new ideas are formed, old ideas are
lost, or reappear, or are subdivided into an infinite variety of minor shades.
The consequence is, that many words must fall into desuetude, and others
must be brought into use.
Democratic nations love change for its own sake; and this is seen in their
language as much as in their politics. Even when they do not need to change
words, they sometimes feel a wish to transform them. The genius of a
democratic people is not only shown by the great number of words they
bring into use, but also by the nature of the ideas these new words
represent. Amongst such a people the majority lays down the law in
language as well as in everything else; its prevailing spirit is as manifest in
that as in other respects. But the majority is more engaged in business than
in study—in political and commercial interests than in philosophical
speculation or literary pursuits. Most of the words coined or adopted for its
use will therefore bear the mark of these habits; they will mainly serve to
express the wants of business, the passions of party, or the details of the
public administration. In these departments the language will constantly

spread, whilst on the other hand it will gradually lose ground in
metaphysics and theology.
As to the source from which democratic nations are wont to derive their
new expressions, and the manner in which they go to work to coin them,
both may easily be described. Men living in democratic countries know but
little of the language which was spoken at Athens and at Rome, and they do
not care to dive into the lore of antiquity to find the expression they happen
to want. If they have sometimes recourse to learned etymologies, vanity
will induce them to search at the roots of the dead languages; but erudition
does not naturally furnish them with its resources. The most ignorant, it
sometimes happens, will use them most. The eminently democratic desire to
get above their own sphere will often lead them to seek to dignify a vulgar
profession by a Greek or Latin name. The lower the calling is, and the more
remote from learning, the more pompous and erudite is its appellation. Thus
the French rope-dancers have transformed themselves into acrobates and
funambules.
In the absence of knowledge of the dead languages, democratic nations
are apt to borrow words from living tongues; for their mutual intercourse
becomes perpetual, and the inhabitants of different countries imitate each
other the more readily as they grow more like each other every day.
But it is principally upon their own languages that democratic nations
attempt to perpetrate innovations. From time to time they resume forgotten
expressions in their vocabulary, which they restore to use; or they borrow
from some particular class of the community a term peculiar to it, which
they introduce with a figurative meaning into the language of daily life.
Many expressions which originally belonged to the technical language of a
profession or a party, are thus drawn into general circulation.
The most common expedient employed by democratic nations to make
an innovation in language consists in giving some unwonted meaning to an
expression already in use. This method is very simple, prompt, and
convenient; no learning is required to use it aright, and ignorance itself
rather facilitates the practice; but that practice is most dangerous to the
language. When a democratic people doubles the meaning of a word in this
way, they sometimes render the signification which it retains as ambiguous
as that which it acquires. An author begins by a slight deflection of a known
expression from its primitive meaning, and he adapts it, thus modified, as

well as he can to his subject. A second writer twists the sense of the
expression in another way; a third takes possession of it for another
purpose; and as there is no common appeal to the sentence of a permanent
tribunal which may definitely settle the signification of the word, it remains
in an ambiguous condition. The consequence is that writers hardly ever
appear to dwell upon a single thought, but they always seem to point their
aim at a knot of ideas, leaving the reader to judge which of them has been
hit. This is a deplorable consequence of democracy. I had rather that the
language should be made hideous with words imported from the Chinese,
the Tartars, or the Hurons, than that the meaning of a word in our own
language should become indeterminate. Harmony and uniformity are only
secondary beauties in composition; many of these things are conventional,
and, strictly speaking, it is possible to forego them; but without clear
phraseology there is no good language.
The principle of equality necessarily introduces several other changes
into language. In aristocratic ages, when each nation tends to stand aloof
from all others and likes to have distinct characteristics of its own, it often
happens that several peoples which have a common origin become
nevertheless estranged from each other, so that, without ceasing to
understand the same language, they no longer all speak it in the same
manner. In these ages each nation is divided into a certain number of
classes, which see but little of each other, and do not intermingle. Each of
these classes contracts, and invariably retains, habits of mind peculiar to
itself, and adopts by choice certain words and certain terms, which
afterwards pass from generation to generation, like their estates. The same
idiom then comprises a language of the poor and a language of the rich—a
language of the citizen and a language of the nobility—a learned language
and a vulgar one. The deeper the divisions, and the more impassable the
barriers of society become, the more must this be the case. I would lay a
wager, that amongst the castes of India there are amazing variations of
language, and that there is almost as much difference between the language
of the pariah and that of the Brahmin as there is in their dress. When, on the
contrary, men, being no longer restrained by ranks, meet on terms of
constant intercourse—when castes are destroyed, and the classes of society
are recruited and intermixed with each other, all the words of a language are
mingled. Those which are unsuitable to the greater number perish; the
remainder form a common store, whence everyone chooses pretty nearly at

random. Almost all the different dialects which divided the idioms of
European nations are manifestly declining; there is no patois in the New
World, and it is disappearing every day from the old countries.
The influence of this revolution in social conditions is as much felt in
style as it is in phraseology. Not only does everyone use the same words,
but a habit springs up of using them without discrimination. The rules
which style had set up are almost abolished: the line ceases to be drawn
between expressions which seem by their very nature vulgar, and other
which appear to be refined. Persons springing from different ranks of
society carry the terms and expressions they are accustomed to use with
them, into whatever circumstances they may pass; thus the origin of words
is lost like the origin of individuals, and there is as much confusion in
language as there is in society.
I am aware that in the classification of words there are rules which do not
belong to one form of society any more than to another, but which are
derived from the nature of things. Some expressions and phrases are vulgar,
because the ideas they are meant to express are low in themselves; others
are of a higher character, because the objects they are intended to designate
are naturally elevated. No intermixture of ranks will ever efface these
differences. But the principle of equality cannot fail to root out whatever is
merely conventional and arbitrary in the forms of thought. Perhaps the
necessary classification which I pointed out in the last sentence will always
be less respected by a democratic people than by any other, because
amongst such a people there are no men who are permanently disposed by
education, culture, and leisure to study the natural laws of language, and
who cause those laws to be respected by their own observance of them.
I shall not quit this topic without touching on a feature of democratic
languages, which is perhaps more characteristic of them than any other. It
has already been shown that democratic nations have a taste, and sometimes
a passion, for general ideas, and that this arises from their peculiar merits
and defects. This liking for general ideas is displayed in democratic
languages by the continual use of generic terms or abstract expressions, and
by the manner in which they are employed. This is the great merit and the
great imperfection of these languages. Democratic nations are passionately
addicted to generic terms or abstract expressions, because these modes of
speech enlarge thought, and assist the operations of the mind by enabling it

to include several objects in a small compass. A French democratic writer
will be apt to say capacites in the abstract for men of capacity, and without
particularizing the objects to which their capacity is applied: he will talk
about actualities to designate in one word the things passing before his eyes
at the instant; and he will comprehend under the term eventualities
whatever may happen in the universe, dating from the moment at which he
speaks. Democratic writers are perpetually coining words of this kind, in
which they sublimate into further abstraction the abstract terms of the
language. Nay, more, to render their mode of speech more succinct, they
personify the subject of these abstract terms, and make it act like a real
entity. Thus they would say in French, "La force des choses veut que les
capacites gouvernent."
I cannot better illustrate what I mean than by my own example. I have
frequently used the word "equality" in an absolute sense—nay, I have
personified equality in several places; thus I have said that equality does
such and such things, or refrains from doing others. It may be affirmed that
the writers of the age of Louis XIV would not have used these expressions:
they would never have thought of using the word "equality" without
applying it to some particular object; and they would rather have renounced
the term altogether than have consented to make a living personage of it.
These abstract terms which abound in democratic languages, and which
are used on every occasion without attaching them to any particular fact,
enlarge and obscure the thoughts they are intended to convey; they render
the mode of speech more succinct, and the idea contained in it less clear.
But with regard to language, democratic nations prefer obscurity to labor. I
know not indeed whether this loose style has not some secret charm for
those who speak and write amongst these nations. As the men who live
there are frequently left to the efforts of their individual powers of mind,
they are almost always a prey to doubt; and as their situation in life is
forever changing, they are never held fast to any of their opinions by the
certain tenure of their fortunes. Men living in democratic countries are,
then, apt to entertain unsettled ideas, and they require loose expressions to
convey them. As they never know whether the idea they express to-day will
be appropriate to the new position they may occupy to-morrow, they
naturally acquire a liking for abstract terms. An abstract term is like a box
with a false bottom: you may put in it what ideas you please, and take them
out again without being observed.

Amongst all nations, generic and abstract terms form the basis of
language. I do not, therefore, affect to expel these terms from democratic
languages; I simply remark that men have an especial tendency, in the ages
of democracy, to multiply words of this kind—to take them always by
themselves in their most abstract acceptation, and to use them on all
occasions, even when the nature of the discourse does not require them.

Chapter XVII: Of Some Of The Sources Of Poetry
Amongst Democratic Nations
Various different significations have been given to the word "poetry." It
would weary my readers if I were to lead them into a discussion as to which
of these definitions ought to be selected: I prefer telling them at once that
which I have chosen. In my opinion, poetry is the search and the delineation
of the ideal. The poet is he who, by suppressing a part of what exists, by
adding some imaginary touches to the picture, and by combining certain
real circumstances, but which do not in fact concurrently happen, completes
and extends the work of nature. Thus the object of poetry is not to represent
what is true, but to adorn it, and to present to the mind some loftier imagery.
Verse, regarded as the ideal beauty of language, may be eminently poetical;
but verse does not, of itself, constitute poetry.
I now proceed to inquire whether, amongst the actions, the sentiments,
and the opinions of democratic nations, there are any which lead to a
conception of ideal beauty, and which may for this reason be considered as
natural sources of poetry. It must in the first place, be acknowledged that
the taste for ideal beauty, and the pleasure derived from the expression of it,
are never so intense or so diffused amongst a democratic as amongst an
aristocratic people. In aristocratic nations it sometimes happens that the
body goes on to act as it were spontaneously, whilst the higher faculties are
bound and burdened by repose. Amongst these nations the people will very
often display poetic tastes, and sometimes allow their fancy to range
beyond and above what surrounds them. But in democracies the love of
physical gratification, the notion of bettering one's condition, the excitement
of competition, the charm of anticipated success, are so many spurs to urge
men onwards in the active professions they have embraced, without
allowing them to deviate for an instant from the track. The main stress of
the faculties is to this point. The imagination is not extinct; but its chief
function is to devise what may be useful, and to represent what is real.
The principle of equality not only diverts men from the description of
ideal beauty—it also diminishes the number of objects to be described.

Aristocracy, by maintaining society in a fixed position, is favorable to the
solidity and duration of positive religions, as well as to the stability of
political institutions. It not only keeps the human mind within a certain
sphere of belief, but it predisposes the mind to adopt one faith rather than
another. An aristocratic people will always be prone to place intermediate
powers between God and man. In this respect it may be said that the
aristocratic element is favorable to poetry. When the universe is peopled
with supernatural creatures, not palpable to the senses but discovered by the
mind, the imagination ranges freely, and poets, finding a thousand subjects
to delineate, also find a countless audience to take an interest in their
productions. In democratic ages it sometimes happens, on the contrary, that
men are as much afloat in matters of belief as they are in their laws.
Scepticism then draws the imagination of poets back to earth, and confines
them to the real and visible world. Even when the principle of equality does
not disturb religious belief, it tends to simplify it, and to divert attention
from secondary agents, to fix it principally on the Supreme Power.
Aristocracy naturally leads the human mind to the contemplation of the
past, and fixes it there. Democracy, on the contrary, gives men a sort of
instinctive distaste for what is ancient. In this respect aristocracy is far more
favorable to poetry; for things commonly grow larger and more obscure as
they are more remote; and for this twofold reason they are better suited to
the delineation of the ideal.
After having deprived poetry of the past, the principle of equality robs it
in part of the present. Amongst aristocratic nations there are a certain
number of privileged personages, whose situation is, as it were, without and
above the condition of man; to these, power, wealth, fame, wit, refinement,
and distinction in all things appear peculiarly to belong. The crowd never
sees them very closely, or does not watch them in minute details; and little
is needed to make the description of such men poetical. On the other hand,
amongst the same people, you will meet with classes so ignorant, low, and
enslaved, that they are no less fit objects for poetry from the excess of their
rudeness and wretchedness, than the former are from their greatness and
refinement. Besides, as the different classes of which an aristocratic
community is composed are widely separated, and imperfectly acquainted
with each other, the imagination may always represent them with some
addition to, or some subtraction from, what they really are. In democratic
communities, where men are all insignificant and very much alike, each

man instantly sees all his fellows when he surveys himself. The poets of
democratic ages can never, therefore, take any man in particular as the
subject of a piece; for an object of slender importance, which is distinctly
seen on all sides, will never lend itself to an ideal conception. Thus the
principle of equality; in proportion as it has established itself in the world,
has dried up most of the old springs of poetry. Let us now attempt to show
what new ones it may disclose.
When scepticism had depopulated heaven, and the progress of equality
had reduced each individual to smaller and better known proportions, the
poets, not yet aware of what they could substitute for the great themes
which were departing together with the aristocracy, turned their eyes to
inanimate nature. As they lost sight of gods and heroes, they set themselves
to describe streams and mountains. Thence originated in the last century,
that kind of poetry which has been called, by way of distinction, the
descriptive. Some have thought that this sort of delineation, embellished
with all the physical and inanimate objects which cover the earth, was the
kind of poetry peculiar to democratic ages; but I believe this to be an error,
and that it only belongs to a period of transition.
I am persuaded that in the end democracy diverts the imagination from
all that is external to man, and fixes it on man alone. Democratic nations
may amuse themselves for a while with considering the productions of
nature; but they are only excited in reality by a survey of themselves. Here,
and here alone, the true sources of poetry amongst such nations are to be
found; and it may be believed that the poets who shall neglect to draw their
inspirations hence, will lose all sway over the minds which they would
enchant, and will be left in the end with none but unimpassioned spectators
of their transports. I have shown how the ideas of progression and of the
indefinite perfectibility of the human race belong to democratic ages.
Democratic nations care but little for what has been, but they are haunted
by visions of what will be; in this direction their unbounded imagination
grows and dilates beyond all measure. Here then is the wildest range open
to the genius of poets, which allows them to remove their performances to a
sufficient distance from the eye. Democracy shuts the past against the poet,
but opens the future before him. As all the citizens who compose a
democratic community are nearly equal and alike, the poet cannot dwell
upon any one of them; but the nation itself invites the exercise of his
powers. The general similitude of individuals, which renders any one of

them taken separately an improper subject of poetry, allows poets to include
them all in the same imagery, and to take a general survey of the people
itself. Democractic nations have a clearer perception than any others of
their own aspect; and an aspect so imposing is admirably fitted to the
delineation of the ideal.
I readily admit that the Americans have no poets; I cannot allow that they
have no poetic ideas. In Europe people talk a great deal of the wilds of
America, but the Americans themselves never think about them: they are
insensible to the wonders of inanimate nature, and they may be said not to
perceive the mighty forests which surround them till they fall beneath the
hatchet. Their eyes are fixed upon another sight: the American people views
its own march across these wilds—drying swamps, turning the course of
rivers, peopling solitudes, and subduing nature. This magnificent image of
themselves does not meet the gaze of the Americans at intervals only; it
may be said to haunt every one of them in his least as well as in his most
important actions, and to be always flitting before his mind. Nothing
conceivable is so petty, so insipid, so crowded with paltry interests, in one
word so anti-poetic, as the life of a man in the United States. But amongst
the thoughts which it suggests there is always one which is full of poetry,
and that is the hidden nerve which gives vigor to the frame.
In aristocratic ages each people, as well as each individual, is prone to
stand separate and aloof from all others. In democratic ages, the extreme
fluctuations of men and the impatience of their desires keep them
perpetually on the move; so that the inhabitants of different countries
intermingle, see, listen to, and borrow from each other's stores. It is not only
then the members of the same community who grow more alike;
communities are themselves assimilated to one another, and the whole
assemblage presents to the eye of the spectator one vast democracy, each
citizen of which is a people. This displays the aspect of mankind for the
first time in the broadest light. All that belongs to the existence of the
human race taken as a whole, to its vicissitudes and to its future, becomes
an abundant mine of poetry. The poets who lived in aristocratic ages have
been eminently successful in their delineations of certain incidents in the
life of a people or a man; but none of them ever ventured to include within
his performances the destinies of mankind—a task which poets writing in
democratic ages may attempt. At that same time at which every man,
raising his eyes above his country, begins at length to discern mankind at

large, the Divinity is more and more manifest to the human mind in full and
entire majesty. If in democratic ages faith in positive religions be often
shaken, and the belief in intermediate agents, by whatever name they are
called, be overcast; on the other hand men are disposed to conceive a far
broader idea of Providence itself, and its interference in human affairs
assumes a new and more imposing appearance to their eyes. Looking at the
human race as one great whole, they easily conceive that its destinies are
regulated by the same design; and in the actions of every individual they are
led to acknowledge a trace of that universal and eternal plan on which God
rules our race. This consideration may be taken as another prolific source of
poetry which is opened in democratic ages. Democratic poets will always
appear trivial and frigid if they seek to invest gods, demons, or angels, with
corporeal forms, and if they attempt to draw them down from heaven to
dispute the supremacy of earth. But if they strive to connect the great events
they commemorate with the general providential designs which govern the
universe, and, without showing the finger of the Supreme Governor, reveal
the thoughts of the Supreme Mind, their works will be admired and
understood, for the imagination of their contemporaries takes this direction
of its own accord.
It may be foreseen in the like manner that poets living in democratic ages
will prefer the delineation of passions and ideas to that of persons and
achievements. The language, the dress, and the daily actions of men in
democracies are repugnant to ideal conceptions. These things are not
poetical in themselves; and, if it were otherwise, they would cease to be so,
because they are too familiar to all those to whom the poet would speak of
them. This forces the poet constantly to search below the external surface
which is palpable to the senses, in order to read the inner soul: and nothing
lends itself more to the delineation of the ideal than the scrutiny of the
hidden depths in the immaterial nature of man. I need not to ramble over
earth and sky to discover a wondrous object woven of contrasts, of
greatness and littleness infinite, of intense gloom and of amazing brightness
—capable at once of exciting pity, admiration, terror, contempt. I find that
object in myself. Man springs out of nothing, crosses time, and disappears
forever in the bosom of God; he is seen but for a moment, staggering on the
verge of the two abysses, and there he is lost. If man were wholly ignorant
of himself, he would have no poetry in him; for it is impossible to describe
what the mind does not conceive. If man clearly discerned his own nature,

his imagination would remain idle, and would have nothing to add to the
picture. But the nature of man is sufficiently disclosed for him to apprehend
something of himself; and sufficiently obscure for all the rest to be plunged
in thick darkness, in which he gropes forever—and forever in vain—to lay
hold on some completer notion of his being.
Amongst a democratic people poetry will not be fed with legendary lays
or the memorials of old traditions. The poet will not attempt to people the
universe with supernatural beings in whom his readers and his own fancy
have ceased to believe; nor will he present virtues and vices in the mask of
frigid personification, which are better received under their own features.
All these resources fail him; but Man remains, and the poet needs no more.
The destinies of mankind—man himself, taken aloof from his age and his
country, and standing in the presence of Nature and of God, with his
passions, his doubts, his rare prosperities, and inconceivable wretchedness
—will become the chief, if not the sole theme of poetry amongst these
nations. Experience may confirm this assertion, if we consider the
productions of the greatest poets who have appeared since the world has
been turned to democracy. The authors of our age who have so admirably
delineated the features of Faust, Childe Harold, Rene, and Jocelyn, did not
seek to record the actions of an individual, but to enlarge and to throw light
on some of the obscurer recesses of the human heart. Such are the poems of
democracy. The principle of equality does not then destroy all the subjects
of poetry: it renders them less numerous, but more vast.

Chapter XVIII: Of The Inflated Style Of
American Writers And Orators
I have frequently remarked that the Americans, who generally treat of
business in clear, plain language, devoid of all ornament, and so extremely
simple as to be often coarse, are apt to become inflated as soon as they
attempt a more poetical diction. They then vent their pomposity from one
end of a harangue to the other; and to hear them lavish imagery on every
occasion, one might fancy that they never spoke of anything with
simplicity. The English are more rarely given to a similar failing. The cause
of this may be pointed out without much difficulty. In democratic
communities each citizen is habitually engaged in the contemplation of a
very puny object, namely himself. If he ever raises his looks higher, he then
perceives nothing but the immense form of society at large, or the still more
imposing aspect of mankind. His ideas are all either extremely minute and
clear, or extremely general and vague: what lies between is an open void.
When he has been drawn out of his own sphere, therefore, he always
expects that some amazing object will be offered to his attention; and it is
on these terms alone that he consents to tear himself for an instant from the
petty complicated cares which form the charm and the excitement of his
life. This appears to me sufficiently to explain why men in democracies,
whose concerns are in general so paltry, call upon their poets for
conceptions so vast and descriptions so unlimited.
The authors, on their part, do not fail to obey a propensity of which they
themselves partake; they perpetually inflate their imaginations, and
expanding them beyond all bounds, they not unfrequently abandon the great
in order to reach the gigantic. By these means they hope to attract the
observation of the multitude, and to fix it easily upon themselves: nor are
their hopes disappointed; for as the multitude seeks for nothing in poetry
but subjects of very vast dimensions, it has neither the time to measure with
accuracy the proportions of all the subjects set before it, nor a taste
sufficiently correct to perceive at once in what respect they are out of
proportion. The author and the public at once vitiate one another.

We have just seen that amongst democratic nations, the sources of poetry
are grand, but not abundant. They are soon exhausted: and poets, not
finding the elements of the ideal in what is real and true, abandon them
entirely and create monsters. I do not fear that the poetry of democratic
nations will prove too insipid, or that it will fly too near the ground; I rather
apprehend that it will be forever losing itself in the clouds, and that it will
range at last to purely imaginary regions. I fear that the productions of
democratic poets may often be surcharged with immense and incoherent
imagery, with exaggerated descriptions and strange creations; and that the
fantastic beings of their brain may sometimes make us regret the world of
reality.

Chapter XIX: Some Observations On The Drama
Amongst Democratic Nations
When the revolution which subverts the social and political state of an
aristocratic people begins to penetrate into literature, it generally first
manifests itself in the drama, and it always remains conspicuous there. The
spectator of a dramatic piece is, to a certain extent, taken by surprise by the
impression it conveys. He has no time to refer to his memory, or to consult
those more able to judge than himself. It does not occur to him to resist the
new literary tendencies which begin to be felt by him; he yields to them
before he knows what they are. Authors are very prompt in discovering
which way the taste of the public is thus secretly inclined. They shape their
productions accordingly; and the literature of the stage, after having served
to indicate the approaching literary revolution, speedily completes its
accomplishment. If you would judge beforehand of the literature of a
people which is lapsing into democracy, study its dramatic productions.
The literature of the stage, moreover, even amongst aristocratic nations,
constitutes the most democratic part of their literature. No kind of literary
gratification is so much within the reach of the multitude as that which is
derived from theatrical representations. Neither preparation nor study is
required to enjoy them: they lay hold on you in the midst of your prejudices
and your ignorance. When the yet untutored love of the pleasures of the
mind begins to affect a class of the community, it instantly draws them to
the stage. The theatres of aristocratic nations have always been filled with
spectators not belonging to the aristocracy. At the theatre alone the higher
ranks mix with the middle and the lower classes; there alone do the former
consent to listen to the opinion of the latter, or at least to allow them to give
an opinion at all. At the theatre, men of cultivation and of literary
attainments have always had more difficulty than elsewhere in making their
taste prevail over that of the people, and in preventing themselves from
being carried away by the latter. The pit has frequently made laws for the
boxes.

If it be difficult for an aristocracy to prevent the people from getting the
upper hand in the theatre, it will readily be understood that the people will
be supreme there when democratic principles have crept into the laws and
manners—when ranks are intermixed—when minds, as well as fortunes, are
brought more nearly together—and when the upper class has lost, with its
hereditary wealth, its power, its precedents, and its leisure. The tastes and
propensities natural to democratic nations, in respect to literature, will
therefore first be discernible in the drama, and it may be foreseen that they
will break out there with vehemence. In written productions, the literary
canons of aristocracy will be gently, gradually, and, so to speak, legally
modified; at the theatre they will be riotously overthrown. The drama brings
out most of the good qualities, and almost all the defects, inherent in
democratic literature. Democratic peoples hold erudition very cheap, and
care but little for what occurred at Rome and Athens; they want to hear
something which concerns themselves, and the delineation of the present
age is what they demand.
When the heroes and the manners of antiquity are frequently brought
upon the stage, and dramatic authors faithfully observe the rules of
antiquated precedent, that is enough to warrant a conclusion that the
democratic classes have not yet got the upper hand of the theatres. Racine
makes a very humble apology in the preface to the "Britannicus" for having
disposed of Junia amongst the Vestals, who, according to Aulus Gellius, he
says, "admitted no one below six years of age nor above ten." We may be
sure that he would neither have accused himself of the offence, nor
defended himself from censure, if he had written for our contemporaries. A
fact of this kind not only illustrates the state of literature at the time when it
occurred, but also that of society itself. A democratic stage does not prove
that the nation is in a state of democracy, for, as we have just seen, even in
aristocracies it may happen that democratic tastes affect the drama; but
when the spirit of aristocracy reigns exclusively on the stage, the fact
irrefragably demonstrates that the whole of society is aristocratic; and it
may be boldly inferred that the same lettered and learned class which sways
the dramatic writers commands the people and governs the country.
The refined tastes and the arrogant bearing of an aristocracy will rarely
fail to lead it, when it manages the stage, to make a kind of selection in
human nature. Some of the conditions of society claim its chief interest; and
the scenes which delineate their manners are preferred upon the stage.

Certain virtues, and even certain vices, are thought more particularly to
deserve to figure there; and they are applauded whilst all others are
excluded. Upon the stage, as well as elsewhere, an aristocratic audience will
only meet personages of quality, and share the emotions of kings. The same
thing applies to style: an aristocracy is apt to impose upon dramatic authors
certain modes of expression which give the key in which everything is to be
delivered. By these means the stage frequently comes to delineate only one
side of man, or sometimes even to represent what is not to be met with in
human nature at all—to rise above nature and to go beyond it.
In democratic communities the spectators have no such partialities, and
they rarely display any such antipathies: they like to see upon the stage that
medley of conditions, of feelings, and of opinions, which occurs before
their eyes. The drama becomes more striking, more common, and more
true. Sometimes, however, those who write for the stage in democracies
also transgress the bounds of human nature—but it is on a different side
from their predecessors. By seeking to represent in minute detail the little
singularities of the moment and the peculiar characteristics of certain
personages, they forget to portray the general features of the race.
When the democratic classes rule the stage, they introduce as much
license in the manner of treating subjects as in the choice of them. As the
love of the drama is, of all literary tastes, that which is most natural to
democratic nations, the number of authors and of spectators, as well as of
theatrical representations, is constantly increasing amongst these
communities. A multitude composed of elements so different, and scattered
in so many different places, cannot acknowledge the same rules or submit
to the same laws. No concurrence is possible amongst judges so numerous,
who know not when they may meet again; and therefore each pronounces
his own sentence on the piece. If the effect of democracy is generally to
question the authority of all literary rules and conventions, on the stage it
abolishes them altogether, and puts in their place nothing but the whim of
each author and of each public.
The drama also displays in an especial manner the truth of what I have
said before in speaking more generally of style and art in democratic
literature. In reading the criticisms which were occasioned by the dramatic
productions of the age of Louis XIV, one is surprised to remark the great
stress which the public laid on the probability of the plot, and the

importance which was attached to the perfect consistency of the characters,
and to their doing nothing which could not be easily explained and
understood. The value which was set upon the forms of language at that
period, and the paltry strife about words with which dramatic authors were
assailed, are no less surprising. It would seem that the men of the age of
Louis XIV attached very exaggerated importance to those details, which
may be perceived in the study, but which escape attention on the stage. For,
after all, the principal object of a dramatic piece is to be performed, and its
chief merit is to affect the audience. But the audience and the readers in that
age were the same: on quitting the theatre they called up the author for
judgment to their own firesides. In democracies, dramatic pieces are
listened to, but not read. Most of those who frequent the amusements of the
stage do not go there to seek the pleasures of the mind, but the keen
emotions of the heart. They do not expect to hear a fine literary work, but to
see a play; and provided the author writes the language of his country
correctly enough to be understood, and that his characters excite curiosity
and awaken sympathy, the audience are satisfied. They ask no more of
fiction, and immediately return to real life. Accuracy of style is therefore
less required, because the attentive observance of its rules is less perceptible
on the stage. As for the probability of the plot, it is incompatible with
perpetual novelty, surprise, and rapidity of invention. It is therefore
neglected, and the public excuses the neglect. You may be sure that if you
succeed in bringing your audience into the presence of something that
affects them, they will not care by what road you brought them there; and
they will never reproach you for having excited their emotions in spite of
dramatic rules.
The Americans very broadly display all the different propensities which I
have here described when they go to the theatres; but it must be
acknowledged that as yet a very small number of them go to theatres at all.
Although playgoers and plays have prodigiously increased in the United
States in the last forty years, the population indulges in this kind of
amusement with the greatest reserve. This is attributable to peculiar causes,
which the reader is already acquainted with, and of which a few words will
suffice to remind him. The Puritans who founded the American republics
were not only enemies to amusements, but they professed an especial
abhorrence for the stage. They considered it as an abominable pastime; and
as long as their principles prevailed with undivided sway, scenic

performances were wholly unknown amongst them. These opinions of the
first fathers of the colony have left very deep marks on the minds of their
descendants. The extreme regularity of habits and the great strictness of
manners which are observable in the United States, have as yet opposed
additional obstacles to the growth of dramatic art. There are no dramatic
subjects in a country which has witnessed no great political catastrophes,
and in which love invariably leads by a straight and easy road to
matrimony. People who spend every day in the week in making money, and
the Sunday in going to church, have nothing to invite the muse of Comedy.
A single fact suffices to show that the stage is not very popular in the
United States. The Americans, whose laws allow of the utmost freedom and
even license of language in all other respects, have nevertheless subjected
their dramatic authors to a sort of censorship. Theatrical performances can
only take place by permission of the municipal authorities. This may serve
to show how much communities are like individuals; they surrender
themselves unscrupulously to their ruling passions, and afterwards take the
greatest care not to yield too much to the vehemence of tastes which they
do not possess.
No portion of literature is connected by closer or more numerous ties
with the present condition of society than the drama. The drama of one
period can never be suited to the following age, if in the interval an
important revolution has changed the manners and the laws of the nation.
The great authors of a preceding age may be read; but pieces written for a
different public will not be followed. The dramatic authors of the past live
only in books. The traditional taste of certain individuals, vanity, fashion, or
the genius of an actor may sustain or resuscitate for a time the aristocratic
drama amongst a democracy; but it will speedily fall away of itself—not
overthrown, but abandoned.

Chapter XX: Characteristics Of Historians In
Democratic Ages
Historians who write in aristocratic ages are wont to refer all occurrences
to the particular will or temper of certain individuals; and they are apt to
attribute the most important revolutions to very slight accidents. They trace
out the smallest causes with sagacity, and frequently leave the greatest
unperceived. Historians who live in democratic ages exhibit precisely
opposite characteristics. Most of them attribute hardly any influence to the
individual over the destiny of the race, nor to citizens over the fate of a
people; but, on the other hand, they assign great general causes to all petty
incidents. These contrary tendencies explain each other.
When the historian of aristocratic ages surveys the theatre of the world,
he at once perceives a very small number of prominent actors, who manage
the whole piece. These great personages, who occupy the front of the stage,
arrest the observation, and fix it on themselves; and whilst the historian is
bent on penetrating the secret motives which make them speak and act, the
rest escape his memory. The importance of the things which some men are
seen to do, gives him an exaggerated estimate of the influence which one
man may possess; and naturally leads him to think, that in order to explain
the impulses of the multitude, it is necessary to refer them to the particular
influence of some one individual.
When, on the contrary, all the citizens are independent of one another,
and each of them is individually weak, no one is seen to exert a great, or
still less a lasting power, over the community. At first sight, individuals
appear to be absolutely devoid of any influence over it; and society would
seem to advance alone by the free and voluntary concurrence of all the men
who compose it. This naturally prompts the mind to search for that general
reason which operates upon so many men's faculties at the same time, and
turns them simultaneously in the same direction.
I am very well convinced that even amongst democratic nations, the
genius, the vices, or the virtues of certain individuals retard or accelerate
the natural current of a people's history: but causes of this secondary and

fortuitous nature are infinitely more various, more concealed, more
complex, less powerful, and consequently less easy to trace in periods of
equality than in ages of aristocracy, when the task of the historian is simply
to detach from the mass of general events the particular influences of one
man or of a few men. In the former case the historian is soon wearied by the
toil; his mind loses itself in this labyrinth; and, in his inability clearly to
discern or conspicuously to point out the influence of individuals, he denies
their existence. He prefers talking about the characteristics of race, the
physical conformation of the country, or the genius of civilization, which
abridges his own labors, and satisfies his reader far better at less cost.
M. de Lafayette says somewhere in his "Memoirs" that the exaggerated
system of general causes affords surprising consolations to second-rate
statesmen. I will add, that its effects are not less consolatory to second-rate
historians; it can always furnish a few mighty reasons to extricate them
from the most difficult part of their work, and it indulges the indolence or
incapacity of their minds, whilst it confers upon them the honors of deep
thinking.
For myself, I am of opinion that at all times one great portion of the
events of this world are attributable to general facts, and another to special
influences. These two kinds of cause are always in operation: their
proportion only varies. General facts serve to explain more things in
democratic than in aristocratic ages, and fewer things are then assignable to
special influences. At periods of aristocracy the reverse takes place: special
influences are stronger, general causes weaker—unless indeed we consider
as a general cause the fact itself of the inequality of conditions, which
allows some individuals to baffle the natural tendencies of all the rest. The
historians who seek to describe what occurs in democratic societies are
right, therefore, in assigning much to general causes, and in devoting their
chief attention to discover them; but they are wrong in wholly denying the
special influence of individuals, because they cannot easily trace or follow
it.
The historians who live in democratic ages are not only prone to assign a
great cause to every incident, but they are also given to connect incidents
together, so as to deduce a system from them. In aristocratic ages, as the
attention of historians is constantly drawn to individuals, the connection of
events escapes them; or rather, they do not believe in any such connection.

To them the clew of history seems every instant crossed and broken by the
step of man. In democratic ages, on the contrary, as the historian sees much
more of actions than of actors, he may easily establish some kind of
sequency and methodical order amongst the former. Ancient literature,
which is so rich in fine historical compositions, does not contain a single
great historical system, whilst the poorest of modern literatures abound with
them. It would appear that the ancient historians did not make sufficient use
of those general theories which our historical writers are ever ready to carry
to excess.
Those who write in democratic ages have another more dangerous
tendency. When the traces of individual action upon nations are lost, it often
happens that the world goes on to move, though the moving agent is no
longer discoverable. As it becomes extremely difficult to discern and to
analyze the reasons which, acting separately on the volition of each member
of the community, concur in the end to produce movement in the old mass,
men are led to believe that this movement is involuntary, and that societies
unconsciously obey some superior force ruling over them. But even when
the general fact which governs the private volition of all individuals is
supposed to be discovered upon the earth, the principle of human free-will
is not secure. A cause sufficiently extensive to affect millions of men at
once, and sufficiently strong to bend them all together in the same direction,
may well seem irresistible: having seen that mankind do yield to it, the
mind is close upon the inference that mankind cannot resist it.
Historians who live in democratic ages, then, not only deny that the few
have any power of acting upon the destiny of a people, but they deprive the
people themselves of the power of modifying their own condition, and they
subject them either to an inflexible Providence, or to some blind necessity.
According to them, each nation is indissolubly bound by its position, its
origin, its precedents, and its character, to a certain lot which no efforts can
ever change. They involve generation in generation, and thus, going back
from age to age, and from necessity to necessity, up to the origin of the
world, they forge a close and enormous chain, which girds and binds the
human race. To their minds it is not enough to show what events have
occurred: they would fain show that events could not have occurred
otherwise. They take a nation arrived at a certain stage of its history, and
they affirm that it could not but follow the track which brought it thither. It

is easier to make such an assertion than to show by what means the nation
might have adopted a better course.
In reading the historians of aristocratic ages, and especially those of
antiquity, it would seem that, to be master of his lot, and to govern his
fellow-creatures, man requires only to be master of himself. In perusing the
historical volumes which our age has produced, it would seem that man is
utterly powerless over himself and over all around him. The historians of
antiquity taught how to command: those of our time teach only how to
obey; in their writings the author often appears great, but humanity is
always diminutive. If this doctrine of necessity, which is so attractive to
those who write history in democratic ages, passes from authors to their
readers, till it infects the whole mass of the community and gets possession
of the public mind, it will soon paralyze the activity of modern society, and
reduce Christians to the level of the Turks. I would moreover observe, that
such principles are peculiarly dangerous at the period at which we are
arrived. Our contemporaries are but too prone to doubt of the human free-
will, because each of them feels himself confined on every side by his own
weakness; but they are still willing to acknowledge the strength and
independence of men united in society. Let not this principle be lost sight
of; for the great object in our time is to raise the faculties of men, not to
complete their prostration.

Chapter XXI: Of Parliamentary Eloquence In
The United States
Amongst aristocratic nations all the members of the community are
connected with and dependent upon each other; the graduated scale of
different ranks acts as a tie, which keeps everyone in his proper place and
the whole body in subordination. Something of the same kind always
occurs in the political assemblies of these nations. Parties naturally range
themselves under certain leaders, whom they obey by a sort of instinct,
which is only the result of habits contracted elsewhere. They carry the
manners of general society into the lesser assemblage.
In democratic countries it often happens that a great number of citizens
are tending to the same point; but each one only moves thither, or at least
flatters himself that he moves, of his own accord. Accustomed to regulate
his doings by personal impulse alone, he does not willingly submit to
dictation from without. This taste and habit of independence accompany
him into the councils of the nation. If he consents to connect himself with
other men in the prosecution of the same purpose, at least he chooses to
remain free to contribute to the common success after his own fashion.
Hence it is that in democratic countries parties are so impatient of control,
and are never manageable except in moments of great public danger. Even
then, the authority of leaders, which under such circumstances may be able
to make men act or speak, hardly ever reaches the extent of making them
keep silence.
Amongst aristocratic nations the members of political assemblies are at
the same time members of the aristocracy. Each of them enjoys high
established rank in his own right, and the position which he occupies in the
assembly is often less important in his eyes than that which he fills in the
country. This consoles him for playing no part in the discussion of public
affairs, and restrains him from too eagerly attempting to play an
insignificant one.
In America, it generally happens that a Representative only becomes
somebody from his position in the Assembly. He is therefore perpetually

haunted by a craving to acquire importance there, and he feels a petulant
desire to be constantly obtruding his opinions upon the House. His own
vanity is not the only stimulant which urges him on in this course, but that
of his constituents, and the continual necessity of propitiating them.
Amongst aristocratic nations a member of the legislature is rarely in strict
dependence upon his constituents: he is frequently to them a sort of
unavoidable representative; sometimes they are themselves strictly
dependent upon him; and if at length they reject him, he may easily get
elected elsewhere, or, retiring from public life, he may still enjoy the
pleasures of splendid idleness. In a democratic country like the United
States a Representative has hardly ever a lasting hold on the minds of his
constituents. However small an electoral body may be, the fluctuations of
democracy are constantly changing its aspect; it must, therefore, be courted
unceasingly. He is never sure of his supporters, and, if they forsake him, he
is left without a resource; for his natural position is not sufficiently elevated
for him to be easily known to those not close to him; and, with the complete
state of independence prevailing among the people, he cannot hope that his
friends or the government will send him down to be returned by an electoral
body unacquainted with him. The seeds of his fortune are, therefore, sown
in his own neighborhood; from that nook of earth he must start, to raise
himself to the command of a people and to influence the destinies of the
world. Thus it is natural that in democratic countries the members of
political assemblies think more of their constituents than of their party,
whilst in aristocracies they think more of their party than of their
constituents.
But what ought to be said to gratify constituents is not always what ought
to be said in order to serve the party to which Representatives profess to
belong. The general interest of a party frequently demands that members
belonging to it should not speak on great questions which they understand
imperfectly; that they should speak but little on those minor questions
which impede the great ones; lastly, and for the most part, that they should
not speak at all. To keep silence is the most useful service that an indifferent
spokesman can render to the commonwealth. Constituents, however, do not
think so. The population of a district sends a representative to take a part in
the government of a country, because they entertain a very lofty notion of
his merits. As men appear greater in proportion to the littleness of the
objects by which they are surrounded, it may be assumed that the opinion

entertained of the delegate will be so much the higher as talents are more
rare among his constituents. It will therefore frequently happen that the less
constituents have to expect from their representative, the more they will
anticipate from him; and, however incompetent he may be, they will not fail
to call upon him for signal exertions, corresponding to the rank they have
conferred upon him.
Independently of his position as a legislator of the State, electors also
regard their Representative as the natural patron of the constituency in the
Legislature; they almost consider him as the proxy of each of his
supporters, and they flatter themselves that he will not be less zealous in
defense of their private interests than of those of the country. Thus electors
are well assured beforehand that the Representative of their choice will be
an orator; that he will speak often if he can, and that in case he is forced to
refrain, he will strive at any rate to compress into his less frequent orations
an inquiry into all the great questions of state, combined with a statement of
all the petty grievances they have themselves to complain to; so that, though
he be not able to come forward frequently, he should on each occasion
prove what he is capable of doing; and that, instead of perpetually lavishing
his powers, he should occasionally condense them in a small compass, so as
to furnish a sort of complete and brilliant epitome of his constituents and of
himself. On these terms they will vote for him at the next election. These
conditions drive worthy men of humble abilities to despair, who, knowing
their own powers, would never voluntarily have come forward. But thus
urged on, the Representative begins to speak, to the great alarm of his
friends; and rushing imprudently into the midst of the most celebrated
orators, he perplexes the debate and wearies the House.
All laws which tend to make the Representative more dependent on the
elector, not only affect the conduct of the legislators, as I have remarked
elsewhere, but also their language. They exercise a simultaneous influence
on affairs themselves, and on the manner in which affairs are discussed.
There is hardly a member of Congress who can make up his mind to go
home without having despatched at least one speech to his constituents; nor
who will endure any interruption until he has introduced into his harangue
whatever useful suggestions may be made touching the four-and-twenty
States of which the Union is composed, and especially the district which he
represents. He therefore presents to the mind of his auditors a succession of

great general truths (which he himself only comprehends, and expresses,
confusedly), and of petty minutia, which he is but too able to discover and
to point out. The consequence is that the debates of that great assembly are
frequently vague and perplexed, and that they seem rather to drag their slow
length along than to advance towards a distinct object. Some such state of
things will, I believe, always arise in the public assemblies of democracies.
Propitious circumstances and good laws might succeed in drawing to the
legislature of a democratic people men very superior to those who are
returned by the Americans to Congress; but nothing will ever prevent the
men of slender abilities who sit there from obtruding themselves with
complacency, and in all ways, upon the public. The evil does not appear to
me to be susceptible of entire cure, because it not only originates in the
tactics of that assembly, but in its constitution and in that of the country.
The inhabitants of the United States seem themselves to consider the matter
in this light; and they show their long experience of parliamentary life not
by abstaining from making bad speeches, but by courageously submitting to
hear them made. They are resigned to it, as to an evil which they know to be
inevitable.
We have shown the petty side of political debates in democratic
assemblies—let us now exhibit the more imposing one. The proceedings
within the Parliament of England for the last one hundred and fifty years
have never occasioned any great sensation out of that country; the opinions
and feelings expressed by the speakers have never awakened much
sympathy, even amongst the nations placed nearest to the great arena of
British liberty; whereas Europe was excited by the very first debates which
took place in the small colonial assemblies of America at the time of the
Revolution. This was attributable not only to particular and fortuitous
circumstances, but to general and lasting causes. I can conceive nothing
more admirable or more powerful than a great orator debating on great
questions of state in a democratic assembly. As no particular class is ever
represented there by men commissioned to defend its own interests, it is
always to the whole nation, and in the name of the whole nation, that the
orator speaks. This expands his thoughts, and heightens his power of
language. As precedents have there but little weight-as there are no longer
any privileges attached to certain property, nor any rights inherent in certain
bodies or in certain individuals, the mind must have recourse to general
truths derived from human nature to resolve the particular question under

discussion. Hence the political debates of a democratic people, however
small it may be, have a degree of breadth which frequently renders them
attractive to mankind. All men are interested by them, because they treat of
man, who is everywhere the same. Amongst the greatest aristocratic
nations, on the contrary, the most general questions are almost always
argued on some special grounds derived from the practice of a particular
time, or the rights of a particular class; which interest that class alone, or at
most the people amongst whom that class happens to exist. It is owing to
this, as much as to the greatness of the French people, and the favorable
disposition of the nations who listen to them, that the great effect which the
French political debates sometimes produce in the world, must be
attributed. The orators of France frequently speak to mankind, even when
they are addressing their countrymen only.

Section 2: Influence of Democracy on the Feelings
of Americans

Chapter I: Why Democratic Nations Show A More
Ardent And Enduring Love Of Equality Than Of
Liberty
The first and most intense passion which is engendered by the equality of
conditions is, I need hardly say, the love of that same equality. My readers
will therefore not be surprised that I speak of its before all others.
Everybody has remarked that in our time, and especially in France, this
passion for equality is every day gaining ground in the human heart. It has
been said a hundred times that our contemporaries are far more ardently and
tenaciously attached to equality than to freedom; but as I do not find that
the causes of the fact have been sufficiently analyzed, I shall endeavor to
point them out.
It is possible to imagine an extreme point at which freedom and equality
would meet and be confounded together. Let us suppose that all the
members of the community take a part in the government, and that each of
them has an equal right to take a part in it. As none is different from his
fellows, none can exercise a tyrannical power: men will be perfectly free,
because they will all be entirely equal; and they will all be perfectly equal,
because they will be entirely free. To this ideal state democratic nations
tend. Such is the completest form that equality can assume upon earth; but
there are a thousand others which, without being equally perfect, are not
less cherished by those nations.
The principle of equality may be established in civil society, without
prevailing in the political world. Equal rights may exist of indulging in the
same pleasures, of entering the same professions, of frequenting the same
places—in a word, of living in the same manner and seeking wealth by the
same means, although all men do not take an equal share in the government.
A kind of equality may even be established in the political world, though
there should be no political freedom there. A man may be the equal of all
his countrymen save one, who is the master of all without distinction, and
who selects equally from among them all the agents of his power. Several
other combinations might be easily imagined, by which very great equality

would be united to institutions more or less free, or even to institutions
wholly without freedom. Although men cannot become absolutely equal
unless they be entirely free, and consequently equality, pushed to its furthest
extent, may be confounded with freedom, yet there is good reason for
distinguishing the one from the other. The taste which men have for liberty,
and that which they feel for equality, are, in fact, two different things; and I
am not afraid to add that, amongst democratic nations, they are two unequal
things.
Upon close inspection, it will be seen that there is in every age some
peculiar and preponderating fact with which all others are connected; this
fact almost always gives birth to some pregnant idea or some ruling
passion, which attracts to itself, and bears away in its course, all the feelings
and opinions of the time: it is like a great stream, towards which each of the
surrounding rivulets seems to flow. Freedom has appeared in the world at
different times and under various forms; it has not been exclusively bound
to any social condition, and it is not confined to democracies. Freedom
cannot, therefore, form the distinguishing characteristic of democratic ages.
The peculiar and preponderating fact which marks those ages as its own is
the equality of conditions; the ruling passion of men in those periods is the
love of this equality. Ask not what singular charm the men of democratic
ages find in being equal, or what special reasons they may have for clinging
so tenaciously to equality rather than to the other advantages which society
holds out to them: equality is the distinguishing characteristic of the age
they live in; that, of itself, is enough to explain that they prefer it to all the
rest.
But independently of this reason there are several others, which will at all
times habitually lead men to prefer equality to freedom. If a people could
ever succeed in destroying, or even in diminishing, the equality which
prevails in its own body, this could only be accomplished by long and
laborious efforts. Its social condition must be modified, its laws abolished,
its opinions superseded, its habits changed, its manners corrupted. But
political liberty is more easily lost; to neglect to hold it fast is to allow it to
escape. Men therefore not only cling to equality because it is dear to them;
they also adhere to it because they think it will last forever.
That political freedom may compromise in its excesses the tranquillity,
the property, the lives of individuals, is obvious to the narrowest and most

unthinking minds. But, on the contrary, none but attentive and clear-sighted
men perceive the perils with which equality threatens us, and they
commonly avoid pointing them out. They know that the calamities they
apprehend are remote, and flatter themselves that they will only fall upon
future generations, for which the present generation takes but little thought.
The evils which freedom sometimes brings with it are immediate; they are
apparent to all, and all are more or less affected by them. The evils which
extreme equality may produce are slowly disclosed; they creep gradually
into the social frame; they are only seen at intervals, and at the moment at
which they become most violent habit already causes them to be no longer
felt. The advantages which freedom brings are only shown by length of
time; and it is always easy to mistake the cause in which they originate. The
advantages of equality are instantaneous, and they may constantly be traced
from their source. Political liberty bestows exalted pleasures, from time to
time, upon a certain number of citizens. Equality every day confers a
number of small enjoyments on every man. The charms of equality are
every instant felt, and are within the reach of all; the noblest hearts are not
insensible to them, and the most vulgar souls exult in them. The passion
which equality engenders must therefore be at once strong and general.
Men cannot enjoy political liberty unpurchased by some sacrifices, and they
never obtain it without great exertions. But the pleasures of equality are
self-proffered: each of the petty incidents of life seems to occasion them,
and in order to taste them nothing is required but to live.
Democratic nations are at all times fond of equality, but there are certain
epochs at which the passion they entertain for it swells to the height of fury.
This occurs at the moment when the old social system, long menaced,
completes its own destruction after a last intestine struggle, and when the
barriers of rank are at length thrown down. At such times men pounce upon
equality as their booty, and they cling to it as to some precious treasure
which they fear to lose. The passion for equality penetrates on every side
into men's hearts, expands there, and fills them entirely. Tell them not that
by this blind surrender of themselves to an exclusive passion they risk their
dearest interests: they are deaf. Show them not freedom escaping from their
grasp, whilst they are looking another way: they are blind—or rather, they
can discern but one sole object to be desired in the universe.
What I have said is applicable to all democratic nations: what I am about
to say concerns the French alone. Amongst most modern nations, and

especially amongst all those of the Continent of Europe, the taste and the
idea of freedom only began to exist and to extend themselves at the time
when social conditions were tending to equality, and as a consequence of
that very equality. Absolute kings were the most efficient levellers of ranks
amongst their subjects. Amongst these nations equality preceded freedom:
equality was therefore a fact of some standing when freedom was still a
novelty: the one had already created customs, opinions, and laws belonging
to it, when the other, alone and for the first time, came into actual existence.
Thus the latter was still only an affair of opinion and of taste, whilst the
former had already crept into the habits of the people, possessed itself of
their manners, and given a particular turn to the smallest actions of their
lives. Can it be wondered that the men of our own time prefer the one to the
other?
I think that democratic communities have a natural taste for freedom: left
to themselves, they will seek it, cherish it, and view any privation of it with
regret. But for equality, their passion is ardent, insatiable, incessant,
invincible: they call for equality in freedom; and if they cannot obtain that,
they still call for equality in slavery. They will endure poverty, servitude,
barbarism—but they will not endure aristocracy. This is true at all times,
and especially true in our own. All men and all powers seeking to cope with
this irresistible passion, will be overthrown and destroyed by it. In our age,
freedom cannot be established without it, and despotism itself cannot reign
without its support.

Chapter II: Of Individualism In Democratic
Countries
I have shown how it is that in ages of equality every man seeks for his
opinions within himself: I am now about to show how it is that, in the same
ages, all his feelings are turned towards himself alone. Individualism *a is a
novel expression, to which a novel idea has given birth. Our fathers were
only acquainted with egotism. Egotism is a passionate and exaggerated love
of self, which leads a man to connect everything with his own person, and
to prefer himself to everything in the world. Individualism is a mature and
calm feeling, which disposes each member of the community to sever
himself from the mass of his fellow-creatures; and to draw apart with his
family and his friends; so that, after he has thus formed a little circle of his
own, he willingly leaves society at large to itself. Egotism originates in
blind instinct: individualism proceeds from erroneous judgment more than
from depraved feelings; it originates as much in the deficiencies of the mind
as in the perversity of the heart. Egotism blights the germ of all virtue;
individualism, at first, only saps the virtues of public life; but, in the long
run, it attacks and destroys all others, and is at length absorbed in downright
egotism. Egotism is a vice as old as the world, which does not belong to one
form of society more than to another: individualism is of democratic origin,
and it threatens to spread in the same ratio as the equality of conditions.
a
[ [I adopt the expression of the original, however strange it
may seem to the English ear, partly because it illustrates the
remark on the introduction of general terms into democratic
language which was made in a preceding chapter, and partly
because I know of no English word exactly equivalent to the
expression. The chapter itself defines the meaning attached
to it by the author.—Translator's Note.]]
Amongst aristocratic nations, as families remain for centuries in the same
condition, often on the same spot, all generations become as it were
contemporaneous. A man almost always knows his forefathers, and respects
them: he thinks he already sees his remote descendants, and he loves them.
He willingly imposes duties on himself towards the former and the latter;

and he will frequently sacrifice his personal gratifications to those who
went before and to those who will come after him. Aristocratic institutions
have, moreover, the effect of closely binding every man to several of his
fellow-citizens. As the classes of an aristocratic people are strongly marked
and permanent, each of them is regarded by its own members as a sort of
lesser country, more tangible and more cherished than the country at large.
As in aristocratic communities all the citizens occupy fixed positions, one
above the other, the result is that each of them always sees a man above
himself whose patronage is necessary to him, and below himself another
man whose co-operation he may claim. Men living in aristocratic ages are
therefore almost always closely attached to something placed out of their
own sphere, and they are often disposed to forget themselves. It is true that
in those ages the notion of human fellowship is faint, and that men seldom
think of sacrificing themselves for mankind; but they often sacrifice
themselves for other men. In democratic ages, on the contrary, when the
duties of each individual to the race are much more clear, devoted service to
any one man becomes more rare; the bond of human affection is extended,
but it is relaxed.
Amongst democratic nations new families are constantly springing up,
others are constantly falling away, and all that remain change their
condition; the woof of time is every instant broken, and the track of
generations effaced. Those who went before are soon forgotten; of those
who will come after no one has any idea: the interest of man is confined to
those in close propinquity to himself. As each class approximates to other
classes, and intermingles with them, its members become indifferent and as
strangers to one another. Aristocracy had made a chain of all the members
of the community, from the peasant to the king: democracy breaks that
chain, and severs every link of it. As social conditions become more equal,
the number of persons increases who, although they are neither rich enough
nor powerful enough to exercise any great influence over their fellow-
creatures, have nevertheless acquired or retained sufficient education and
fortune to satisfy their own wants. They owe nothing to any man, they
expect nothing from any man; they acquire the habit of always considering
themselves as standing alone, and they are apt to imagine that their whole
destiny is in their own hands. Thus not only does democracy make every
man forget his ancestors, but it hides his descendants, and separates his
contemporaries from him; it throws him back forever upon himself alone,

and threatens in the end to confine him entirely within the solitude of his
own heart.

Chapter III: Individualism Stronger At The Close
Of A Democratic Revolution Than At Other
Periods
The period when the construction of democratic society upon the ruins of
an aristocracy has just been completed, is especially that at which this
separation of men from one another, and the egotism resulting from it, most
forcibly strike the observation. Democratic communities not only contain a
large number of independent citizens, but they are constantly filled with
men who, having entered but yesterday upon their independent condition,
are intoxicated with their new power. They entertain a presumptuous
confidence in their strength, and as they do not suppose that they can
henceforward ever have occasion to claim the assistance of their fellow-
creatures, they do not scruple to show that they care for nobody but
themselves.
An aristocracy seldom yields without a protracted struggle, in the course
of which implacable animosities are kindled between the different classes of
society. These passions survive the victory, and traces of them may be
observed in the midst of the democratic confusion which ensues. Those
members of the community who were at the top of the late gradations of
rank cannot immediately forget their former greatness; they will long regard
themselves as aliens in the midst of the newly composed society. They look
upon all those whom this state of society has made their equals as
oppressors, whose destiny can excite no sympathy; they have lost sight of
their former equals, and feel no longer bound by a common interest to their
fate: each of them, standing aloof, thinks that he is reduced to care for
himself alone. Those, on the contrary, who were formerly at the foot of the
social scale, and who have been brought up to the common level by a
sudden revolution, cannot enjoy their newly acquired independence without
secret uneasiness; and if they meet with some of their former superiors on
the same footing as themselves, they stand aloof from them with an
expression of triumph and of fear. It is, then, commonly at the outset of
democratic society that citizens are most disposed to live apart. Democracy

leads men not to draw near to their fellow-creatures; but democratic
revolutions lead them to shun each other, and perpetuate in a state of
equality the animosities which the state of inequality engendered. The great
advantage of the Americans is that they have arrived at a state of democracy
without having to endure a democratic revolution; and that they are born
equal, instead of becoming so.

Chapter IV: That The Americans Combat The
Effects Of Individualism By Free Institutions
Despotism, which is of a very timorous nature, is never more secure of
continuance than when it can keep men asunder; and all is influence is
commonly exerted for that purpose. No vice of the human heart is so
acceptable to it as egotism: a despot easily forgives his subjects for not
loving him, provided they do not love each other. He does not ask them to
assist him in governing the State; it is enough that they do not aspire to
govern it themselves. He stigmatizes as turbulent and unruly spirits those
who would combine their exertions to promote the prosperity of the
community, and, perverting the natural meaning of words, he applauds as
good citizens those who have no sympathy for any but themselves. Thus the
vices which despotism engenders are precisely those which equality fosters.
These two things mutually and perniciously complete and assist each other.
Equality places men side by side, unconnected by any common tie;
despotism raises barriers to keep them asunder; the former predisposes
them not to consider their fellow-creatures, the latter makes general
indifference a sort of public virtue.
Despotism then, which is at all times dangerous, is more particularly to
be feared in democratic ages. It is easy to see that in those same ages men
stand most in need of freedom. When the members of a community are
forced to attend to public affairs, they are necessarily drawn from the circle
of their own interests, and snatched at times from self-observation. As soon
as a man begins to treat of public affairs in public, he begins to perceive that
he is not so independent of his fellow-men as he had at first imagined, and
that, in order to obtain their support, he must often lend them his co-
operation.
When the public is supreme, there is no man who does not feel the value
of public goodwill, or who does not endeavor to court it by drawing to
himself the esteem and affection of those amongst whom he is to live. Many
of the passions which congeal and keep asunder human hearts, are then
obliged to retire and hide below the surface. Pride must be dissembled;

disdain dares not break out; egotism fears its own self. Under a free
government, as most public offices are elective, the men whose elevated
minds or aspiring hopes are too closely circumscribed in private life,
constantly feel that they cannot do without the population which surrounds
them. Men learn at such times to think of their fellow-men from ambitious
motives; and they frequently find it, in a manner, their interest to forget
themselves.
I may here be met by an objection derived from electioneering intrigues,
the meannesses of candidates, and the calumnies of their opponents. These
are opportunities for animosity which occur the oftener the more frequent
elections become. Such evils are doubtless great, but they are transient;
whereas the benefits which attend them remain. The desire of being elected
may lead some men for a time to violent hostility; but this same desire leads
all men in the long run mutually to support each other; and if it happens that
an election accidentally severs two friends, the electoral system brings a
multitude of citizens permanently together, who would always have
remained unknown to each other. Freedom engenders private animosities,
but despotism gives birth to general indifference.
The Americans have combated by free institutions the tendency of
equality to keep men asunder, and they have subdued it. The legislators of
America did not suppose that a general representation of the whole nation
would suffice to ward off a disorder at once so natural to the frame of
democratic society, and so fatal: they also thought that it would be well to
infuse political life into each portion of the territory, in order to multiply to
an infinite extent opportunities of acting in concert for all the members of
the community, and to make them constantly feel their mutual dependence
on each other. The plan was a wise one. The general affairs of a country
only engage the attention of leading politicians, who assemble from time to
time in the same places; and as they often lose sight of each other
afterwards, no lasting ties are established between them. But if the object be
to have the local affairs of a district conducted by the men who reside there,
the same persons are always in contact, and they are, in a manner, forced to
be acquainted, and to adapt themselves to one another.
It is difficult to draw a man out of his own circle to interest him in the
destiny of the State, because he does not clearly understand what influence
the destiny of the State can have upon his own lot. But if it be proposed to

make a road cross the end of his estate, he will see at a glance that there is a
connection between this small public affair and his greatest private affairs;
and he will discover, without its being shown to him, the close tie which
unites private to general interest. Thus, far more may be done by intrusting
to the citizens the administration of minor affairs than by surrendering to
them the control of important ones, towards interesting them in the public
welfare, and convincing them that they constantly stand in need one of the
other in order to provide for it. A brilliant achievement may win for you the
favor of a people at one stroke; but to earn the love and respect of the
population which surrounds you, a long succession of little services
rendered and of obscure good deeds—a constant habit of kindness, and an
established reputation for disinterestedness—will be required. Local
freedom, then, which leads a great number of citizens to value the affection
of their neighbors and of their kindred, perpetually brings men together, and
forces them to help one another, in spite of the propensities which sever
them.
In the United States the more opulent citizens take great care not to stand
aloof from the people; on the contrary, they constantly keep on easy terms
with the lower classes: they listen to them, they speak to them every day.
They know that the rich in democracies always stand in need of the poor;
and that in democratic ages you attach a poor man to you more by your
manner than by benefits conferred. The magnitude of such benefits, which
sets off the difference of conditions, causes a secret irritation to those who
reap advantage from them; but the charm of simplicity of manners is almost
irresistible: their affability carries men away, and even their want of polish
is not always displeasing. This truth does not take root at once in the minds
of the rich. They generally resist it as long as the democratic revolution
lasts, and they do not acknowledge it immediately after that revolution is
accomplished. They are very ready to do good to the people, but they still
choose to keep them at arm's length; they think that is sufficient, but they
are mistaken. They might spend fortunes thus without warming the hearts of
the population around them;—that population does not ask them for the
sacrifice of their money, but of their pride.
It would seem as if every imagination in the United States were upon the
stretch to invent means of increasing the wealth and satisfying the wants of
the public. The best-informed inhabitants of each district constantly use
their information to discover new truths which may augment the general

prosperity; and if they have made any such discoveries, they eagerly
surrender them to the mass of the people.
When the vices and weaknesses, frequently exhibited by those who
govern in America, are closely examined, the prosperity of the people
occasions—but improperly occasions—surprise. Elected magistrates do not
make the American democracy flourish; it flourishes because the
magistrates are elective.
It would be unjust to suppose that the patriotism and the zeal which every
American displays for the welfare of his fellow-citizens are wholly
insincere. Although private interest directs the greater part of human actions
in the United States as well as elsewhere, it does not regulate them all. I
must say that I have often seen Americans make great and real sacrifices to
the public welfare; and I have remarked a hundred instances in which they
hardly ever failed to lend faithful support to each other. The free institutions
which the inhabitants of the United States possess, and the political rights of
which they make so much use, remind every citizen, and in a thousand
ways, that he lives in society. They every instant impress upon his mind the
notion that it is the duty, as well as the interest of men, to make themselves
useful to their fellow-creatures; and as he sees no particular ground of
animosity to them, since he is never either their master or their slave, his
heart readily leans to the side of kindness. Men attend to the interests of the
public, first by necessity, afterwards by choice: what was intentional
becomes an instinct; and by dint of working for the good of one's fellow
citizens, the habit and the taste for serving them is at length acquired.
Many people in France consider equality of conditions as one evil, and
political freedom as a second. When they are obliged to yield to the former,
they strive at least to escape from the latter. But I contend that in order to
combat the evils which equality may produce, there is only one effectual
remedy—namely, political freedom.

Chapter V: Of The Use Which The Americans
Make Of Public Associations In Civil Life
I do not propose to speak of those political associations—by the aid of
which men endeavor to defend themselves against the despotic influence of
a majority—or against the aggressions of regal power. That subject I have
already treated. If each citizen did not learn, in proportion as he individually
becomes more feeble, and consequently more incapable of preserving his
freedom single-handed, to combine with his fellow-citizens for the purpose
of defending it, it is clear that tyranny would unavoidably increase together
with equality.
Those associations only which are formed in civil life, without reference
to political objects, are here adverted to. The political associations which
exist in the United States are only a single feature in the midst of the
immense assemblage of associations in that country. Americans of all ages,
all conditions, and all dispositions, constantly form associations. They have
not only commercial and manufacturing companies, in which all take part,
but associations of a thousand other kinds—religious, moral, serious, futile,
extensive, or restricted, enormous or diminutive. The Americans make
associations to give entertainments, to found establishments for education,
to build inns, to construct churches, to diffuse books, to send missionaries
to the antipodes; and in this manner they found hospitals, prisons, and
schools. If it be proposed to advance some truth, or to foster some feeling
by the encouragement of a great example, they form a society. Wherever, at
the head of some new undertaking, you see the government in France, or a
man of rank in England, in the United States you will be sure to find an
association. I met with several kinds of associations in America, of which I
confess I had no previous notion; and I have often admired the extreme skill
with which the inhabitants of the United States succeed in proposing a
common object to the exertions of a great many men, and in getting them
voluntarily to pursue it. I have since travelled over England, whence the
Americans have taken some of their laws and many of their customs; and it
seemed to me that the principle of association was by no means so
constantly or so adroitly used in that country. The English often perform

great things singly; whereas the Americans form associations for the
smallest undertakings. It is evident that the former people consider
association as a powerful means of action, but the latter seem to regard it as
the only means they have of acting.
Thus the most democratic country on the face of the earth is that in which
men have in our time carried to the highest perfection the art of pursuing in
common the object of their common desires, and have applied this new
science to the greatest number of purposes. Is this the result of accident? or
is there in reality any necessary connection between the principle of
association and that of equality? Aristocratic communities always contain,
amongst a multitude of persons who by themselves are powerless, a small
number of powerful and wealthy citizens, each of whom can achieve great
undertakings single-handed. In aristocratic societies men do not need to
combine in order to act, because they are strongly held together. Every
wealthy and powerful citizen constitutes the head of a permanent and
compulsory association, composed of all those who are dependent upon
him, or whom he makes subservient to the execution of his designs.
Amongst democratic nations, on the contrary, all the citizens are
independent and feeble; they can do hardly anything by themselves, and
none of them can oblige his fellow-men to lend him their assistance. They
all, therefore, fall into a state of incapacity, if they do not learn voluntarily
to help each other. If men living in democratic countries had no right and no
inclination to associate for political purposes, their independence would be
in great jeopardy; but they might long preserve their wealth and their
cultivation: whereas if they never acquired the habit of forming associations
in ordinary life, civilization itself would be endangered. A people amongst
which individuals should lose the power of achieving great things single-
handed, without acquiring the means of producing them by united
exertions, would soon relapse into barbarism.
Unhappily, the same social condition which renders associations so
necessary to democratic nations, renders their formation more difficult
amongst those nations than amongst all others. When several members of
an aristocracy agree to combine, they easily succeed in doing so; as each of
them brings great strength to the partnership, the number of its members
may be very limited; and when the members of an association are limited in
number, they may easily become mutually acquainted, understand each
other, and establish fixed regulations. The same opportunities do not occur

amongst democratic nations, where the associated members must always be
very numerous for their association to have any power.
I am aware that many of my countrymen are not in the least embarrassed
by this difficulty. They contend that the more enfeebled and incompetent
the citizens become, the more able and active the government ought to be
rendered, in order that society at large may execute what individuals can no
longer accomplish. They believe this answers the whole difficulty, but I
think they are mistaken. A government might perform the part of some of
the largest American companies; and several States, members of the Union,
have already attempted it; but what political power could ever carry on the
vast multitude of lesser undertakings which the American citizens perform
every day, with the assistance of the principle of association? It is easy to
foresee that the time is drawing near when man will be less and less able to
produce, of himself alone, the commonest necessaries of life. The task of
the governing power will therefore perpetually increase, and its very efforts
will extend it every day. The more it stands in the place of associations, the
more will individuals, losing the notion of combining together, require its
assistance: these are causes and effects which unceasingly engender each
other. Will the administration of the country ultimately assume the
management of all the manufacturers, which no single citizen is able to
carry on? And if a time at length arrives, when, in consequence of the
extreme subdivision of landed property, the soil is split into an infinite
number of parcels, so that it can only be cultivated by companies of
husbandmen, will it be necessary that the head of the government should
leave the helm of state to follow the plough? The morals and the
intelligence of a democratic people would be as much endangered as its
business and manufactures, if the government ever wholly usurped the
place of private companies.
Feelings and opinions are recruited, the heart is enlarged, and the human
mind is developed by no other means than by the reciprocal influence of
men upon each other. I have shown that these influences are almost null in
democratic countries; they must therefore be artificially created, and this
can only be accomplished by associations.
When the members of an aristocratic community adopt a new opinion, or
conceive a new sentiment, they give it a station, as it were, beside
themselves, upon the lofty platform where they stand; and opinions or

sentiments so conspicuous to the eyes of the multitude are easily introduced
into the minds or hearts of all around. In democratic countries the governing
power alone is naturally in a condition to act in this manner; but it is easy to
see that its action is always inadequate, and often dangerous. A government
can no more be competent to keep alive and to renew the circulation of
opinions and feelings amongst a great people, than to manage all the
speculations of productive industry. No sooner does a government attempt
to go beyond its political sphere and to enter upon this new track, than it
exercises, even unintentionally, an insupportable tyranny; for a government
can only dictate strict rules, the opinions which it favors are rigidly
enforced, and it is never easy to discriminate between its advice and its
commands. Worse still will be the case if the government really believes
itself interested in preventing all circulation of ideas; it will then stand
motionless, and oppressed by the heaviness of voluntary torpor.
Governments therefore should not be the only active powers: associations
ought, in democratic nations, to stand in lieu of those powerful private
individuals whom the equality of conditions has swept away.
As soon as several of the inhabitants of the United States have taken up
an opinion or a feeling which they wish to promote in the world, they look
out for mutual assistance; and as soon as they have found each other out,
they combine. From that moment they are no longer isolated men, but a
power seen from afar, whose actions serve for an example, and whose
language is listened to. The first time I heard in the United States that
100,000 men had bound themselves publicly to abstain from spirituous
liquors, it appeared to me more like a joke than a serious engagement; and I
did not at once perceive why these temperate citizens could not content
themselves with drinking water by their own firesides. I at last understood
that 300,000 Americans, alarmed by the progress of drunkenness around
them, had made up their minds to patronize temperance. They acted just in
the same way as a man of high rank who should dress very plainly, in order
to inspire the humbler orders with a contempt of luxury. It is probable that if
these 100,000 men had lived in France, each of them would singly have
memorialized the government to watch the public-houses all over the
kingdom.
Nothing, in my opinion, is more deserving of our attention than the
intellectual and moral associations of America. The political and industrial
associations of that country strike us forcibly; but the others elude our

observation, or if we discover them, we understand them imperfectly,
because we have hardly ever seen anything of the kind. It must, however, be
acknowledged that they are as necessary to the American people as the
former, and perhaps more so. In democratic countries the science of
association is the mother of science; the progress of all the rest depends
upon the progress it has made. Amongst the laws which rule human
societies there is one which seems to be more precise and clear than all
others. If men are to remain civilized, or to become so, the art of associating
together must grow and improve in the same ratio in which the equality of
conditions is increased.

Chapter VI: Of The Relation Between Public
Associations And Newspapers
When men are no longer united amongst themselves by firm and lasting
ties, it is impossible to obtain the cooperation of any great number of them,
unless you can persuade every man whose concurrence you require that this
private interest obliges him voluntarily to unite his exertions to the
exertions of all the rest. This can only be habitually and conveniently
effected by means of a newspaper; nothing but a newspaper can drop the
same thought into a thousand minds at the same moment. A newspaper is an
adviser who does not require to be sought, but who comes of his own
accord, and talks to you briefly every day of the common weal, without
distracting you from your private affairs.
Newspapers therefore become more necessary in proportion as men
become more equal, and individualism more to be feared. To suppose that
they only serve to protect freedom would be to diminish their importance:
they maintain civilization. I shall not deny that in democratic countries
newspapers frequently lead the citizens to launch together in very ill-
digested schemes; but if there were no newspapers there would be no
common activity. The evil which they produce is therefore much less than
that which they cure.
The effect of a newspaper is not only to suggest the same purpose to a
great number of persons, but also to furnish means for executing in
common the designs which they may have singly conceived. The principal
citizens who inhabit an aristocratic country discern each other from afar;
and if they wish to unite their forces, they move towards each other,
drawing a multitude of men after them. It frequently happens, on the
contrary, in democratic countries, that a great number of men who wish or
who want to combine cannot accomplish it, because as they are very
insignificant and lost amidst the crowd, they cannot see, and know not
where to find, one another. A newspaper then takes up the notion or the
feeling which had occurred simultaneously, but singly, to each of them. All
are then immediately guided towards this beacon; and these wandering

minds, which had long sought each other in darkness, at length meet and
unite.
The newspaper brought them together, and the newspaper is still
necessary to keep them united. In order that an association amongst a
democratic people should have any power, it must be a numerous body. The
persons of whom it is composed are therefore scattered over a wide extent,
and each of them is detained in the place of his domicile by the narrowness
of his income, or by the small unremitting exertions by which he earns it.
Means then must be found to converse every day without seeing each other,
and to take steps in common without having met. Thus hardly any
democratic association can do without newspapers. There is consequently a
necessary connection between public associations and newspapers:
newspapers make associations, and associations make newspapers; and if it
has been correctly advanced that associations will increase in number as the
conditions of men become more equal, it is not less certain that the number
of newspapers increases in proportion to that of associations. Thus it is in
America that we find at the same time the greatest number of associations
and of newspapers.
This connection between the number of newspapers and that of
associations leads us to the discovery of a further connection between the
state of the periodical press and the form of the administration in a country;
and shows that the number of newspapers must diminish or increase
amongst a democratic people, in proportion as its administration is more or
less centralized. For amongst democratic nations the exercise of local
powers cannot be intrusted to the principal members of the community as in
aristocracies. Those powers must either be abolished, or placed in the hands
of very large numbers of men, who then in fact constitute an association
permanently established by law for the purpose of administering the affairs
of a certain extent of territory; and they require a journal, to bring to them
every day, in the midst of their own minor concerns, some intelligence of
the state of their public weal. The more numerous local powers are, the
greater is the number of men in whom they are vested by law; and as this
want is hourly felt, the more profusely do newspapers abound.
The extraordinary subdivision of administrative power has much more to
do with the enormous number of American newspapers than the great
political freedom of the country and the absolute liberty of the press. If all

the inhabitants of the Union had the suffrage—but a suffrage which should
only extend to the choice of their legislators in Congress—they would
require but few newspapers, because they would only have to act together
on a few very important but very rare occasions. But within the pale of the
great association of the nation, lesser associations have been established by
law in every country, every city, and indeed in every village, for the
purposes of local administration. The laws of the country thus compel every
American to co-operate every day of his life with some of his fellow-
citizens for a common purpose, and each one of them requires a newspaper
to inform him what all the others are doing.
I am of opinion that a democratic people, *a without any national
representative assemblies, but with a great number of small local powers,
would have in the end more newspapers than another people governed by a
centralized administration and an elective legislation. What best explains to
me the enormous circulation of the daily press in the United States, is that
amongst the Americans I find the utmost national freedom combined with
local freedom of every kind. There is a prevailing opinion in France and
England that the circulation of newspapers would be indefinitely increased
by removing the taxes which have been laid upon the press. This is a very
exaggerated estimate of the effects of such a reform. Newspapers increase
in numbers, not according to their cheapness, but according to the more or
less frequent want which a great number of men may feel for
intercommunication and combination.
a
[ I say a democratic people: the administration of an
aristocratic people may be the reverse of centralized, and yet
the want of newspapers be little felt, because local powers
are then vested in the hands of a very small number of men,
who either act apart, or who know each other and can easily
meet and come to an understanding.]
In like manner I should attribute the increasing influence of the daily
press to causes more general than those by which it is commonly explained.
A newspaper can only subsist on the condition of publishing sentiments or
principles common to a large number of men. A newspaper therefore always
represents an association which is composed of its habitual readers. This
association may be more or less defined, more or less restricted, more or
less numerous; but the fact that the newspaper keeps alive, is a proof that at
least the germ of such an association exists in the minds of its readers.

This leads me to a last reflection, with which I shall conclude this
chapter. The more equal the conditions of men become, and the less strong
men individually are, the more easily do they give way to the current of the
multitude, and the more difficult is it for them to adhere by themselves to an
opinion which the multitude discard. A newspaper represents an
association; it may be said to address each of its readers in the name of all
the others, and to exert its influence over them in proportion to their
individual weakness. The power of the newspaper press must therefore
increase as the social conditions of men become more equal.

Chapter VII: Connection Of Civil And Political
Associations
There is only one country on the face of the earth where the citizens
enjoy unlimited freedom of association for political purposes. This same
country is the only one in the world where the continual exercise of the
right of association has been introduced into civil life, and where all the
advantages which civilization can confer are procured by means of it. In all
the countries where political associations are prohibited, civil associations
are rare. It is hardly probable that this is the result of accident; but the
inference should rather be, that there is a natural, and perhaps a necessary,
connection between these two kinds of associations. Certain men happen to
have a common interest in some concern—either a commercial undertaking
is to be managed, or some speculation in manufactures to be tried; they
meet, they combine, and thus by degrees they become familiar with the
principle of association. The greater is the multiplicity of small affairs, the
more do men, even without knowing it, acquire facility in prosecuting great
undertakings in common. Civil associations, therefore, facilitate political
association: but, on the other hand, political association singularly
strengthens and improves associations for civil purposes. In civil life every
man may, strictly speaking, fancy that he can provide for his own wants; in
politics, he can fancy no such thing. When a people, then, have any
knowledge of public life, the notion of association, and the wish to
coalesce, present themselves every day to the minds of the whole
community: whatever natural repugnance may restrain men from acting in
concert, they will always be ready to combine for the sake of a party. Thus
political life makes the love and practice of association more general; it
imparts a desire of union, and teaches the means of combination to numbers
of men who would have always lived apart.
Politics not only give birth to numerous associations, but to associations
of great extent. In civil life it seldom happens that any one interest draws a
very large number of men to act in concert; much skill is required to bring
such an interest into existence: but in politics opportunities present
themselves every day. Now it is solely in great associations that the general

value of the principle of association is displayed. Citizens who are
individually powerless, do not very clearly anticipate the strength which
they may acquire by uniting together; it must be shown to them in order to
be understood. Hence it is often easier to collect a multitude for a public
purpose than a few persons; a thousand citizens do not see what interest
they have in combining together—ten thousand will be perfectly aware of
it. In politics men combine for great undertakings; and the use they make of
the principle of association in important affairs practically teaches them that
it is their interest to help each other in those of less moment. A political
association draws a number of individuals at the same time out of their own
circle: however they may be naturally kept asunder by age, mind, and
fortune, it places them nearer together and brings them into contact. Once
met, they can always meet again.
Men can embark in few civil partnerships without risking a portion of
their possessions; this is the case with all manufacturing and trading
companies. When men are as yet but little versed in the art of association,
and are unacquainted with its principal rules, they are afraid, when first they
combine in this manner, of buying their experience dear. They therefore
prefer depriving themselves of a powerful instrument of success to running
the risks which attend the use of it. They are, however, less reluctant to join
political associations, which appear to them to be without danger, because
they adventure no money in them. But they cannot belong to these
associations for any length of time without finding out how order is
maintained amongst a large number of men, and by what contrivance they
are made to advance, harmoniously and methodically, to the same object.
Thus they learn to surrender their own will to that of all the rest, and to
make their own exertions subordinate to the common impulse—things
which it is not less necessary to know in civil than in political associations.
Political associations may therefore be considered as large free schools,
where all the members of the community go to learn the general theory of
association.
But even if political association did not directly contribute to the progress
of civil association, to destroy the former would be to impair the latter.
When citizens can only meet in public for certain purposes, they regard
such meetings as a strange proceeding of rare occurrence, and they rarely
think at all about it. When they are allowed to meet freely for all purposes,
they ultimately look upon public association as the universal, or in a manner

the sole means, which men can employ to accomplish the different purposes
they may have in view. Every new want instantly revives the notion. The art
of association then becomes, as I have said before, the mother of action,
studied and applied by all.
When some kinds of associations are prohibited and others allowed, it is
difficult to distinguish the former from the latter, beforehand. In this state of
doubt men abstain from them altogether, and a sort of public opinion passes
current which tends to cause any association whatsoever to be regarded as a
bold and almost an illicit enterprise. *a
a
[ This is more especially true when the executive
government has a discretionary power of allowing or
prohibiting associations. When certain associations are
simply prohibited by law, and the courts of justice have to
punish infringements of that law, the evil is far less
considerable. Then every citizen knows beforehand pretty
nearly what he has to expect. He judges himself before he is
judged by the law, and, abstaining from prohibited
associations, he embarks in those which are legally
sanctioned. It is by these restrictions that all free nations
have always admitted that the right of association might be
limited. But if the legislature should invest a man with a
power of ascertaining beforehand which associations are
dangerous and which are useful, and should authorize him to
destroy all associations in the bud or allow them to be
formed, as nobody would be able to foresee in what cases
associations might be established and in what cases they
would be put down, the spirit of association would be
entirely paralyzed. The former of these laws would only
assail certain associations; the latter would apply to society
itself, and inflict an injury upon it. I can conceive that a
regular government may have recourse to the former, but I
do not concede that any government has the right of
enacting the latter.]
It is therefore chimerical to suppose that the spirit of association, when it
is repressed on some one point, will nevertheless display the same vigor on
all others; and that if men be allowed to prosecute certain undertakings in
common, that is quite enough for them eagerly to set about them. When the
members of a community are allowed and accustomed to combine for all
purposes, they will combine as readily for the lesser as for the more
important ones; but if they are only allowed to combine for small affairs,
they will be neither inclined nor able to effect it. It is in vain that you will
leave them entirely free to prosecute their business on joint-stock account:

they will hardly care to avail themselves of the rights you have granted to
them; and, after having exhausted your strength in vain efforts to put down
prohibited associations, you will be surprised that you cannot persuade men
to form the associations you encourage.
I do not say that there can be no civil associations in a country where
political association is prohibited; for men can never live in society without
embarking in some common undertakings: but I maintain that in such a
country civil associations will always be few in number, feebly planned,
unskillfully managed, that they will never form any vast designs, or that
they will fail in the execution of them.
This naturally leads me to think that freedom of association in political
matters is not so dangerous to public tranquillity as is supposed; and that
possibly, after having agitated society for some time, it may strengthen the
State in the end. In democratic countries political associations are, so to
speak, the only powerful persons who aspire to rule the State. Accordingly,
the governments of our time look upon associations of this kind just as
sovereigns in the Middle Ages regarded the great vassals of the Crown: they
entertain a sort of instinctive abhorrence of them, and they combat them on
all occasions. They bear, on the contrary, a natural goodwill to civil
associations, because they readily discover that, instead of directing the
minds of the community to public affairs, these institutions serve to divert
them from such reflections; and that, by engaging them more and more in
the pursuit of objects which cannot be attained without public tranquillity,
they deter them from revolutions. But these governments do not attend to
the fact that political associations tend amazingly to multiply and facilitate
those of a civil character, and that in avoiding a dangerous evil they deprive
themselves of an efficacious remedy.
When you see the Americans freely and constantly forming associations
for the purpose of promoting some political principle, of raising one man to
the head of affairs, or of wresting power from another, you have some
difficulty in understanding that men so independent do not constantly fall
into the abuse of freedom. If, on the other hand, you survey the infinite
number of trading companies which are in operation in the United States,
and perceive that the Americans are on every side unceasingly engaged in
the execution of important and difficult plans, which the slightest revolution
would throw into confusion, you will readily comprehend why people so

well employed are by no means tempted to perturb the State, nor to destroy
that public tranquillity by which they all profit.
Is it enough to observe these things separately, or should we not discover
the hidden tie which connects them? In their political associations, the
Americans of all conditions, minds, and ages, daily acquire a general taste
for association, and grow accustomed to the use of it. There they meet
together in large numbers, they converse, they listen to each other, and they
are mutually stimulated to all sorts of undertakings. They afterwards
transfer to civil life the notions they have thus acquired, and make them
subservient to a thousand purposes. Thus it is by the enjoyment of a
dangerous freedom that the Americans learn the art of rendering the dangers
of freedom less formidable.
If a certain moment in the existence of a nation be selected, it is easy to
prove that political associations perturb the State, and paralyze productive
industry; but take the whole life of a people, and it may perhaps be easy to
demonstrate that freedom of association in political matters is favorable to
the prosperity and even to the tranquillity of the community.
I said in the former part of this work, "The unrestrained liberty of
political association cannot be entirely assimilated to the liberty of the
press. The one is at the same time less necessary and more dangerous than
the other. A nation may confine it within certain limits without ceasing to be
mistress of itself; and it may sometimes be obliged to do so in order to
maintain its own authority." And further on I added: "It cannot be denied
that the unrestrained liberty of association for political purposes is the last
degree of liberty which a people is fit for. If it does not throw them into
anarchy, it perpetually brings them, as it were, to the verge of it." Thus I do
not think that a nation is always at liberty to invest its citizens with an
absolute right of association for political purposes; and I doubt whether, in
any country or in any age, it be wise to set no limits to freedom of
association. A certain nation, it is said, could not maintain tranquillity in the
community, cause the laws to be respected, or establish a lasting
government, if the right of association were not confined within narrow
limits. These blessings are doubtless invaluable, and I can imagine that, to
acquire or to preserve them, a nation may impose upon itself severe
temporary restrictions: but still it is well that the nation should know at
what price these blessings are purchased. I can understand that it may be

advisable to cut off a man's arm in order to save his life; but it would be
ridiculous to assert that he will be as dexterous as he was before he lost it.

Chapter VIII: The Americans Combat
Individualism By The Principle Of Interest
Rightly Understood
When the world was managed by a few rich and powerful individuals,
these persons loved to entertain a lofty idea of the duties of man. They were
fond of professing that it is praiseworthy to forget one's self, and that good
should be done without hope of reward, as it is by the Deity himself. Such
were the standard opinions of that time in morals. I doubt whether men
were more virtuous in aristocratic ages than in others; but they were
incessantly talking of the beauties of virtue, and its utility was only studied
in secret. But since the imagination takes less lofty flights and every man's
thoughts are centred in himself, moralists are alarmed by this idea of self-
sacrifice, and they no longer venture to present it to the human mind. They
therefore content themselves with inquiring whether the personal advantage
of each member of the community does not consist in working for the good
of all; and when they have hit upon some point on which private interest
and public interest meet and amalgamate, they are eager to bring it into
notice. Observations of this kind are gradually multiplied: what was only a
single remark becomes a general principle; and it is held as a truth that man
serves himself in serving his fellow-creatures, and that his private interest is
to do good.
I have already shown, in several parts of this work, by what means the
inhabitants of the United States almost always manage to combine their
own advantage with that of their fellow-citizens: my present purpose is to
point out the general rule which enables them to do so. In the United States
hardly anybody talks of the beauty of virtue; but they maintain that virtue is
useful, and prove it every day. The American moralists do not profess that
men ought to sacrifice themselves for their fellow-creatures because it is
noble to make such sacrifices; but they boldly aver that such sacrifices are
as necessary to him who imposes them upon himself as to him for whose
sake they are made. They have found out that in their country and their age
man is brought home to himself by an irresistible force; and losing all hope

of stopping that force, they turn all their thoughts to the direction of it. They
therefore do not deny that every man may follow his own interest; but they
endeavor to prove that it is the interest of every man to be virtuous. I shall
not here enter into the reasons they allege, which would divert me from my
subject: suffice it to say that they have convinced their fellow-countrymen.
Montaigne said long ago: "Were I not to follow the straight road for its
straightness, I should follow it for having found by experience that in the
end it is commonly the happiest and most useful track." The doctrine of
interest rightly understood is not, then, new, but amongst the Americans of
our time it finds universal acceptance: it has become popular there; you
may trace it at the bottom of all their actions, you will remark it in all they
say. It is as often to be met with on the lips of the poor man as of the rich. In
Europe the principle of interest is much grosser than it is in America, but at
the same time it is less common, and especially it is less avowed; amongst
us, men still constantly feign great abnegation which they no longer feel.
The Americans, on the contrary, are fond of explaining almost all the
actions of their lives by the principle of interest rightly understood; they
show with complacency how an enlightened regard for themselves
constantly prompts them to assist each other, and inclines them willingly to
sacrifice a portion of their time and property to the welfare of the State. In
this respect I think they frequently fail to do themselves justice; for in the
United States, as well as elsewhere, people are sometimes seen to give way
to those disinterested and spontaneous impulses which are natural to man;
but the Americans seldom allow that they yield to emotions of this kind;
they are more anxious to do honor to their philosophy than to themselves.
I might here pause, without attempting to pass a judgment on what I have
described. The extreme difficulty of the subject would be my excuse, but I
shall not avail myself of it; and I had rather that my readers, clearly
perceiving my object, should refuse to follow me than that I should leave
them in suspense. The principle of interest rightly understood is not a lofty
one, but it is clear and sure. It does not aim at mighty objects, but it attains
without excessive exertion all those at which it aims. As it lies within the
reach of all capacities, everyone can without difficulty apprehend and retain
it. By its admirable conformity to human weaknesses, it easily obtains great
dominion; nor is that dominion precarious, since the principle checks one
personal interest by another, and uses, to direct the passions, the very same
instrument which excites them. The principle of interest rightly understood

produces no great acts of self-sacrifice, but it suggests daily small acts of
self-denial. By itself it cannot suffice to make a man virtuous, but it
disciplines a number of citizens in habits of regularity, temperance,
moderation, foresight, self-command; and, if it does not lead men straight to
virtue by the will, it gradually draws them in that direction by their habits.
If the principle of interest rightly understood were to sway the whole moral
world, extraordinary virtues would doubtless be more rare; but I think that
gross depravity would then also be less common. The principle of interest
rightly understood perhaps prevents some men from rising far above the
level of mankind; but a great number of other men, who were falling far
below it, are caught and restrained by it. Observe some few individuals,
they are lowered by it; survey mankind, it is raised. I am not afraid to say
that the principle of interest, rightly understood, appears to me the best
suited of all philosophical theories to the wants of the men of our time, and
that I regard it as their chief remaining security against themselves. Towards
it, therefore, the minds of the moralists of our age should turn; even should
they judge it to be incomplete, it must nevertheless be adopted as necessary.
I do not think upon the whole that there is more egotism amongst us than
in America; the only difference is, that there it is enlightened—here it is not.
Every American will sacrifice a portion of his private interests to preserve
the rest; we would fain preserve the whole, and oftentimes the whole is lost.
Everybody I see about me seems bent on teaching his contemporaries, by
precept and example, that what is useful is never wrong. Will nobody
undertake to make them understand how what is right may be useful? No
power upon earth can prevent the increasing equality of conditions from
inclining the human mind to seek out what is useful, or from leading every
member of the community to be wrapped up in himself. It must therefore be
expected that personal interest will become more than ever the principal, if
not the sole, spring of men's actions; but it remains to be seen how each
man will understand his personal interest. If the members of a community,
as they become more equal, become more ignorant and coarse, it is difficult
to foresee to what pitch of stupid excesses their egotism may lead them; and
no one can foretell into what disgrace and wretchedness they would plunge
themselves, lest they should have to sacrifice something of their own well-
being to the prosperity of their fellow-creatures. I do not think that the
system of interest, as it is professed in America, is, in all its parts, self-
evident; but it contains a great number of truths so evident that men, if they

are but educated, cannot fail to see them. Educate, then, at any rate; for the
age of implicit self-sacrifice and instinctive virtues is already flitting far
away from us, and the time is fast approaching when freedom, public peace,
and social order itself will not be able to exist without education.

Chapter IX: That The Americans Apply The
Principle Of Interest Rightly Understood To
Religious Matters
If the principle of interest rightly understood had nothing but the present
world in view, it would be very insufficient; for there are many sacrifices
which can only find their recompense in another; and whatever ingenuity
may be put forth to demonstrate the utility of virtue, it will never be an easy
task to make that man live aright who has no thoughts of dying. It is
therefore necessary to ascertain whether the principle of interest rightly
understood is easily compatible with religious belief. The philosophers who
inculcate this system of morals tell men, that to be happy in this life they
must watch their own passions and steadily control their excess; that lasting
happiness can only be secured by renouncing a thousand transient
gratifications; and that a man must perpetually triumph over himself, in
order to secure his own advantage. The founders of almost all religions
have held the same language. The track they point out to man is the same,
only that the goal is more remote; instead of placing in this world the
reward of the sacrifices they impose, they transport it to another.
Nevertheless I cannot believe that all those who practise virtue from
religious motives are only actuated by the hope of a recompense. I have
known zealous Christians who constantly forgot themselves, to work with
greater ardor for the happiness of their fellow-men; and I have heard them
declare that all they did was only to earn the blessings of a future state. I
cannot but think that they deceive themselves; I respect them too much to
believe them.
Christianity indeed teaches that a man must prefer his neighbor to
himself, in order to gain eternal life; but Christianity also teaches that men
ought to benefit their fellow-creatures for the love of God. A sublime
expression! Man, searching by his intellect into the divine conception, and
seeing that order is the purpose of God, freely combines to prosecute the
great design; and whilst he sacrifices his personal interests to this
consummate order of all created things, expects no other recompense than

the pleasure of contemplating it. I do not believe that interest is the sole
motive of religious men: but I believe that interest is the principal means
which religions themselves employ to govern men, and I do not question
that this way they strike into the multitude and become popular. It is not
easy clearly to perceive why the principle of interest rightly understood
should keep aloof from religious opinions; and it seems to me more easy to
show why it should draw men to them. Let it be supposed that, in order to
obtain happiness in this world, a man combats his instinct on all occasions
and deliberately calculates every action of his life; that, instead of yielding
blindly to the impetuosity of first desires, he has learned the art of resisting
them, and that he has accustomed himself to sacrifice without an effort the
pleasure of a moment to the lasting interest of his whole life. If such a man
believes in the religion which he professes, it will cost him but little to
submit to the restrictions it may impose. Reason herself counsels him to
obey, and habit has prepared him to endure them. If he should have
conceived any doubts as to the object of his hopes, still he will not easily
allow himself to be stopped by them; and he will decide that it is wise to
risk some of the advantages of this world, in order to preserve his rights to
the great inheritance promised him in another. "To be mistaken in believing
that the Christian religion is true," says Pascal, "is no great loss to anyone;
but how dreadful to be mistaken in believing it to be false!"
The Americans do not affect a brutal indifference to a future state; they
affect no puerile pride in despising perils which they hope to escape from.
They therefore profess their religion without shame and without weakness;
but there generally is, even in their zeal, something so indescribably
tranquil, methodical, and deliberate, that it would seem as if the head, far
more than the heart, brought them to the foot of the altar. The Americans
not only follow their religion from interest, but they often place in this
world the interest which makes them follow it. In the Middle Ages the
clergy spoke of nothing but a future state; they hardly cared to prove that a
sincere Christian may be a happy man here below. But the American
preachers are constantly referring to the earth; and it is only with great
difficulty that they can divert their attention from it. To touch their
congregations, they always show them how favorable religious opinions are
to freedom and public tranquillity; and it is often difficult to ascertain from
their discourses whether the principal object of religion is to procure eternal
felicity in the other world, or prosperity in this.

Chapter X: Of The Taste For Physical Well-Being
In America
In America the passion for physical well-being is not always exclusive,
but it is general; and if all do not feel it in the same manner, yet it is felt by
all. Carefully to satisfy all, even the least wants of the body, and to provide
the little conveniences of life, is uppermost in every mind. Something of an
analogous character is more and more apparent in Europe. Amongst the
causes which produce these similar consequences in both hemispheres,
several are so connected with my subject as to deserve notice.
When riches are hereditarily fixed in families, there are a great number of
men who enjoy the comforts of life without feeling an exclusive taste for
those comforts. The heart of man is not so much caught by the undisturbed
possession of anything valuable as by the desire, as yet imperfectly
satisfied, of possessing it, and by the incessant dread of losing it. In
aristocratic communities, the wealthy, never having experienced a condition
different from their own, entertain no fear of changing it; the existence of
such conditions hardly occurs to them. The comforts of life are not to them
the end of life, but simply a way of living; they regard them as existence
itself—enjoyed, but scarcely thought of. As the natural and instinctive taste
which all men feel for being well off is thus satisfied without trouble and
without apprehension, their faculties are turned elsewhere, and cling to
more arduous and more lofty undertakings, which excite and engross their
minds. Hence it is that, in the midst of physical gratifications, the members
of an aristocracy often display a haughty contempt of these very
enjoyments, and exhibit singular powers of endurance under the privation
of them. All the revolutions which have ever shaken or destroyed
aristocracies, have shown how easily men accustomed to superfluous
luxuries can do without the necessaries of life; whereas men who have
toiled to acquire a competency can hardly live after they have lost it.
If I turn my observation from the upper to the lower classes, I find
analogous effects produced by opposite causes. Amongst a nation where
aristocracy predominates in society, and keeps it stationary, the people in

the end get as much accustomed to poverty as the rich to their opulence.
The latter bestow no anxiety on their physical comforts, because they enjoy
them without an effort; the former do not think of things which they despair
of obtaining, and which they hardly know enough of to desire them. In
communities of this kind, the imagination of the poor is driven to seek
another world; the miseries of real life inclose it around, but it escapes from
their control, and flies to seek its pleasures far beyond. When, on the
contrary, the distinctions of ranks are confounded together and privileges
are destroyed—when hereditary property is subdivided, and education and
freedom widely diffused, the desire of acquiring the comforts of the world
haunts the imagination of the poor, and the dread of losing them that of the
rich. Many scanty fortunes spring up; those who possess them have a
sufficient share of physical gratifications to conceive a taste for these
pleasures—not enough to satisfy it. They never procure them without
exertion, and they never indulge in them without apprehension. They are
therefore always straining to pursue or to retain gratifications so delightful,
so imperfect, so fugitive.
If I were to inquire what passion is most natural to men who are
stimulated and circumscribed by the obscurity of their birth or the
mediocrity of their fortune, I could discover none more peculiarly
appropriate to their condition than this love of physical prosperity. The
passion for physical comforts is essentially a passion of the middle classes:
with those classes it grows and spreads, with them it preponderates. From
them it mounts into the higher orders of society, and descends into the mass
of the people. I never met in America with any citizen so poor as not to cast
a glance of hope and envy on the enjoyments of the rich, or whose
imagination did not possess itself by anticipation of those good things
which fate still obstinately withheld from him. On the other hand, I never
perceived amongst the wealthier inhabitants of the United States that proud
contempt of physical gratifications which is sometimes to be met with even
in the most opulent and dissolute aristocracies. Most of these wealthy
persons were once poor; they have felt the sting of want; they were long a
prey to adverse fortunes; and now that the victory is won, the passions
which accompanied the contest have survived it: their minds are, as it were,
intoxicated by the small enjoyments which they have pursued for forty
years. Not but that in the United States, as elsewhere, there are a certain
number of wealthy persons who, having come into their property by

inheritance, possess, without exertion, an opulence they have not earned.
But even these men are not less devotedly attached to the pleasures of
material life. The love of well-being is now become the predominant taste
of the nation; the great current of man's passions runs in that channel, and
sweeps everything along in its course.

Chapter XI: Peculiar Effects Of The Love Of
Physical Gratifications In Democratic Ages
It may be supposed, from what has just been said, that the love of
physical gratifications must constantly urge the Americans to irregularities
in morals, disturb the peace of families, and threaten the security of society
at large. Such is not the case: the passion for physical gratifications
produces in democracies effects very different from those which it
occasions in aristocratic nations. It sometimes happens that, wearied with
public affairs and sated with opulence, amidst the ruin of religious belief
and the decline of the State, the heart of an aristocracy may by degrees be
seduced to the pursuit of sensual enjoyments only. At other times the power
of the monarch or the weakness of the people, without stripping the nobility
of their fortune, compels them to stand aloof from the administration of
affairs, and whilst the road to mighty enterprise is closed, abandons them to
the inquietude of their own desires; they then fall back heavily upon
themselves, and seek in the pleasures of the body oblivion of their former
greatness. When the members of an aristocratic body are thus exclusively
devoted to the pursuit of physical gratifications, they commonly concentrate
in that direction all the energy which they derive from their long experience
of power. Such men are not satisfied with the pursuit of comfort; they
require sumptuous depravity and splendid corruption. The worship they pay
the senses is a gorgeous one; and they seem to vie with each other in the art
of degrading their own natures. The stronger, the more famous, and the
more free an aristocracy has been, the more depraved will it then become;
and however brilliant may have been the lustre of its virtues, I dare predict
that they will always be surpassed by the splendor of its vices.
The taste for physical gratifications leads a democratic people into no
such excesses. The love of well-being is there displayed as a tenacious,
exclusive, universal passion; but its range is confined. To build enormous
palaces, to conquer or to mimic nature, to ransack the world in order to
gratify the passions of a man, is not thought of: but to add a few roods of
land to your field, to plant an orchard, to enlarge a dwelling, to be always
making life more comfortable and convenient, to avoid trouble, and to

satisfy the smallest wants without effort and almost without cost. These are
small objects, but the soul clings to them; it dwells upon them closely and
day by day, till they at last shut out the rest of the world, and sometimes
intervene between itself and heaven.
This, it may be said, can only be applicable to those members of the
community who are in humble circumstances; wealthier individuals will
display tastes akin to those which belonged to them in aristocratic ages. I
contest the proposition: in point of physical gratifications, the most opulent
members of a democracy will not display tastes very different from those of
the people; whether it be that, springing from the people, they really share
those tastes, or that they esteem it a duty to submit to them. In democratic
society the sensuality of the public has taken a moderate and tranquil
course, to which all are bound to conform: it is as difficult to depart from
the common rule by one's vices as by one's virtues. Rich men who live
amidst democratic nations are therefore more intent on providing for their
smallest wants than for their extraordinary enjoyments; they gratify a
number of petty desires, without indulging in any great irregularities of
passion: thus they are more apt to become enervated than debauched. The
especial taste which the men of democratic ages entertain for physical
enjoyments is not naturally opposed to the principles of public order; nay, it
often stands in need of order that it may be gratified. Nor is it adverse to
regularity of morals, for good morals contribute to public tranquillity and
are favorable to industry. It may even be frequently combined with a
species of religious morality: men wish to be as well off as they can in this
world, without foregoing their chance of another. Some physical
gratifications cannot be indulged in without crime; from such they strictly
abstain. The enjoyment of others is sanctioned by religion and morality; to
these the heart, the imagination, and life itself are unreservedly given up;
till, in snatching at these lesser gifts, men lose sight of those more precious
possessions which constitute the glory and the greatness of mankind. The
reproach I address to the principle of equality, is not that it leads men away
in the pursuit of forbidden enjoyments, but that it absorbs them wholly in
quest of those which are allowed. By these means, a kind of virtuous
materialism may ultimately be established in the world, which would not
corrupt, but enervate the soul, and noiselessly unbend its springs of action.

Chapter XII: Causes Of Fanatical Enthusiasm In
Some Americans
Although the desire of acquiring the good things of this world is the
prevailing passion of the American people, certain momentary outbreaks
occur, when their souls seem suddenly to burst the bonds of matter by
which they are restrained, and to soar impetuously towards heaven. In all
the States of the Union, but especially in the half-peopled country of the Far
West, wandering preachers may be met with who hawk about the word of
God from place to place. Whole families—old men, women, and children—
cross rough passes and untrodden wilds, coming from a great distance, to
join a camp-meeting, where they totally forget for several days and nights,
in listening to these discourses, the cares of business and even the most
urgent wants of the body. Here and there, in the midst of American society,
you meet with men, full of a fanatical and almost wild enthusiasm, which
hardly exists in Europe. From time to time strange sects arise, which
endeavor to strike out extraordinary paths to eternal happiness. Religious
insanity is very common in the United States.
Nor ought these facts to surprise us. It was not man who implanted in
himself the taste for what is infinite and the love of what is immortal: those
lofty instincts are not the offspring of his capricious will; their steadfast
foundation is fixed in human nature, and they exist in spite of his efforts. He
may cross and distort them—destroy them he cannot. The soul has wants
which must be satisfied; and whatever pains be taken to divert it from itself,
it soon grows weary, restless, and disquieted amidst the enjoyments of
sense. If ever the faculties of the great majority of mankind were
exclusively bent upon the pursuit of material objects, it might be anticipated
that an amazing reaction would take place in the souls of some men. They
would drift at large in the world of spirits, for fear of remaining shackled by
the close bondage of the body.
It is not then wonderful if, in the midst of a community whose thoughts
tend earthward, a small number of individuals are to be found who turn
their looks to heaven. I should be surprised if mysticism did not soon make

some advance amongst a people solely engaged in promoting its own
worldly welfare. It is said that the deserts of the Thebaid were peopled by
the persecutions of the emperors and the massacres of the Circus; I should
rather say that it was by the luxuries of Rome and the Epicurean philosophy
of Greece. If their social condition, their present circumstances, and their
laws did not confine the minds of the Americans so closely to the pursuit of
worldly welfare, it is probable that they would display more reserve and
more experience whenever their attention is turned to things immaterial,
and that they would check themselves without difficulty. But they feel
imprisoned within bounds which they will apparently never be allowed to
pass. As soon as they have passed these bounds, their minds know not
where to fix themselves, and they often rush unrestrained beyond the range
of common-sense.

Chapter XIII: Causes Of The Restless Spirit Of
Americans In The Midst Of Their Prosperity
In certain remote corners of the Old World you may still sometimes
stumble upon a small district which seems to have been forgotten amidst the
general tumult, and to have remained stationary whilst everything around it
was in motion. The inhabitants are for the most part extremely ignorant and
poor; they take no part in the business of the country, and they are
frequently oppressed by the government; yet their countenances are
generally placid, and their spirits light. In America I saw the freest and most
enlightened men, placed in the happiest circumstances which the world
affords: it seemed to me as if a cloud habitually hung upon their brow, and I
thought them serious and almost sad even in their pleasures. The chief
reason of this contrast is that the former do not think of the ills they endure
—the latter are forever brooding over advantages they do not possess. It is
strange to see with what feverish ardor the Americans pursue their own
welfare; and to watch the vague dread that constantly torments them lest
they should not have chosen the shortest path which may lead to it. A native
of the United States clings to this world's goods as if he were certain never
to die; and he is so hasty in grasping at all within his reach, that one would
suppose he was constantly afraid of not living long enough to enjoy them.
He clutches everything, he holds nothing fast, but soon loosens his grasp to
pursue fresh gratifications.
In the United States a man builds a house to spend his latter years in it,
and he sells it before the roof is on: he plants a garden, and lets it just as the
trees are coming into bearing: he brings a field into tillage, and leaves other
men to gather the crops: he embraces a profession, and gives it up: he
settles in a place, which he soon afterwards leaves, to carry his changeable
longings elsewhere. If his private affairs leave him any leisure, he instantly
plunges into the vortex of politics; and if at the end of a year of unremitting
labor he finds he has a few days' vacation, his eager curiosity whirls him
over the vast extent of the United States, and he will travel fifteen hundred
miles in a few days, to shake off his happiness. Death at length overtakes

him, but it is before he is weary of his bootless chase of that complete
felicity which is forever on the wing.
At first sight there is something surprising in this strange unrest of so
many happy men, restless in the midst of abundance. The spectacle itself is
however as old as the world; the novelty is to see a whole people furnish an
exemplification of it. Their taste for physical gratifications must be
regarded as the original source of that secret inquietude which the actions of
the Americans betray, and of that inconstancy of which they afford fresh
examples every day. He who has set his heart exclusively upon the pursuit
of worldly welfare is always in a hurry, for he has but a limited time at his
disposal to reach it, to grasp it, and to enjoy it. The recollection of the
brevity of life is a constant spur to him. Besides the good things which he
possesses, he every instant fancies a thousand others which death will
prevent him from trying if he does not try them soon. This thought fills him
with anxiety, fear, and regret, and keeps his mind in ceaseless trepidation,
which leads him perpetually to change his plans and his abode. If in
addition to the taste for physical well-being a social condition be
superadded, in which the laws and customs make no condition permanent,
here is a great additional stimulant to this restlessness of temper. Men will
then be seen continually to change their track, for fear of missing the
shortest cut to happiness. It may readily be conceived that if men,
passionately bent upon physical gratifications, desire eagerly, they are also
easily discouraged: as their ultimate object is to enjoy, the means to reach
that object must be prompt and easy, or the trouble of acquiring the
gratification would be greater than the gratification itself. Their prevailing
frame of mind then is at once ardent and relaxed, violent and enervated.
Death is often less dreaded than perseverance in continuous efforts to one
end.
The equality of conditions leads by a still straighter road to several of the
effects which I have here described. When all the privileges of birth and
fortune are abolished, when all professions are accessible to all, and a man's
own energies may place him at the top of any one of them, an easy and
unbounded career seems open to his ambition, and he will readily persuade
himself that he is born to no vulgar destinies. But this is an erroneous
notion, which is corrected by daily experience. The same equality which
allows every citizen to conceive these lofty hopes, renders all the citizens
less able to realize them: it circumscribes their powers on every side, whilst

it gives freer scope to their desires. Not only are they themselves powerless,
but they are met at every step by immense obstacles, which they did not at
first perceive. They have swept away the privileges of some of their fellow-
creatures which stood in their way, but they have opened the door to
universal competition: the barrier has changed its shape rather than its
position. When men are nearly alike, and all follow the same track, it is
very difficult for any one individual to walk quick and cleave a way through
the dense throng which surrounds and presses him. This constant strife
between the propensities springing from the equality of conditions and the
means it supplies to satisfy them, harasses and wearies the mind.
It is possible to conceive men arrived at a degree of freedom which
should completely content them; they would then enjoy their independence
without anxiety and without impatience. But men will never establish any
equality with which they can be contented. Whatever efforts a people may
make, they will never succeed in reducing all the conditions of society to a
perfect level; and even if they unhappily attained that absolute and complete
depression, the inequality of minds would still remain, which, coming
directly from the hand of God, will forever escape the laws of man.
However democratic then the social state and the political constitution of a
people may be, it is certain that every member of the community will
always find out several points about him which command his own position;
and we may foresee that his looks will be doggedly fixed in that direction.
When inequality of conditions is the common law of society, the most
marked inequalities do not strike the eye: when everything is nearly on the
same level, the slightest are marked enough to hurt it. Hence the desire of
equality always becomes more insatiable in proportion as equality is more
complete.
Amongst democratic nations men easily attain a certain equality of
conditions: they can never attain the equality they desire. It perpetually
retires from before them, yet without hiding itself from their sight, and in
retiring draws them on. At every moment they think they are about to grasp
it; it escapes at every moment from their hold. They are near enough to see
its charms, but too far off to enjoy them; and before they have fully tasted
its delights they die. To these causes must be attributed that strange
melancholy which oftentimes will haunt the inhabitants of democratic
countries in the midst of their abundance, and that disgust at life which
sometimes seizes upon them in the midst of calm and easy circumstances.

Complaints are made in France that the number of suicides increases; in
America suicide is rare, but insanity is said to be more common than
anywhere else. These are all different symptoms of the same disease. The
Americans do not put an end to their lives, however disquieted they may be,
because their religion forbids it; and amongst them materialism may be said
hardly to exist, notwithstanding the general passion for physical
gratification. The will resists—reason frequently gives way. In democratic
ages enjoyments are more intense than in the ages of aristocracy, and
especially the number of those who partake in them is larger: but, on the
other hand, it must be admitted that man's hopes and his desires are oftener
blasted, the soul is more stricken and perturbed, and care itself more keen.

Chapter XIV: Taste For Physical Gratifications
United In America To Love Of Freedom And
Attention To Public Affairs
When a democratic state turns to absolute monarchy, the activity which
was before directed to public and to private affairs is all at once centred
upon the latter: the immediate consequence is, for some time, great physical
prosperity; but this impulse soon slackens, and the amount of productive
industry is checked. I know not if a single trading or manufacturing people
can be cited, from the Tyrians down to the Florentines and the English, who
were not a free people also. There is therefore a close bond and necessary
relation between these two elements—freedom and productive industry.
This proposition is generally true of all nations, but especially of
democratic nations. I have already shown that men who live in ages of
equality continually require to form associations in order to procure the
things they covet; and, on the other hand, I have shown how great political
freedom improves and diffuses the art of association. Freedom, in these
ages, is therefore especially favorable to the production of wealth; nor is it
difficult to perceive that despotism is especially adverse to the same result.
The nature of despotic power in democratic ages is not to be fierce or cruel,
but minute and meddling. Despotism of this kind, though it does not
trample on humanity, is directly opposed to the genius of commerce and the
pursuits of industry.
Thus the men of democratic ages require to be free in order more readily
to procure those physical enjoyments for which they are always longing. It
sometimes happens, however, that the excessive taste they conceive for
these same enjoyments abandons them to the first master who appears. The
passion for worldly welfare then defeats itself, and, without perceiving it,
throws the object of their desires to a greater distance.
There is, indeed, a most dangerous passage in the history of a democratic
people. When the taste for physical gratifications amongst such a people has
grown more rapidly than their education and their experience of free
institutions, the time will come when men are carried away, and lose all

self-restraint, at the sight of the new possessions they are about to lay hold
upon. In their intense and exclusive anxiety to make a fortune, they lose
sight of the close connection which exists between the private fortune of
each of them and the prosperity of all. It is not necessary to do violence to
such a people in order to strip them of the rights they enjoy; they
themselves willingly loosen their hold. The discharge of political duties
appears to them to be a troublesome annoyance, which diverts them from
their occupations and business. If they be required to elect representatives,
to support the Government by personal service, to meet on public business,
they have no time—they cannot waste their precious time in useless
engagements: such idle amusements are unsuited to serious men who are
engaged with the more important interests of life. These people think they
are following the principle of self-interest, but the idea they entertain of that
principle is a very rude one; and the better to look after what they call their
business, they neglect their chief business, which is to remain their own
masters.
As the citizens who work do not care to attend to public business, and as
the class which might devote its leisure to these duties has ceased to exist,
the place of the Government is, as it were, unfilled. If at that critical
moment some able and ambitious man grasps the supreme power, he will
find the road to every kind of usurpation open before him. If he does but
attend for some time to the material prosperity of the country, no more will
be demanded of him. Above all he must insure public tranquillity: men who
are possessed by the passion of physical gratification generally find out that
the turmoil of freedom disturbs their welfare, before they discover how
freedom itself serves to promote it. If the slightest rumor of public
commotion intrudes into the petty pleasures of private life, they are aroused
and alarmed by it. The fear of anarchy perpetually haunts them, and they
are always ready to fling away their freedom at the first disturbance.
I readily admit that public tranquillity is a great good; but at the same
time I cannot forget that all nations have been enslaved by being kept in
good order. Certainly it is not to be inferred that nations ought to despise
public tranquillity; but that state ought not to content them. A nation which
asks nothing of its government but the maintenance of order is already a
slave at heart—the slave of its own well-being, awaiting but the hand that
will bind it. By such a nation the despotism of faction is not less to be
dreaded than the despotism of an individual. When the bulk of the

community is engrossed by private concerns, the smallest parties need not
despair of getting the upper hand in public affairs. At such times it is not
rare to see upon the great stage of the world, as we see at our theatres, a
multitude represented by a few players, who alone speak in the name of an
absent or inattentive crowd: they alone are in action whilst all are
stationary; they regulate everything by their own caprice; they change the
laws, and tyrannize at will over the manners of the country; and then men
wonder to see into how small a number of weak and worthless hands a great
people may fall.
Hitherto the Americans have fortunately escaped all the perils which I
have just pointed out; and in this respect they are really deserving of
admiration. Perhaps there is no country in the world where fewer idle men
are to be met with than in America, or where all who work are more eager
to promote their own welfare. But if the passion of the Americans for
physical gratifications is vehement, at least it is not indiscriminating; and
reason, though unable to restrain it, still directs its course. An American
attends to his private concerns as if he were alone in the world, and the next
minute he gives himself up to the common weal as if he had forgotten them.
At one time he seems animated by the most selfish cupidity, at another by
the most lively patriotism. The human heart cannot be thus divided. The
inhabitants of the United States alternately display so strong and so similar
a passion for their own welfare and for their freedom, that it may be
supposed that these passions are united and mingled in some part of their
character. And indeed the Americans believe their freedom to be the best
instrument and surest safeguard of their welfare: they are attached to the
one by the other. They by no means think that they are not called upon to
take a part in the public weal; they believe, on the contrary, that their chief
business is to secure for themselves a government which will allow them to
acquire the things they covet, and which will not debar them from the
peaceful enjoyment of those possessions which they have acquired.

Chapter XV: That Religious Belief Sometimes
Turns The Thoughts Of The Americans To
Immaterial Pleasures
In the United States, on the seventh day of every week, the trading and
working life of the nation seems suspended; all noises cease; a deep
tranquillity, say rather the solemn calm of meditation, succeeds the turmoil
of the week, and the soul resumes possession and contemplation of itself.
Upon this day the marts of traffic are deserted; every member of the
community, accompanied by his children, goes to church, where he listens
to strange language which would seem unsuited to his ear. He is told of the
countless evils caused by pride and covetousness: he is reminded of the
necessity of checking his desires, of the finer pleasures which belong to
virtue alone, and of the true happiness which attends it. On his return home,
he does not turn to the ledgers of his calling, but he opens the book of Holy
Scripture; there he meets with sublime or affecting descriptions of the
greatness and goodness of the Creator, of the infinite magnificence of the
handiwork of God, of the lofty destinies of man, of his duties, and of his
immortal privileges. Thus it is that the American at times steals an hour
from himself; and laying aside for a while the petty passions which agitate
his life, and the ephemeral interests which engross it, he strays at once into
an ideal world, where all is great, eternal, and pure.
I have endeavored to point out in another part of this work the causes to
which the maintenance of the political institutions of the Americans is
attributable; and religion appeared to be one of the most prominent amongst
them. I am now treating of the Americans in an individual capacity, and I
again observe that religion is not less useful to each citizen than to the
whole State. The Americans show, by their practice, that they feel the high
necessity of imparting morality to democratic communities by means of
religion. What they think of themselves in this respect is a truth of which
every democratic nation ought to be thoroughly persuaded.
I do not doubt that the social and political constitution of a people
predisposes them to adopt a certain belief and certain tastes, which

afterwards flourish without difficulty amongst them; whilst the same causes
may divert a people from certain opinions and propensities, without any
voluntary effort, and, as it were, without any distinct consciousness, on their
part. The whole art of the legislator is correctly to discern beforehand these
natural inclinations of communities of men, in order to know whether they
should be assisted, or whether it may not be necessary to check them. For
the duties incumbent on the legislator differ at different times; the goal
towards which the human race ought ever to be tending is alone stationary;
the means of reaching it are perpetually to be varied.
If I had been born in an aristocratic age, in the midst of a nation where
the hereditary wealth of some, and the irremediable penury of others,
should equally divert men from the idea of bettering their condition, and
hold the soul as it were in a state of torpor fixed on the contemplation of
another world, I should then wish that it were possible for me to rouse that
people to a sense of their wants; I should seek to discover more rapid and
more easy means for satisfying the fresh desires which I might have
awakened; and, directing the most strenuous efforts of the human mind to
physical pursuits, I should endeavor to stimulate it to promote the well-
being of man. If it happened that some men were immoderately incited to
the pursuit of riches, and displayed an excessive liking for physical
gratifications, I should not be alarmed; these peculiar symptoms would soon
be absorbed in the general aspect of the people.
The attention of the legislators of democracies is called to other cares.
Give democratic nations education and freedom, and leave them alone.
They will soon learn to draw from this world all the benefits which it can
afford; they will improve each of the useful arts, and will day by day render
life more comfortable, more convenient, and more easy. Their social
condition naturally urges them in this direction; I do not fear that they will
slacken their course.
But whilst man takes delight in this honest and lawful pursuit of his
wellbeing, it is to be apprehended that he may in the end lose the use of his
sublimest faculties; and that whilst he is busied in improving all around
him, he may at length degrade himself. Here, and here only, does the peril
lie. It should therefore be the unceasing object of the legislators of
democracies, and of all the virtuous and enlightened men who live there, to
raise the souls of their fellow-citizens, and keep them lifted up towards

heaven. It is necessary that all who feel an interest in the future destinies of
democratic society should unite, and that all should make joint and
continual efforts to diffuse the love of the infinite, a sense of greatness, and
a love of pleasures not of earth. If amongst the opinions of a democratic
people any of those pernicious theories exist which tend to inculcate that all
perishes with the body, let men by whom such theories are professed be
marked as the natural foes of such a people.
The materialists are offensive to me in many respects; their doctrines I
hold to be pernicious, and I am disgusted at their arrogance. If their system
could be of any utility to man, it would seem to be by giving him a modest
opinion of himself. But these reasoners show that it is not so; and when they
think they have said enough to establish that they are brutes, they show
themselves as proud as if they had demonstrated that they are gods.
Materialism is, amongst all nations, a dangerous disease of the human
mind; but it is more especially to be dreaded amongst a democratic people,
because it readily amalgamates with that vice which is most familiar to the
heart under such circumstances. Democracy encourages a taste for physical
gratification: this taste, if it become excessive, soon disposes men to believe
that all is matter only; and materialism, in turn, hurries them back with mad
impatience to these same delights: such is the fatal circle within which
democratic nations are driven round. It were well that they should see the
danger and hold back.
Most religions are only general, simple, and practical means of teaching
men the doctrine of the immortality of the soul. That is the greatest benefit
which a democratic people derives, from its belief, and hence belief is more
necessary to such a people than to all others. When therefore any religion
has struck its roots deep into a democracy, beware lest you disturb them;
but rather watch it carefully, as the most precious bequest of aristocratic
ages. Seek not to supersede the old religious opinions of men by new ones;
lest in the passage from one faith to another, the soul being left for a while
stripped of all belief, the love of physical gratifications should grow upon it
and fill it wholly.
The doctrine of metempsychosis is assuredly not more rational than that
of materialism; nevertheless if it were absolutely necessary that a
democracy should choose one of the two, I should not hesitate to decide
that the community would run less risk of being brutalized by believing that

the soul of man will pass into the carcass of a hog, than by believing that
the soul of man is nothing at all. The belief in a supersensual and immortal
principle, united for a time to matter, is so indispensable to man's greatness,
that its effects are striking even when it is not united to the doctrine of
future reward and punishment; and when it holds no more than that after
death the divine principle contained in man is absorbed in the Deity, or
transferred to animate the frame of some other creature. Men holding so
imperfect a belief will still consider the body as the secondary and inferior
portion of their nature, and they will despise it even whilst they yield to its
influence; whereas they have a natural esteem and secret admiration for the
immaterial part of man, even though they sometimes refuse to submit to its
dominion. That is enough to give a lofty cast to their opinions and their
tastes, and to bid them tend with no interested motive, and as it were by
impulse, to pure feelings and elevated thoughts.
It is not certain that Socrates and his followers had very fixed opinions as
to what would befall man hereafter; but the sole point of belief on which
they were determined—that the soul has nothing in common with the body,
and survives it—was enough to give the Platonic philosophy that sublime
aspiration by which it is distinguished. It is clear from the works of Plato,
that many philosophical writers, his predecessors or contemporaries,
professed materialism. These writers have not reached us, or have reached
us in mere fragments. The same thing has happened in almost all ages; the
greater part of the most famous minds in literature adhere to the doctrines of
a supersensual philosophy. The instinct and the taste of the human race
maintain those doctrines; they save them oftentimes in spite of men
themselves, and raise the names of their defenders above the tide of time. It
must not then be supposed that at any period or under any political
condition, the passion for physical gratifications, and the opinions which
are superinduced by that passion, can ever content a whole people. The
heart of man is of a larger mould: it can at once comprise a taste for the
possessions of earth and the love of those of heaven: at times it may seem to
cling devotedly to the one, but it will never be long without thinking of the
other.
If it be easy to see that it is more particularly important in democratic
ages that spiritual opinions should prevail, it is not easy to say by what
means those who govern democratic nations may make them predominate. I
am no believer in the prosperity, any more than in the durability, of official

philosophies; and as to state religions, I have always held, that if they be
sometimes of momentary service to the interests of political power, they
always, sooner or later, become fatal to the Church. Nor do I think with
those who assert, that to raise religion in the eyes of the people, and to make
them do honor to her spiritual doctrines, it is desirable indirectly to give her
ministers a political influence which the laws deny them. I am so much
alive to the almost inevitable dangers which beset religious belief whenever
the clergy take part in public affairs, and I am so convinced that Christianity
must be maintained at any cost in the bosom of modern democracies, that I
had rather shut up the priesthood within the sanctuary than allow them to
step beyond it.
What means then remain in the hands of constituted authorities to bring
men back to spiritual opinions, or to hold them fast to the religion by which
those opinions are suggested? My answer will do me harm in the eyes of
politicians. I believe that the sole effectual means which governments can
employ in order to have the doctrine of the immortality of the soul duly
respected, is ever to act as if they believed in it themselves; and I think that
it is only by scrupulous conformity to religious morality in great affairs that
they can hope to teach the community at large to know, to love, and to
observe it in the lesser concerns of life.

Chapter XVI: That Excessive Care Of Worldly
Welfare May Impair That Welfare
There is a closer tie than is commonly supposed between the
improvement of the soul and the amelioration of what belongs to the body.
Man may leave these two things apart, and consider each of them
alternately; but he cannot sever them entirely without at last losing sight of
one and of the other. The beasts have the same senses as ourselves, and very
nearly the same appetites. We have no sensual passions which are not
common to our race and theirs, and which are not to be found, at least in the
germ, in a dog as well as in a man. Whence is it then that the animals can
only provide for their first and lowest wants, whereas we can infinitely vary
and endlessly increase our enjoyments?
We are superior to the beasts in this, that we use our souls to find out
those material benefits to which they are only led by instinct. In man, the
angel teaches the brute the art of contenting its desires. It is because man is
capable of rising above the things of the body, and of contemning life itself,
of which the beasts have not the least notion, that he can multiply these
same things of the body to a degree which inferior races are equally unable
to conceive. Whatever elevates, enlarges, and expands the soul, renders it
more capable of succeeding in those very undertakings which concern it
not. Whatever, on the other hand, enervates or lowers it, weakens it for all
purposes, the chiefest, as well as the least, and threatens to render it almost
equally impotent for the one and for the other. Hence the soul must remain
great and strong, though it were only to devote its strength and greatness
from time to time to the service of the body. If men were ever to content
themselves with material objects, it is probable that they would lose by
degrees the art of producing them; and they would enjoy them in the end,
like the brutes, without discernment and without improvement.

Chapter XVII: That In Times Marked By
Equality Of Conditions And Sceptical Opinions, It
Is Important To Remove To A Distance The
Objects Of Human Actions
In the ages of faith the final end of life is placed beyond life. The men of
those ages therefore naturally, and in a manner involuntarily, accustom
themselves to fix their gaze for a long course of years on some immovable
object, towards which they are constantly tending; and they learn by
insensible degrees to repress a multitude of petty passing desires, in order to
be the better able to content that great and lasting desire which possesses
them. When these same men engage in the affairs of this world, the same
habits may be traced in their conduct. They are apt to set up some general
and certain aim and end to their actions here below, towards which all their
efforts are directed: they do not turn from day to day to chase some novel
object of desire, but they have settled designs which they are never weary
of pursuing. This explains why religious nations have so often achieved
such lasting results: for whilst they were thinking only of the other world,
they had found out the great secret of success in this. Religions give men a
general habit of conducting themselves with a view to futurity: in this
respect they are not less useful to happiness in this life than to felicity
hereafter; and this is one of their chief political characteristics.
But in proportion as the light of faith grows dim, the range of man's sight
is circumscribed, as if the end and aim of human actions appeared every
day to be more within his reach. When men have once allowed themselves
to think no more of what is to befall them after life, they readily lapse into
that complete and brutal indifference to futurity, which is but too
conformable to some propensities of mankind. As soon as they have lost the
habit of placing their chief hopes upon remote events, they naturally seek to
gratify without delay their smallest desires; and no sooner do they despair
of living forever, than they are disposed to act as if they were to exist but
for a single day. In sceptical ages it is always therefore to be feared that men
may perpetually give way to their daily casual desires; and that, wholly

renouncing whatever cannot be acquired without protracted effort, they may
establish nothing great, permanent, and calm.
If the social condition of a people, under these circumstances, becomes
democratic, the danger which I here point out is thereby increased. When
everyone is constantly striving to change his position—when an immense
field for competition is thrown open to all—when wealth is amassed or
dissipated in the shortest possible space of time amidst the turmoil of
democracy, visions of sudden and easy fortunes—of great possessions
easily won and lost—of chance, under all its forms—haunt the mind. The
instability of society itself fosters the natural instability of man's desires. In
the midst of these perpetual fluctuations of his lot, the present grows upon
his mind, until it conceals futurity from his sight, and his looks go no
further than the morrow.
In those countries in which unhappily irreligion and democracy coexist,
the most important duty of philosophers and of those in power is to be
always striving to place the objects of human actions far beyond man's
immediate range. Circumscribed by the character of his country and his age,
the moralist must learn to vindicate his principles in that position. He must
constantly endeavor to show his contemporaries, that, even in the midst of
the perpetual commotion around them, it is easier than they think to
conceive and to execute protracted undertakings. He must teach them that,
although the aspect of mankind may have changed, the methods by which
men may provide for their prosperity in this world are still the same; and
that amongst democratic nations, as well as elsewhere, it is only by resisting
a thousand petty selfish passions of the hour that the general and
unquenchable passion for happiness can be satisfied.
The task of those in power is not less clearly marked out. At all times it is
important that those who govern nations should act with a view to the
future: but this is even more necessary in democratic and sceptical ages
than in any others. By acting thus, the leading men of democracies not only
make public affairs prosperous, but they also teach private individuals, by
their example, the art of managing private concerns. Above all they must
strive as much as possible to banish chance from the sphere of politics. The
sudden and undeserved promotion of a courtier produces only a transient
impression in an aristocratic country, because the aggregate institutions and
opinions of the nation habitually compel men to advance slowly in tracks

which they cannot get out of. But nothing is more pernicious than similar
instances of favor exhibited to the eyes of a democratic people: they give
the last impulse to the public mind in a direction where everything hurries it
onwards. At times of scepticism and equality more especially, the favor of
the people or of the prince, which chance may confer or chance withhold,
ought never to stand in lieu of attainments or services. It is desirable that
every advancement should there appear to be the result of some effort; so
that no greatness should be of too easy acquirement, and that ambition
should be obliged to fix its gaze long upon an object before it is gratified.
Governments must apply themselves to restore to men that love of the
future with which religion and the state of society no longer inspire them;
and, without saying so, they must practically teach the community day by
day that wealth, fame, and power are the rewards of labor—that great
success stands at the utmost range of long desires, and that nothing lasting
is obtained but what is obtained by toil. When men have accustomed
themselves to foresee from afar what is likely to befall in the world and to
feed upon hopes, they can hardly confine their minds within the precise
circumference of life, and they are ready to break the boundary and cast
their looks beyond. I do not doubt that, by training the members of a
community to think of their future condition in this world, they would be
gradually and unconsciously brought nearer to religious convictions. Thus
the means which allow men, up to a certain point, to go without religion,
are perhaps after all the only means we still possess for bringing mankind
back by a long and roundabout path to a state of faith.

Chapter XVIII: That Amongst The Americans All
Honest Callings Are Honorable
Amongst a democratic people, where there is no hereditary wealth, every
man works to earn a living, or has worked, or is born of parents who have
worked. The notion of labor is therefore presented to the mind on every side
as the necessary, natural, and honest condition of human existence. Not
only is labor not dishonorable amongst such a people, but it is held in
honor: the prejudice is not against it, but in its favor. In the United States a
wealthy man thinks that he owes it to public opinion to devote his leisure to
some kind of industrial or commercial pursuit, or to public business. He
would think himself in bad repute if he employed his life solely in living. It
is for the purpose of escaping this obligation to work, that so many rich
Americans come to Europe, where they find some scattered remains of
aristocratic society, amongst which idleness is still held in honor.
Equality of conditions not only ennobles the notion of labor in men's
estimation, but it raises the notion of labor as a source of profit. In
aristocracies it is not exactly labor that is despised, but labor with a view to
profit. Labor is honorific in itself, when it is undertaken at the sole bidding
of ambition or of virtue. Yet in aristocratic society it constantly happens that
he who works for honor is not insensible to the attractions of profit. But
these two desires only intermingle in the innermost depths of his soul: he
carefully hides from every eye the point at which they join; he would fain
conceal it from himself. In aristocratic countries there are few public
officers who do not affect to serve their country without interested motives.
Their salary is an incident of which they think but little, and of which they
always affect not to think at all. Thus the notion of profit is kept distinct
from that of labor; however they may be united in point of fact, they are not
thought of together.
In democratic communities these two notions are, on the contrary, always
palpably united. As the desire of well-being is universal—as fortunes are
slender or fluctuating—as everyone wants either to increase his own
resources, or to provide fresh ones for his progeny, men clearly see that it is

profit which, if not wholly, at least partially, leads them to work. Even those
who are principally actuated by the love of fame are necessarily made
familiar with the thought that they are not exclusively actuated by that
motive; and they discover that the desire of getting a living is mingled in
their minds with the desire of making life illustrious.
As soon as, on the one hand, labor is held by the whole community to be
an honorable necessity of man's condition, and, on the other, as soon as
labor is always ostensibly performed, wholly or in part, for the purpose of
earning remuneration, the immense interval which separated different
callings in aristocratic societies disappears. If all are not alike, all at least
have one feature in common. No profession exists in which men do not
work for money; and the remuneration which is common to them all gives
them all an air of resemblance. This serves to explain the opinions which
the Americans entertain with respect to different callings. In America no
one is degraded because he works, for everyone about him works also; nor
is anyone humiliated by the notion of receiving pay, for the President of the
United States also works for pay. He is paid for commanding, other men for
obeying orders. In the United States professions are more or less laborious,
more or less profitable; but they are never either high or low: every honest
calling is honorable.

Chapter XIX: That Almost All The Americans
Follow Industrial Callings
Agriculture is, perhaps, of all the useful arts that which improves most
slowly amongst democratic nations. Frequently, indeed, it would seem to be
stationary, because other arts are making rapid strides towards perfection.
On the other hand, almost all the tastes and habits which the equality of
condition engenders naturally lead men to commercial and industrial
occupations.
Suppose an active, enlightened, and free man, enjoying a competency,
but full of desires: he is too poor to live in idleness; he is rich enough to feel
himself protected from the immediate fear of want, and he thinks how he
can better his condition. This man has conceived a taste for physical
gratifications, which thousands of his fellow-men indulge in around him; he
has himself begun to enjoy these pleasures, and he is eager to increase his
means of satisfying these tastes more completely. But life is slipping away,
time is urgent—to what is he to turn? The cultivation of the ground
promises an almost certain result to his exertions, but a slow one; men are
not enriched by it without patience and toil. Agriculture is therefore only
suited to those who have already large, superfluous wealth, or to those
whose penury bids them only seek a bare subsistence. The choice of such a
man as we have supposed is soon made; he sells his plot of ground, leaves
his dwelling, and embarks in some hazardous but lucrative calling.
Democratic communities abound in men of this kind; and in proportion as
the equality of conditions becomes greater, their multitude increases. Thus
democracy not only swells the number of workingmen, but it leads men to
prefer one kind of labor to another; and whilst it diverts them from
agriculture, it encourages their taste for commerce and manufactures. *a
a
[ It has often been remarked that manufacturers and
mercantile men are inordinately addicted to physical
gratifications, and this has been attributed to commerce and
manufactures; but that is, I apprehend, to take the effect for
the cause. The taste for physical gratifications is not
imparted to men by commerce or manufactures, but it is

rather this taste which leads men to embark in commerce
and manufactures, as a means by which they hope to satisfy
themselves more promptly and more completely. If
commerce and manufactures increase the desire of well-
being, it is because every passion gathers strength in
proportion as it is cultivated, and is increased by all the
efforts made to satiate it. All the causes which make the love
of worldly welfare predominate in the heart of man are
favorable to the growth of commerce and manufactures.
Equality of conditions is one of those causes; it encourages
trade, not directly by giving men a taste for business, but
indirectly by strengthening and expanding in their minds a
taste for prosperity.]
This spirit may be observed even amongst the richest members of the
community. In democratic countries, however opulent a man is supposed to
be, he is almost always discontented with his fortune, because he finds that
he is less rich than his father was, and he fears that his sons will be less rich
than himself. Most rich men in democracies are therefore constantly
haunted by the desire of obtaining wealth, and they naturally turn their
attention to trade and manufactures, which appear to offer the readiest and
most powerful means of success. In this respect they share the instincts of
the poor, without feeling the same necessities; say rather, they feel the most
imperious of all necessities, that of not sinking in the world.
In aristocracies the rich are at the same time those who govern. The
attention which they unceasingly devote to important public affairs diverts
them from the lesser cares which trade and manufactures demand. If the
will of an individual happens, nevertheless, to turn his attention to business,
the will of the body to which he belongs will immediately debar him from
pursuing it; for however men may declaim against the rule of numbers, they
cannot wholly escape their sway; and even amongst those aristocratic
bodies which most obstinately refuse to acknowledge the rights of the
majority of the nation, a private majority is formed which governs the rest.
*b
b
[ Some aristocracies, however, have devoted themselves
eagerly to commerce, and have cultivated manufactures with
success. The history of the world might furnish several
conspicuous examples. But, generally speaking, it may be
affirmed that the aristocratic principle is not favorable to the
growth of trade and manufactures. Moneyed aristocracies
are the only exception to the rule. Amongst such
aristocracies there are hardly any desires which do not

require wealth to satisfy them; the love of riches becomes,
so to speak, the high road of human passions, which is
crossed by or connected with all lesser tracks. The love of
money and the thirst for that distinction which attaches to
power, are then so closely intermixed in the same souls, that
it becomes difficult to discover whether men grow covetous
from ambition, or whether they are ambitious from
covetousness. This is the case in England, where men seek
to get rich in order to arrive at distinction, and seek
distinctions as a manifestation of their wealth. The mind is
then seized by both ends, and hurried into trade and
manufactures, which are the shortest roads that lead to
opulence.
This, however, strikes me as an exceptional and transitory circumstance.
When wealth is become the only symbol of aristocracy, it is very difficult
for the wealthy to maintain sole possession of political power, to the
exclusion of all other men. The aristocracy of birth and pure democracy are
at the two extremes of the social and political state of nations: between
them moneyed aristocracy finds its place. The latter approximates to the
aristocracy of birth by conferring great privileges on a small number of
persons; it so far belongs to the democratic element, that these privileges
may be successively acquired by all. It frequently forms a natural transition
between these two conditions of society, and it is difficult to say whether it
closes the reign of aristocratic institutions, or whether it already opens the
new era of democracy.]
In democratic countries, where money does not lead those who possess it
to political power, but often removes them from it, the rich do not know
how to spend their leisure. They are driven into active life by the inquietude
and the greatness of their desires, by the extent of their resources, and by
the taste for what is extraordinary, which is almost always felt by those who
rise, by whatsoever means, above the crowd. Trade is the only road open to
them. In democracies nothing is more great or more brilliant than
commerce: it attracts the attention of the public, and fills the imagination of
the multitude; all energetic passions are directed towards it. Neither their
own prejudices, nor those of anybody else, can prevent the rich from
devoting themselves to it. The wealthy members of democracies never form
a body which has manners and regulations of its own; the opinions peculiar
to their class do not restrain them, and the common opinions of their
country urge them on. Moreover, as all the large fortunes which are to be
met with in a democratic community are of commercial growth, many

generations must succeed each other before their possessors can have
entirely laid aside their habits of business.
Circumscribed within the narrow space which politics leave them, rich
men in democracies eagerly embark in commercial enterprise: there they
can extend and employ their natural advantages; and indeed it is even by the
boldness and the magnitude of their industrial speculations that we may
measure the slight esteem in which productive industry would have been
held by them, if they had been born amidst an aristocracy.
A similar observation is likewise applicable to all men living in
democracies, whether they be poor or rich. Those who live in the midst of
democratic fluctuations have always before their eyes the phantom of
chance; and they end by liking all undertakings in which chance plays a
part. They are therefore all led to engage in commerce, not only for the sake
of the profit it holds out to them, but for the love of the constant excitement
occasioned by that pursuit.
The United States of America have only been emancipated for half a
century [in 1840] from the state of colonial dependence in which they stood
to Great Britain; the number of large fortunes there is small, and capital is
still scarce. Yet no people in the world has made such rapid progress in
trade and manufactures as the Americans: they constitute at the present day
the second maritime nation in the world; and although their manufactures
have to struggle with almost insurmountable natural impediments, they are
not prevented from making great and daily advances. In the United States
the greatest undertakings and speculations are executed without difficulty,
because the whole population is engaged in productive industry, and
because the poorest as well as the most opulent members of the
commonwealth are ready to combine their efforts for these purposes. The
consequence is, that a stranger is constantly amazed by the immense public
works executed by a nation which contains, so to speak, no rich men. The
Americans arrived but as yesterday on the territory which they inhabit, and
they have already changed the whole order of nature for their own
advantage. They have joined the Hudson to the Mississippi, and made the
Atlantic Ocean communicate with the Gulf of Mexico, across a continent of
more than five hundred leagues in extent which separates the two seas. The
longest railroads which have been constructed up to the present time are in
America. But what most astonishes me in the United States, is not so much

the marvellous grandeur of some undertakings, as the innumerable
multitude of small ones. Almost all the farmers of the United States
combine some trade with agriculture; most of them make agriculture itself a
trade. It seldom happens that an American farmer settles for good upon the
land which he occupies: especially in the districts of the Far West he brings
land into tillage in order to sell it again, and not to farm it: he builds a
farmhouse on the speculation that, as the state of the country will soon be
changed by the increase of population, a good price will be gotten for it.
Every year a swarm of the inhabitants of the North arrive in the Southern
States, and settle in the parts where the cotton plant and the sugar-cane
grow. These men cultivate the soil in order to make it produce in a few
years enough to enrich them; and they already look forward to the time
when they may return home to enjoy the competency thus acquired. Thus
the Americans carry their business-like qualities into agriculture; and their
trading passions are displayed in that as in their other pursuits.
The Americans make immense progress in productive industry, because
they all devote themselves to it at once; and for this same reason they are
exposed to very unexpected and formidable embarrassments. As they are all
engaged in commerce, their commercial affairs are affected by such various
and complex causes that it is impossible to foresee what difficulties may
arise. As they are all more or less engaged in productive industry, at the
least shock given to business all private fortunes are put in jeopardy at the
same time, and the State is shaken. I believe that the return of these
commercial panics is an endemic disease of the democratic nations of our
age. It may be rendered less dangerous, but it cannot be cured; because it
does not originate in accidental circumstances, but in the temperament of
these nations.

Chapter XX: That Aristocracy May Be
Engendered By Manufactures
I have shown that democracy is favorable to the growth of manufactures,
and that it increases without limit the numbers of the manufacturing classes:
we shall now see by what side road manufacturers may possibly in their
turn bring men back to aristocracy. It is acknowledged that when a
workman is engaged every day upon the same detail, the whole commodity
is produced with greater ease, promptitude, and economy. It is likewise
acknowledged that the cost of the production of manufactured goods is
diminished by the extent of the establishment in which they are made, and
by the amount of capital employed or of credit. These truths had long been
imperfectly discerned, but in our time they have been demonstrated. They
have been already applied to many very important kinds of manufactures,
and the humblest will gradually be governed by them. I know of nothing in
politics which deserves to fix the attention of the legislator more closely
than these two new axioms of the science of manufactures.
When a workman is unceasingly and exclusively engaged in the
fabrication of one thing, he ultimately does his work with singular
dexterity; but at the same time he loses the general faculty of applying his
mind to the direction of the work. He every day becomes more adroit and
less industrious; so that it may be said of him, that in proportion as the
workman improves the man is degraded. What can be expected of a man
who has spent twenty years of his life in making heads for pins? and to
what can that mighty human intelligence, which has so often stirred the
world, be applied in him, except it be to investigate the best method of
making pins' heads? When a workman has spent a considerable portion of
his existence in this manner, his thoughts are forever set upon the object of
his daily toil; his body has contracted certain fixed habits, which it can
never shake off: in a word, he no longer belongs to himself, but to the
calling which he has chosen. It is in vain that laws and manners have been
at the pains to level all barriers round such a man, and to open to him on
every side a thousand different paths to fortune; a theory of manufactures
more powerful than manners and laws binds him to a craft, and frequently

to a spot, which he cannot leave: it assigns to him a certain place in society,
beyond which he cannot go: in the midst of universal movement it has
rendered him stationary.
In proportion as the principle of the division of labor is more extensively
applied, the workman becomes more weak, more narrow-minded, and more
dependent. The art advances, the artisan recedes. On the other hand, in
proportion as it becomes more manifest that the productions of
manufactures are by so much the cheaper and better as the manufacture is
larger and the amount of capital employed more considerable, wealthy and
educated men come forward to embark in manufactures which were
heretofore abandoned to poor or ignorant handicraftsmen. The magnitude of
the efforts required, and the importance of the results to be obtained, attract
them. Thus at the very time at which the science of manufactures lowers the
class of workmen, it raises the class of masters.
Whereas the workman concentrates his faculties more and more upon the
study of a single detail, the master surveys a more extensive whole, and the
mind of the latter is enlarged in proportion as that of the former is
narrowed. In a short time the one will require nothing but physical strength
without intelligence; the other stands in need of science, and almost of
genius, to insure success. This man resembles more and more the
administrator of a vast empire—that man, a brute. The master and the
workman have then here no similarity, and their differences increase every
day. They are only connected as the two rings at the extremities of a long
chain. Each of them fills the station which is made for him, and out of
which he does not get: the one is continually, closely, and necessarily
dependent upon the other, and seems as much born to obey as that other is
to command. What is this but aristocracy?
As the conditions of men constituting the nation become more and more
equal, the demand for manufactured commodities becomes more general
and more extensive; and the cheapness which places these objects within
the reach of slender fortunes becomes a great element of success. Hence
there are every day more men of great opulence and education who devote
their wealth and knowledge to manufactures; and who seek, by opening
large establishments, and by a strict division of labor, to meet the fresh
demands which are made on all sides. Thus, in proportion as the mass of the
nation turns to democracy, that particular class which is engaged in

manufactures becomes more aristocratic. Men grow more alike in the one—
more different in the other; and inequality increases in the less numerous
class in the same ratio in which it decreases in the community. Hence it
would appear, on searching to the bottom, that aristocracy should naturally
spring out of the bosom of democracy.
But this kind of aristocracy by no means resembles those kinds which
preceded it. It will be observed at once, that as it applies exclusively to
manufactures and to some manufacturing callings, it is a monstrous
exception in the general aspect of society. The small aristocratic societies
which are formed by some manufacturers in the midst of the immense
democracy of our age, contain, like the great aristocratic societies of former
ages, some men who are very opulent, and a multitude who are wretchedly
poor. The poor have few means of escaping from their condition and
becoming rich; but the rich are constantly becoming poor, or they give up
business when they have realized a fortune. Thus the elements of which the
class of the poor is composed are fixed; but the elements of which the class
of the rich is composed are not so. To say the truth, though there are rich
men, the class of rich men does not exist; for these rich individuals have no
feelings or purposes in common, no mutual traditions or mutual hopes;
there are therefore members, but no body.
Not only are the rich not compactly united amongst themselves, but there
is no real bond between them and the poor. Their relative position is not a
permanent one; they are constantly drawn together or separated by their
interests. The workman is generally dependent on the master, but not on any
particular master; these two men meet in the factory, but know not each
other elsewhere; and whilst they come into contact on one point, they stand
very wide apart on all others. The manufacturer asks nothing of the
workman but his labor; the workman expects nothing from him but his
wages. The one contracts no obligation to protect, nor the other to defend;
and they are not permanently connected either by habit or by duty. The
aristocracy created by business rarely settles in the midst of the
manufacturing population which it directs; the object is not to govern that
population, but to use it. An aristocracy thus constituted can have no great
hold upon those whom it employs; and even if it succeed in retaining them
at one moment, they escape the next; it knows not how to will, and it cannot
act. The territorial aristocracy of former ages was either bound by law, or
thought itself bound by usage, to come to the relief of its serving-men, and

to succor their distresses. But the manufacturing aristocracy of our age first
impoverishes and debases the men who serve it, and then abandons them to
be supported by the charity of the public. This is a natural consequence of
what has been said before. Between the workmen and the master there are
frequent relations, but no real partnership.
I am of opinion, upon the whole, that the manufacturing aristocracy
which is growing up under our eyes is one of the harshest which ever
existed in the world; but at the same time it is one of the most confined and
least dangerous. Nevertheless the friends of democracy should keep their
eyes anxiously fixed in this direction; for if ever a permanent inequality of
conditions and aristocracy again penetrate into the world, it may be
predicted that this is the channel by which they will enter.

Book Three: Influence Of Democracy On
Manners, Properly So Called

Chapter I: That Manners Are Softened As Social
Conditions Become More Equal
We perceive that for several ages social conditions have tended to
equality, and we discover that in the course of the same period the manners
of society have been softened. Are these two things merely
contemporaneous, or does any secret link exist between them, so that the
one cannot go on without making the other advance? Several causes may
concur to render the manners of a people less rude; but, of all these causes,
the most powerful appears to me to be the equality of conditions. Equality
of conditions and growing civility in manners are, then, in my eyes, not
only contemporaneous occurrences, but correlative facts. When the fabulists
seek to interest us in the actions of beasts, they invest them with human
notions and passions; the poets who sing of spirits and angels do the same;
there is no wretchedness so deep, nor any happiness so pure, as to fill the
human mind and touch the heart, unless we are ourselves held up to our
own eyes under other features.
This is strictly applicable to the subject upon which we are at present
engaged. When all men are irrevocably marshalled in an aristocratic
community, according to their professions, their property, and their birth,
the members of each class, considering themselves as children of the same
family, cherish a constant and lively sympathy towards each other, which
can never be felt in an equal degree by the citizens of a democracy. But the
same feeling does not exist between the several classes towards each other.
Amongst an aristocratic people each caste has its own opinions, feelings,
rights, manners, and modes of living. Thus the men of whom each caste is
composed do not resemble the mass of their fellow-citizens; they do not
think or feel in the same manner, and they scarcely believe that they belong
to the same human race. They cannot, therefore, thoroughly understand
what others feel, nor judge of others by themselves. Yet they are sometimes
eager to lend each other mutual aid; but this is not contrary to my previous
observation. These aristocratic institutions, which made the beings of one
and the same race so different, nevertheless bound them to each other by
close political ties. Although the serf had no natural interest in the fate of

nobles, he did not the less think himself obliged to devote his person to the
service of that noble who happened to be his lord; and although the noble
held himself to be of a different nature from that of his serfs, he
nevertheless held that his duty and his honor constrained him to defend, at
the risk of his own life, those who dwelt upon his domains.
It is evident that these mutual obligations did not originate in the law of
nature, but in the law of society; and that the claim of social duty was more
stringent than that of mere humanity. These services were not supposed to
be due from man to man, but to the vassal or to the lord. Feudal institutions
awakened a lively sympathy for the sufferings of certain men, but none at
all for the miseries of mankind. They infused generosity rather than
mildness into the manners of the time, and although they prompted men to
great acts of self-devotion, they engendered no real sympathies; for real
sympathies can only exist between those who are alike; and in aristocratic
ages men acknowledge none but the members of their own caste to be like
themselves.
When the chroniclers of the Middle Ages, who all belonged to the
aristocracy by birth or education, relate the tragical end of a noble, their
grief flows apace; whereas they tell you at a breath, and without wincing, of
massacres and tortures inflicted on the common sort of people. Not that
these writers felt habitual hatred or systematic disdain for the people; war
between the several classes of the community was not yet declared. They
were impelled by an instinct rather than by a passion; as they had formed no
clear notion of a poor man's sufferings, they cared but little for his fate. The
same feelings animated the lower orders whenever the feudal tie was
broken. The same ages which witnessed so many heroic acts of self-
devotion on the part of vassals for their lords, were stained with atrocious
barbarities, exercised from time to time by the lower classes on the higher.
It must not be supposed that this mutual insensibility arose solely from the
absence of public order and education; for traces of it are to be found in the
following centuries, which became tranquil and enlightened whilst they
remained aristocratic. In 1675 the lower classes in Brittany revolted at the
imposition of a new tax. These disturbances were put down with
unexampled atrocity. Observe the language in which Madame de Sevigne, a
witness of these horrors, relates them to her daughter:—
"Aux Rochers, 30 Octobre, 1675.

"Mon Dieu, ma fille, que votre lettre d'Aix est plaisante! Au moins relisez
vos lettres avant que de les envoyer; laissez-vous surpendre a leur
agrement, et consolez-vous par ce plaisir de la peine que vous avez d'en tant
ecrire. Vous avez donc baise toute la Provence? il n'y aurait pas satisfaction
a baiser toute la Bretagne, a moins qu'on n'aimat a sentir le vin. . . . Voulez-
vous savoir des nouvelles de Rennes? On a fait une taxe de cent mille ecus
sur le bourgeois; et si on ne trouve point cette somme dans vingt-quatre
heures, elle sera doublee et exigible par les soldats. On a chasse et banni
toute une grand rue, et defendu de les recueillir sous peine de la vie; de
sorte qu'on voyait tous ces miserables, veillards, femmes accouchees,
enfans, errer en pleurs au sortir de cette ville sans savoir ou aller. On roua
avant-hier un violon, qui avait commence la danse et la pillerie du papier
timbre; il a ete ecartele apres sa mort, et ses quatre quartiers exposes aux
quatre coins de la ville. On a pris soixante bourgeois, et on commence
demain les punitions. Cette province est un bel exemple pour les autres, et
surtout de respecter les gouverneurs et les gouvernantes, et de ne point jeter
de pierres dans leur jardin." *a
a
[ To feel the point of this joke the reader should recollect
that Madame de Grignan was Gouvernante de Provence.]
"Madame de Tarente etait hier dans ces bois par un temps
enchante: il n'est question ni de chambre ni de collation; elle
entre par la barriere et s'en retourne de meme. . . ."
In another letter she adds:—
"Vous me parlez bien plaisamment de nos miseres; nous ne sommes plus
si roues; un en huit jours, pour entretenir la justice. Il est vrai que la
penderie me parait maintenant un refraichissement. J'ai une tout autre idee
de la justice, depuis que je suis en ce pays. Vos galeriens me paraissent une
societe d'honnetes gens qui se sont retires du monde pour mener une vie
douce."
It would be a mistake to suppose that Madame de Sevigne, who wrote
these lines, was a selfish or cruel person; she was passionately attached to
her children, and very ready to sympathize in the sorrows of her friends;
nay, her letters show that she treated her vassals and servants with kindness
and indulgence. But Madame de Sevigne had no clear notion of suffering in
anyone who was not a person of quality.
In our time the harshest man writing to the most insensible person of his
acquaintance would not venture wantonly to indulge in the cruel jocularity

which I have quoted; and even if his own manners allowed him to do so, the
manners of society at large would forbid it. Whence does this arise? Have
we more sensibility than our forefathers? I know not that we have; but I am
sure that our insensibility is extended to a far greater range of objects. When
all the ranks of a community are nearly equal, as all men think and feel in
nearly the same manner, each of them may judge in a moment of the
sensations of all the others; he casts a rapid glance upon himself, and that is
enough. There is no wretchedness into which he cannot readily enter, and a
secret instinct reveals to him its extent. It signifies not that strangers or foes
be the sufferers; imagination puts him in their place; something like a
personal feeling is mingled with his pity, and makes himself suffer whilst
the body of his fellow-creature is in torture. In democratic ages men rarely
sacrifice themselves for one another; but they display general compassion
for the members of the human race. They inflict no useless ills; and they are
happy to relieve the griefs of others, when they can do so without much
hurting themselves; they are not disinterested, but they are humane.
Although the Americans have, in a manner, reduced egotism to a social
and philosophical theory, they are nevertheless extremely open to
compassion. In no country is criminal justice administered with more
mildness than in the United States. Whilst the English seem disposed
carefully to retain the bloody traces of the dark ages in their penal
legislation, the Americans have almost expunged capital punishment from
their codes. North America is, I think, the only one country upon earth in
which the life of no one citizen has been taken for a political offence in the
course of the last fifty years. The circumstance which conclusively shows
that this singular mildness of the Americans arises chiefly from their social
condition, is the manner in which they treat their slaves. Perhaps there is
not, upon the whole, a single European colony in the New World in which
the physical condition of the blacks is less severe than in the United States;
yet the slaves still endure horrid sufferings there, and are constantly
exposed to barbarous punishments. It is easy to perceive that the lot of these
unhappy beings inspires their masters with but little compassion, and that
they look upon slavery, not only as an institution which is profitable to
them, but as an evil which does not affect them. Thus the same man who is
full of humanity towards his fellow-creatures when they are at the same
time his equals, becomes insensible to their afflictions as soon as that

equality ceases. His mildness should therefore be attributed to the equality
of conditions, rather than to civilization and education.
What I have here remarked of individuals is, to a certain extent,
applicable to nations. When each nation has its distinct opinions, belief,
laws, and customs, it looks upon itself as the whole of mankind, and is
moved by no sorrows but its own. Should war break out between two
nations animated by this feeling, it is sure to be waged with great cruelty. At
the time of their highest culture, the Romans slaughtered the generals of
their enemies, after having dragged them in triumph behind a car; and they
flung their prisoners to the beasts of the Circus for the amusement of the
people. Cicero, who declaimed so vehemently at the notion of crucifying a
Roman citizen, had not a word to say against these horrible abuses of
victory. It is evident that in his eyes a barbarian did not belong to the same
human race as a Roman. On the contrary, in proportion as nations become
more like each other, they become reciprocally more compassionate, and
the law of nations is mitigated.

Chapter II: That Democracy Renders The
Habitual Intercourse Of The Americans Simple
And Easy
Democracy does not attach men strongly to each other; but it places their
habitual intercourse upon an easier footing. If two Englishmen chance to
meet at the Antipodes, where they are surrounded by strangers whose
language and manners are almost unknown to them, they will first stare at
each other with much curiosity and a kind of secret uneasiness; they will
then turn away, or, if one accosts the other, they will take care only to
converse with a constrained and absent air upon very unimportant subjects.
Yet there is no enmity between these men; they have never seen each other
before, and each believes the other to be a respectable person. Why then
should they stand so cautiously apart? We must go back to England to learn
the reason.
When it is birth alone, independent of wealth, which classes men in
society, everyone knows exactly what his own position is upon the social
scale; he does not seek to rise, he does not fear to sink. In a community thus
organized, men of different castes communicate very little with each other;
but if accident brings them together, they are ready to converse without
hoping or fearing to lose their own position. Their intercourse is not upon a
footing of equality, but it is not constrained. When moneyed aristocracy
succeeds to aristocracy of birth, the case is altered. The privileges of some
are still extremely great, but the possibility of acquiring those privileges is
open to all: whence it follows that those who possess them are constantly
haunted by the apprehension of losing them, or of other men's sharing them;
those who do not yet enjoy them long to possess them at any cost, or, if they
fail to appear at least to possess them—which is not impossible. As the
social importance of men is no longer ostensibly and permanently fixed by
blood, and is infinitely varied by wealth, ranks still exist, but it is not easy
clearly to distinguish at a glance those who respectively belong to them.
Secret hostilities then arise in the community; one set of men endeavor by
innumerable artifices to penetrate, or to appear to penetrate, amongst those

who are above them; another set are constantly in arms against these
usurpers of their rights; or rather the same individual does both at once, and
whilst he seeks to raise himself into a higher circle, he is always on the
defensive against the intrusion of those below him.
Such is the condition of England at the present time; and I am of opinion
that the peculiarity before adverted to is principally to be attributed to this
cause. As aristocratic pride is still extremely great amongst the English, and
as the limits of aristocracy are ill-defined, everybody lives in constant dread
lest advantage should be taken of his familiarity. Unable to judge at once of
the social position of those he meets, an Englishman prudently avoids all
contact with them. Men are afraid lest some slight service rendered should
draw them into an unsuitable acquaintance; they dread civilities, and they
avoid the obtrusive gratitude of a stranger quite as much as his hatred.
Many people attribute these singular anti-social propensities, and the
reserved and taciturn bearing of the English, to purely physical causes. I
may admit that there is something of it in their race, but much more of it is
attributable to their social condition, as is proved by the contrast of the
Americans.
In America, where the privileges of birth never existed, and where riches
confer no peculiar rights on their possessors, men unacquainted with each
other are very ready to frequent the same places, and find neither peril nor
advantage in the free interchange of their thoughts. If they meet by
accident, they neither seek nor avoid intercourse; their manner is therefore
natural, frank, and open: it is easy to see that they hardly expect or
apprehend anything from each other, and that they do not care to display,
any more than to conceal, their position in the world. If their demeanor is
often cold and serious, it is never haughty or constrained; and if they do not
converse, it is because they are not in a humor to talk, not because they
think it their interest to be silent. In a foreign country two Americans are at
once friends, simply because they are Americans. They are repulsed by no
prejudice; they are attracted by their common country. For two Englishmen
the same blood is not enough; they must be brought together by the same
rank. The Americans remark this unsociable mood of the English as much
as the French do, and they are not less astonished by it. Yet the Americans
are connected with England by their origin, their religion, their language,
and partially by their manners; they only differ in their social condition. It

may therefore be inferred that the reserve of the English proceeds from the
constitution of their country much more than from that of its inhabitants.

Chapter III: Why The Americans Show So Little
Sensitiveness In Their Own Country, And Are So
Sensitive In Europe
The temper of the Americans is vindictive, like that of all serious and
reflecting nations. They hardly ever forget an offence, but it is not easy to
offend them; and their resentment is as slow to kindle as it is to abate. In
aristocratic communities where a small number of persons manage
everything, the outward intercourse of men is subject to settled
conventional rules. Everyone then thinks he knows exactly what marks of
respect or of condescension he ought to display, and none are presumed to
be ignorant of the science of etiquette. These usages of the first class in
society afterwards serve as a model to all the others; besides which each of
the latter lays down a code of its own, to which all its members are bound to
conform. Thus the rules of politeness form a complex system of legislation,
which it is difficult to be perfectly master of, but from which it is dangerous
for anyone to deviate; so that men are constantly exposed involuntarily to
inflict or to receive bitter affronts. But as the distinctions of rank are
obliterated, as men differing in education and in birth meet and mingle in
the same places of resort, it is almost impossible to agree upon the rules of
good breeding. As its laws are uncertain, to disobey them is not a crime,
even in the eyes of those who know what they are; men attach more
importance to intentions than to forms, and they grow less civil, but at the
same time less quarrelsome. There are many little attentions which an
American does not care about; he thinks they are not due to him, or he
presumes that they are not known to be due: he therefore either does not
perceive a rudeness or he forgives it; his manners become less courteous,
and his character more plain and masculine.
The mutual indulgence which the Americans display, and the manly
confidence with which they treat each other, also result from another deeper
and more general cause, which I have already adverted to in the preceding
chapter. In the United States the distinctions of rank in civil society are
slight, in political society they are null; an American, therefore, does not

think himself bound to pay particular attentions to any of his fellow-
citizens, nor does he require such attentions from them towards himself. As
he does not see that it is his interest eagerly to seek the company of any of
his countrymen, he is slow to fancy that his own company is declined:
despising no one on account of his station, he does not imagine that anyone
can despise him for that cause; and until he has clearly perceived an insult,
he does not suppose that an affront was intended. The social condition of
the Americans naturally accustoms them not to take offence in small
matters; and, on the other hand, the democratic freedom which they enjoy
transfuses this same mildness of temper into the character of the nation. The
political institutions of the United States constantly bring citizens of all
ranks into contact, and compel them to pursue great undertakings in
concert. People thus engaged have scarcely time to attend to the details of
etiquette, and they are besides too strongly interested in living
harmoniously for them to stick at such things. They therefore soon acquire a
habit of considering the feelings and opinions of those whom they meet
more than their manners, and they do not allow themselves to be annoyed
by trifles.
I have often remarked in the United States that it is not easy to make a
man understand that his presence may be dispensed with; hints will not
always suffice to shake him off. I contradict an American at every word he
says, to show him that his conversation bores me; he instantly labors with
fresh pertinacity to convince me; I preserve a dogged silence, and he thinks
I am meditating deeply on the truths which he is uttering; at last I rush from
his company, and he supposes that some urgent business hurries me
elsewhere. This man will never understand that he wearies me to extinction
unless I tell him so: and the only way to get rid of him is to make him my
enemy for life.
It appears surprising at first sight that the same man transported to
Europe suddenly becomes so sensitive and captious, that I often find it as
difficult to avoid offending him here as it was to put him out of
countenance. These two opposite effects proceed from the same cause.
Democratic institutions generally give men a lofty notion of their country
and of themselves. An American leaves his country with a heart swollen
with pride; on arriving in Europe he at once finds out that we are not so
engrossed by the United States and the great people which inhabits them as
he had supposed, and this begins to annoy him. He has been informed that

the conditions of society are not equal in our part of the globe, and he
observes that among the nations of Europe the traces of rank are not wholly
obliterated; that wealth and birth still retain some indeterminate privileges,
which force themselves upon his notice whilst they elude definition. He is
therefore profoundly ignorant of the place which he ought to occupy in this
half-ruined scale of classes, which are sufficiently distinct to hate and
despise each other, yet sufficiently alike for him to be always confounding
them. He is afraid of ranging himself too high—still more is he afraid of
being ranged too low; this twofold peril keeps his mind constantly on the
stretch, and embarrasses all he says and does. He learns from tradition that
in Europe ceremonial observances were infinitely varied according to
different ranks; this recollection of former times completes his perplexity,
and he is the more afraid of not obtaining those marks of respect which are
due to him, as he does not exactly know in what they consist. He is like a
man surrounded by traps: society is not a recreation for him, but a serious
toil: he weighs your least actions, interrogates your looks, and scrutinizes
all you say, lest there should be some hidden allusion to affront him. I doubt
whether there was ever a provincial man of quality so punctilious in
breeding as he is: he endeavors to attend to the slightest rules of etiquette,
and does not allow one of them to be waived towards himself: he is full of
scruples and at the same time of pretensions; he wishes to do enough, but
fears to do too much; and as he does not very well know the limits of the
one or of the other, he keeps up a haughty and embarrassed air of reserve.
But this is not all: here is yet another double of the human heart. An
American is forever talking of the admirable equality which prevails in the
United States; aloud he makes it the boast of his country, but in secret he
deplores it for himself; and he aspires to show that, for his part, he is an
exception to the general state of things which he vaunts. There is hardly an
American to be met with who does not claim some remote kindred with the
first founders of the colonies; and as for the scions of the noble families of
England, America seemed to me to be covered with them. When an opulent
American arrives in Europe, his first care is to surround himself with all the
luxuries of wealth: he is so afraid of being taken for the plain citizen of a
democracy, that he adopts a hundred distorted ways of bringing some new
instance of his wealth before you every day. His house will be in the most
fashionable part of the town: he will always be surrounded by a host of
servants. I have heard an American complain, that in the best houses of

Paris the society was rather mixed; the taste which prevails there was not
pure enough for him; and he ventured to hint that, in his opinion, there was
a want of elegance of manner; he could not accustom himself to see wit
concealed under such unpretending forms.
These contrasts ought not to surprise us. If the vestiges of former
aristocratic distinctions were not so completely effaced in the United States,
the Americans would be less simple and less tolerant in their own country—
they would require less, and be less fond of borrowed manners in ours.

Chapter IV: Consequences Of The Three
Preceding Chapters
When men feel a natural compassion for their mutual sufferings—when
they are brought together by easy and frequent intercourse, and no sensitive
feelings keep them asunder—it may readily be supposed that they will lend
assistance to one another whenever it is needed. When an American asks for
the co-operation of his fellow-citizens it is seldom refused, and I have often
seen it afforded spontaneously and with great goodwill. If an accident
happens on the highway, everybody hastens to help the sufferer; if some
great and sudden calamity befalls a family, the purses of a thousand
strangers are at once willingly opened, and small but numerous donations
pour in to relieve their distress. It often happens amongst the most civilized
nations of the globe, that a poor wretch is as friendless in the midst of a
crowd as the savage in his wilds: this is hardly ever the case in the United
States. The Americans, who are always cold and often coarse in their
manners, seldom show insensibility; and if they do not proffer services
eagerly, yet they do not refuse to render them.
All this is not in contradiction to what I have said before on the subject of
individualism. The two things are so far from combating each other, that I
can see how they agree. Equality of conditions, whilst it makes men feel
their independence, shows them their own weakness: they are free, but
exposed to a thousand accidents; and experience soon teaches them that,
although they do not habitually require the assistance of others, a time
almost always comes when they cannot do without it. We constantly see in
Europe that men of the same profession are ever ready to assist each other;
they are all exposed to the same ills, and that is enough to teach them to
seek mutual preservatives, however hard-hearted and selfish they may
otherwise be. When one of them falls into danger, from which the others
may save him by a slight transient sacrifice or a sudden effort, they do not
fail to make the attempt. Not that they are deeply interested in his fate; for
if, by chance, their exertions are unavailing, they immediately forget the
object of them, and return to their own business; but a sort of tacit and
almost involuntary agreement has been passed between them, by which

each one owes to the others a temporary support which he may claim for
himself in turn. Extend to a people the remark here applied to a class, and
you will understand my meaning. A similar covenant exists in fact between
all the citizens of a democracy: they all feel themselves subject to the same
weakness and the same dangers; and their interest, as well as their
sympathy, makes it a rule with them to lend each other mutual assistance
when required. The more equal social conditions become, the more do men
display this reciprocal disposition to oblige each other. In democracies no
great benefits are conferred, but good offices are constantly rendered: a man
seldom displays self-devotion, but all men are ready to be of service to one
another.

Chapter V: How Democracy Affects the Relation
Of Masters And Servants
An American who had travelled for a long time in Europe once said to
me, "The English treat their servants with a stiffness and imperiousness of
manner which surprise us; but on the other hand the French sometimes treat
their attendants with a degree of familiarity or of politeness which we
cannot conceive. It looks as if they were afraid to give orders: the posture of
the superior and the inferior is ill-maintained." The remark was a just one,
and I have often made it myself. I have always considered England as the
country in the world where, in our time, the bond of domestic service is
drawn most tightly, and France as the country where it is most relaxed.
Nowhere have I seen masters stand so high or so low as in these two
countries. Between these two extremes the Americans are to be placed.
Such is the fact as it appears upon the surface of things: to discover the
causes of that fact, it is necessary to search the matter thoroughly.
No communities have ever yet existed in which social conditions have
been so equal that there were neither rich nor poor, and consequently
neither masters nor servants. Democracy does not prevent the existence of
these two classes, but it changes their dispositions and modifies their
mutual relations. Amongst aristocratic nations servants form a distinct class,
not more variously composed than that of masters. A settled order is soon
established; in the former as well as in the latter class a scale is formed,
with numerous distinctions or marked gradations of rank, and generations
succeed each other thus without any change of position. These two
communities are superposed one above the other, always distinct, but
regulated by analogous principles. This aristocratic constitution does not
exert a less powerful influence on the notions and manners of servants than
on those of masters; and, although the effects are different, the same cause
may easily be traced. Both classes constitute small communities in the heart
of the nation, and certain permanent notions of right and wrong are
ultimately engendered amongst them. The different acts of human life are
viewed by one particular and unchanging light. In the society of servants, as
in that of masters, men exercise a great influence over each other: they

acknowledge settled rules, and in the absence of law they are guided by a
sort of public opinion: their habits are settled, and their conduct is placed
under a certain control.
These men, whose destiny is to obey, certainly do not understand fame,
virtue, honesty, and honor in the same manner as their masters; but they
have a pride, a virtue, and an honesty pertaining to their condition; and they
have a notion, if I may use the expression, of a sort of servile honor. *a
Because a class is mean, it must not be supposed that all who belong to it
are mean-hearted; to think so would be a great mistake. However lowly it
may be, he who is foremost there, and who has no notion of quitting it,
occupies an aristocratic position which inspires him with lofty feelings,
pride, and self-respect, that fit him for the higher virtues and actions above
the common. Amongst aristocratic nations it was by no means rare to find
men of noble and vigorous minds in the service of the great, who felt not
the servitude they bore, and who submitted to the will of their masters
without any fear of their displeasure. But this was hardly ever the case
amongst the inferior ranks of domestic servants. It may be imagined that he
who occupies the lowest stage of the order of menials stands very low
indeed. The French created a word on purpose to designate the servants of
the aristocracy—they called them lackeys. This word "lackey" served as the
strongest expression, when all others were exhausted, to designate human
meanness. Under the old French monarchy, to denote by a single expression
a low-spirited contemptible fellow, it was usual to say that he had the "soul
of a lackey"; the term was enough to convey all that was intended.
[Footnote a: If the principal opinions by which men are guided are
examined closely and in detail, the analogy appears still more striking, and
one is surprised to find amongst them, just as much as amongst the
haughtiest scions of a feudal race, pride of birth, respect for their ancestry
and their descendants, disdain of their inferiors, a dread of contact, a taste
for etiquette, precedents, and antiquity.]
The permanent inequality of conditions not only gives servants certain
peculiar virtues and vices, but it places them in a peculiar relation with
respect to their masters. Amongst aristocratic nations the poor man is
familiarized from his childhood with the notion of being commanded: to
whichever side he turns his eyes the graduated structure of society and the
aspect of obedience meet his view. Hence in those countries the master
readily obtains prompt, complete, respectful, and easy obedience from his

servants, because they revere in him not only their master but the class of
masters. He weighs down their will by the whole weight of the aristocracy.
He orders their actions—to a certain extent he even directs their thoughts.
In aristocracies the master often exercises, even without being aware of it,
an amazing sway over the opinions, the habits, and the manners of those
who obey him, and his influence extends even further than his authority.
In aristocratic communities there are not only hereditary families of
servants as well as of masters, but the same families of servants adhere for
several generations to the same families of masters (like two parallel lines
which neither meet nor separate); and this considerably modifies the mutual
relations of these two classes of persons. Thus, although in aristocratic
society the master and servant have no natural resemblance—although, on
the contrary, they are placed at an immense distance on the scale of human
beings by their fortune, education, and opinions—yet time ultimately binds
them together. They are connected by a long series of common
reminiscences, and however different they may be, they grow alike; whilst
in democracies, where they are naturally almost alike, they always remain
strangers to each other. Amongst an aristocratic people the master gets to
look upon his servants as an inferior and secondary part of himself, and he
often takes an interest in their lot by a last stretch of egotism.
Servants, on their part, are not averse to regard themselves in the same
light; and they sometimes identify themselves with the person of the master,
so that they become an appendage to him in their own eyes as well as in his.
In aristocracies a servant fills a subordinate position which he cannot get
out of; above him is another man, holding a superior rank which he cannot
lose. On one side are obscurity, poverty, obedience for life; on the other, and
also for life, fame, wealth, and command. The two conditions are always
distinct and always in propinquity; the tie that connects them is as lasting as
they are themselves. In this predicament the servant ultimately detaches his
notion of interest from his own person; he deserts himself, as it were, or
rather he transports himself into the character of his master, and thus
assumes an imaginary personality. He complacently invests himself with
the wealth of those who command him; he shares their fame, exalts himself
by their rank, and feeds his mind with borrowed greatness, to which he
attaches more importance than those who fully and really possess it. There
is something touching, and at the same time ridiculous, in this strange
confusion of two different states of being. These passions of masters, when

they pass into the souls of menials, assume the natural dimensions of the
place they occupy—they are contracted and lowered. What was pride in the
former becomes puerile vanity and paltry ostentation in the latter. The
servants of a great man are commonly most punctilious as to the marks of
respect due to him, and they attach more importance to his slightest
privileges than he does himself. In France a few of these old servants of the
aristocracy are still to be met with here and there; they have survived their
race, which will soon disappear with them altogether. In the United States I
never saw anyone at all like them. The Americans are not only
unacquainted with the kind of man, but it is hardly possible to make them
understand that such ever existed. It is scarcely less difficult for them to
conceive it, than for us to form a correct notion of what a slave was
amongst the Romans, or a serf in the Middle Ages. All these men were in
fact, though in different degrees, results of the same cause: they are all
retiring from our sight, and disappearing in the obscurity of the past,
together with the social condition to which they owed their origin.
Equality of conditions turns servants and masters into new beings, and
places them in new relative positions. When social conditions are nearly
equal, men are constantly changing their situations in life: there is still a
class of menials and a class of masters, but these classes are not always
composed of the same individuals, still less of the same families; and those
who command are not more secure of perpetuity than those who obey. As
servants do not form a separate people, they have no habits, prejudices, or
manners peculiar to themselves; they are not remarkable for any particular
turn of mind or moods of feeling. They know no vices or virtues of their
condition, but they partake of the education, the opinions, the feelings, the
virtues, and the vices of their contemporaries; and they are honest men or
scoundrels in the same way as their masters are. The conditions of servants
are not less equal than those of masters. As no marked ranks or fixed
subordination are to be found amongst them, they will not display either the
meanness or the greatness which characterizes the aristocracy of menials as
well as all other aristocracies. I never saw a man in the United States who
reminded me of that class of confidential servants of which we still retain a
reminiscence in Europe, neither did I ever meet with such a thing as a
lackey: all traces of the one and of the other have disappeared.
In democracies servants are not only equal amongst themselves, but it
may be said that they are in some sort the equals of their masters. This

requires explanation in order to be rightly understood. At any moment a
servant may become a master, and he aspires to rise to that condition: the
servant is therefore not a different man from the master. Why then has the
former a right to command, and what compels the latter to obey?—the free
and temporary consent of both their wills. Neither of them is by nature
inferior to the other; they only become so for a time by covenant. Within the
terms of this covenant, the one is a servant, the other a master; beyond it
they are two citizens of the commonwealth—two men. I beg the reader
particularly to observe that this is not only the notion which servants
themselves entertain of their own condition; domestic service is looked
upon by masters in the same light; and the precise limits of authority and
obedience are as clearly settled in the mind of the one as in that of the other.
When the greater part of the community have long attained a condition
nearly alike, and when equality is an old and acknowledged fact, the public
mind, which is never affected by exceptions, assigns certain general limits
to the value of man, above or below which no man can long remain placed.
It is in vain that wealth and poverty, authority and obedience, accidentally
interpose great distances between two men; public opinion, founded upon
the usual order of things, draws them to a common level, and creates a
species of imaginary equality between them, in spite of the real inequality
of their conditions. This all-powerful opinion penetrates at length even into
the hearts of those whose interest might arm them to resist it; it affects their
judgment whilst it subdues their will. In their inmost convictions the master
and the servant no longer perceive any deep-seated difference between
them, and they neither hope nor fear to meet with any such at any time.
They are therefore neither subject to disdain nor to anger, and they discern
in each other neither humility nor pride. The master holds the contract of
service to be the only source of his power, and the servant regards it as the
only cause of his obedience. They do not quarrel about their reciprocal
situations, but each knows his own and keeps it.
In the French army the common soldier is taken from nearly the same
classes as the officer, and may hold the same commissions; out of the ranks
he considers himself entirely equal to his military superiors, and in point of
fact he is so; but when under arms he does not hesitate to obey, and his
obedience is not the less prompt, precise, and ready, for being voluntary and
defined. This example may give a notion of what takes place between
masters and servants in democratic communities.

It would be preposterous to suppose that those warm and deep-seated
affections, which are sometimes kindled in the domestic service of
aristocracy, will ever spring up between these two men, or that they will
exhibit strong instances of self-sacrifice. In aristocracies masters and
servants live apart, and frequently their only intercourse is through a third
person; yet they commonly stand firmly by one another. In democratic
countries the master and the servant are close together; they are in daily
personal contact, but their minds do not intermingle; they have common
occupations, hardly ever common interests. Amongst such a people the
servant always considers himself as a sojourner in the dwelling of his
masters. He knew nothing of their forefathers—he will see nothing of their
descendants—he has nothing lasting to expect from their hand. Why then
should he confound his life with theirs, and whence should so strange a
surrender of himself proceed? The reciprocal position of the two men is
changed—their mutual relations must be so too.
I would fain illustrate all these reflections by the example of the
Americans; but for this purpose the distinctions of persons and places must
be accurately traced. In the South of the Union, slavery exists; all that I
have just said is consequently inapplicable there. In the North, the majority
of servants are either freedmen or the children of freedmen; these persons
occupy a contested position in the public estimation; by the laws they are
brought up to the level of their masters—by the manners of the country they
are obstinately detruded from it. They do not themselves clearly know their
proper place, and they are almost always either insolent or craven. But in
the Northern States, especially in New England, there are a certain number
of whites, who agree, for wages, to yield a temporary obedience to the will
of their fellow-citizens. I have heard that these servants commonly perform
the duties of their situation with punctuality and intelligence; and that
without thinking themselves naturally inferior to the person who orders
them, they submit without reluctance to obey him. They appear to me to
carry into service some of those manly habits which independence and
equality engender. Having once selected a hard way of life, they do not seek
to escape from it by indirect means; and they have sufficient respect for
themselves, not to refuse to their master that obedience which they have
freely promised. On their part, masters require nothing of their servants but
the faithful and rigorous performance of the covenant: they do not ask for
marks of respect, they do not claim their love or devoted attachment; it is

enough that, as servants, they are exact and honest. It would not then be true
to assert that, in democratic society, the relation of servants and masters is
disorganized: it is organized on another footing; the rule is different, but
there is a rule.
It is not my purpose to inquire whether the new state of things which I
have just described is inferior to that which preceded it, or simply different.
Enough for me that it is fixed and determined: for what is most important to
meet with among men is not any given ordering, but order. But what shall I
say of those sad and troubled times at which equality is established in the
midst of the tumult of revolution—when democracy, after having been
introduced into the state of society, still struggles with difficulty against the
prejudices and manners of the country? The laws, and partially public
opinion, already declare that no natural or permanent inferiority exists
between the servant and the master. But this new belief has not yet reached
the innermost convictions of the latter, or rather his heart rejects it; in the
secret persuasion of his mind the master thinks that he belongs to a peculiar
and superior race; he dares not say so, but he shudders whilst he allows
himself to be dragged to the same level. His authority over his servants
becomes timid and at the same time harsh: he has already ceased to
entertain for them the feelings of patronizing kindness which long
uncontested power always engenders, and he is surprised that, being
changed himself, his servant changes also. He wants his attendants to form
regular and permanent habits, in a condition of domestic service which is
only temporary: he requires that they should appear contented with and
proud of a servile condition, which they will one day shake off—that they
should sacrifice themselves to a man who can neither protect nor ruin them
—and in short that they should contract an indissoluble engagement to a
being like themselves, and one who will last no longer than they will.
Amongst aristocratic nations it often happens that the condition of
domestic service does not degrade the character of those who enter upon it,
because they neither know nor imagine any other; and the amazing
inequality which is manifest between them and their master appears to be
the necessary and unavoidable consequence of some hidden law of
Providence. In democracies the condition of domestic service does not
degrade the character of those who enter upon it, because it is freely chosen,
and adopted for a time only; because it is not stigmatized by public opinion,
and creates no permanent inequality between the servant and the master.

But whilst the transition from one social condition to another is going on,
there is almost always a time when men's minds fluctuate between the
aristocratic notion of subjection and the democratic notion of obedience.
Obedience then loses its moral importance in the eyes of him who obeys; he
no longer considers it as a species of divine obligation, and he does not yet
view it under its purely human aspect; it has to him no character of sanctity
or of justice, and he submits to it as to a degrading but profitable condition.
At that moment a confused and imperfect phantom of equality haunts the
minds of servants; they do not at once perceive whether the equality to
which they are entitled is to be found within or without the pale of domestic
service; and they rebel in their hearts against a subordination to which they
have subjected themselves, and from which they derive actual profit. They
consent to serve, and they blush to obey; they like the advantages of
service, but not the master; or rather, they are not sure that they ought not
themselves to be masters, and they are inclined to consider him who orders
them as an unjust usurper of their own rights. Then it is that the dwelling of
every citizen offers a spectacle somewhat analogous to the gloomy aspect
of political society. A secret and intestine warfare is going on there between
powers, ever rivals and suspicious of one another: the master is ill-natured
and weak, the servant ill-natured and intractable; the one constantly
attempts to evade by unfair restrictions his obligation to protect and to
remunerate—the other his obligation to obey. The reins of domestic
government dangle between them, to be snatched at by one or the other. The
lines which divide authority from oppression, liberty from license, and right
from might, are to their eyes so jumbled together and confused, that no one
knows exactly what he is, or what he may be, or what he ought to be. Such
a condition is not democracy, but revolution.

Chapter VI: That Democratic Institutions And
Manners Tend To Raise Rents And Shorten The
Terms Of Leases
What has been said of servants and masters is applicable, to a certain
extent, to landowners and farming tenants; but this subject deserves to be
considered by itself. In America there are, properly speaking, no tenant
farmers; every man owns the ground he tills. It must be admitted that
democratic laws tend greatly to increase the number of landowners, and to
diminish that of farming tenants. Yet what takes place in the United States is
much less attributable to the institutions of the country than to the country
itself. In America land is cheap, and anyone may easily become a
landowner; its returns are small, and its produce cannot well be divided
between a landowner and a farmer. America therefore stands alone in this as
well as in many other respects, and it would be a mistake to take it as an
example.
I believe that in democratic as well as in aristocratic countries there will
be landowners and tenants, but the connection existing between them will
be of a different kind. In aristocracies the hire of a farm is paid to the
landlord, not only in rent, but in respect, regard, and duty; in democracies
the whole is paid in cash. When estates are divided and passed from hand to
hand, and the permanent connection which existed between families and the
soil is dissolved, the landowner and the tenant are only casually brought
into contact. They meet for a moment to settle the conditions of the
agreement, and then lose sight of each other; they are two strangers brought
together by a common interest, and who keenly talk over a matter of
business, the sole object of which is to make money.
In proportion as property is subdivided and wealth distributed over the
country, the community is filled with people whose former opulence is
declining, and with others whose fortunes are of recent growth and whose
wants increase more rapidly than their resources. For all such persons the
smallest pecuniary profit is a matter of importance, and none of them feel
disposed to waive any of their claims, or to lose any portion of their

income. As ranks are intermingled, and as very large as well as very scanty
fortunes become more rare, every day brings the social condition of the
landowner nearer to that of the farmer; the one has not naturally any
uncontested superiority over the other; between two men who are equal,
and not at ease in their circumstances, the contract of hire is exclusively an
affair of money. A man whose estate extends over a whole district, and who
owns a hundred farms, is well aware of the importance of gaining at the
same time the affections of some thousands of men; this object appears to
call for his exertions, and to attain it he will readily make considerable
sacrifices. But he who owns a hundred acres is insensible to similar
considerations, and he cares but little to win the private regard of his tenant.
An aristocracy does not expire like a man in a single day; the aristocratic
principle is slowly undermined in men's opinion, before it is attacked in
their laws. Long before open war is declared against it, the tie which had
hitherto united the higher classes to the lower may be seen to be gradually
relaxed. Indifference and contempt are betrayed by one class, jealousy and
hatred by the others; the intercourse between rich and poor becomes less
frequent and less kind, and rents are raised. This is not the consequence of a
democratic revolution, but its certain harbinger; for an aristocracy which
has lost the affections of the people, once and forever, is like a tree dead at
the root, which is the more easily torn up by the winds the higher its
branches have spread.
In the course of the last fifty years the rents of farms have amazingly
increased, not only in France but throughout the greater part of Europe. The
remarkable improvements which have taken place in agriculture and
manufactures within the same period do not suffice in my opinion to
explain this fact; recourse must be had to another cause more powerful and
more concealed. I believe that cause is to be found in the democratic
institutions which several European nations have adopted, and in the
democratic passions which more or less agitate all the rest. I have
frequently heard great English landowners congratulate themselves that, at
the present day, they derive a much larger income from their estates than
their fathers did. They have perhaps good reasons to be glad; but most
assuredly they know not what they are glad of. They think they are making
a clear gain, when it is in reality only an exchange; their influence is what
they are parting with for cash; and what they gain in money will ere long be
lost in power.

There is yet another sign by which it is easy to know that a great
democratic revolution is going on or approaching. In the Middle Ages
almost all lands were leased for lives, or for very long terms; the domestic
economy of that period shows that leases for ninety-nine years were more
frequent then than leases for twelve years are now. Men then believed that
families were immortal; men's conditions seemed settled forever, and the
whole of society appeared to be so fixed, that it was not supposed that
anything would ever be stirred or shaken in its structure. In ages of equality,
the human mind takes a different bent; the prevailing notion is that nothing
abides, and man is haunted by the thought of mutability. Under this
impression the landowner and the tenant himself are instinctively averse to
protracted terms of obligation; they are afraid of being tied up to-morrow
by the contract which benefits them today. They have vague anticipations of
some sudden and unforeseen change in their conditions; they mistrust
themselves; they fear lest their taste should change, and lest they should
lament that they cannot rid themselves of what they coveted; nor are such
fears unfounded, for in democratic ages that which is most fluctuating
amidst the fluctuation of all around is the heart of man.

Chapter VII: Influence Of Democracy On Wages
Most of the remarks which I have already made in speaking of servants
and masters, may be applied to masters and workmen. As the gradations of
the social scale come to be less observed, whilst the great sink the humble
rise, and as poverty as well as opulence ceases to be hereditary, the distance
both in reality and in opinion, which heretofore separated the workman
from the master, is lessened every day. The workman conceives a more
lofty opinion of his rights, of his future, of himself; he is filled with new
ambition and with new desires, he is harassed by new wants. Every instant
he views with longing eyes the profits of his employer; and in order to share
them, he strives to dispose of his labor at a higher rate, and he generally
succeeds at length in the attempt. In democratic countries, as well as
elsewhere, most of the branches of productive industry are carried on at a
small cost, by men little removed by their wealth or education above the
level of those whom they employ. These manufacturing speculators are
extremely numerous; their interests differ; they cannot therefore easily
concert or combine their exertions. On the other hand the workmen have
almost always some sure resources, which enable them to refuse to work
when they cannot get what they conceive to be the fair price of their labor.
In the constant struggle for wages which is going on between these two
classes, their strength is divided, and success alternates from one to the
other. It is even probable that in the end the interest of the working class
must prevail; for the high wages which they have already obtained make
them every day less dependent on their masters; and as they grow more
independent, they have greater facilities for obtaining a further increase of
wages.
I shall take for example that branch of productive industry which is still
at the present day the most generally followed in France, and in almost all
the countries of the world—I mean the cultivation of the soil. In France
most of those who labor for hire in agriculture, are themselves owners of
certain plots of ground, which just enable them to subsist without working
for anyone else. When these laborers come to offer their services to a

neighboring landowner or farmer, if he refuses them a certain rate of wages,
they retire to their own small property and await another opportunity.
I think that, upon the whole, it may be asserted that a slow and gradual
rise of wages is one of the general laws of democratic communities. In
proportion as social conditions become more equal, wages rise; and as
wages are higher, social conditions become more equal. But a great and
gloomy exception occurs in our own time. I have shown in a preceding
chapter that aristocracy, expelled from political society, has taken refuge in
certain departments of productive industry, and has established its sway
there under another form; this powerfully affects the rate of wages. As a
large capital is required to embark in the great manufacturing speculations
to which I allude, the number of persons who enter upon them is
exceedingly limited: as their number is small, they can easily concert
together, and fix the rate of wages as they please. Their workmen on the
contrary are exceedingly numerous, and the number of them is always
increasing; for, from time to time, an extraordinary run of business takes
place, during which wages are inordinately high, and they attract the
surrounding population to the factories. But, when once men have
embraced that line of life, we have already seen that they cannot quit it
again, because they soon contract habits of body and mind which unfit them
for any other sort of toil. These men have generally but little education and
industry, with but few resources; they stand therefore almost at the mercy of
the master. When competition, or other fortuitous circumstances, lessen his
profits, he can reduce the wages of his workmen almost at pleasure, and
make from them what he loses by the chances of business. Should the
workmen strike, the master, who is a rich man, can very well wait without
being ruined until necessity brings them back to him; but they must work
day by day or they die, for their only property is in their hands. They have
long been impoverished by oppression, and the poorer they become the
more easily may they be oppressed: they can never escape from this fatal
circle of cause and consequence. It is not then surprising that wages, after
having sometimes suddenly risen, are permanently lowered in this branch of
industry; whereas in other callings the price of labor, which generally
increases but little, is nevertheless constantly augmented.
This state of dependence and wretchedness, in which a part of the
manufacturing population of our time lives, forms an exception to the
general rule, contrary to the state of all the rest of the community; but, for

this very reason, no circumstance is more important or more deserving of
the especial consideration of the legislator; for when the whole of society is
in motion, it is difficult to keep any one class stationary; and when the
greater number of men are opening new paths to fortune, it is no less
difficult to make the few support in peace their wants and their desires.

Chapter VIII: Influence Of Democracy On
Kindred
I have just examined the changes which the equality of conditions
produces in the mutual relations of the several members of the community
amongst democratic nations, and amongst the Americans in particular. I
would now go deeper, and inquire into the closer ties of kindred: my object
here is not to seek for new truths, but to show in what manner facts already
known are connected with my subject.
It has been universally remarked, that in our time the several members of
a family stand upon an entirely new footing towards each other; that the
distance which formerly separated a father from his sons has been lessened;
and that paternal authority, if not destroyed, is at least impaired. Something
analogous to this, but even more striking, may be observed in the United
States. In America the family, in the Roman and aristocratic signification of
the word, does not exist. All that remains of it are a few vestiges in the first
years of childhood, when the father exercises, without opposition, that
absolute domestic authority, which the feebleness of his children renders
necessary, and which their interest, as well as his own incontestable
superiority, warrants. But as soon as the young American approaches
manhood, the ties of filial obedience are relaxed day by day: master of his
thoughts, he is soon master of his conduct. In America there is, strictly
speaking, no adolescence: at the close of boyhood the man appears, and
begins to trace out his own path. It would be an error to suppose that this is
preceded by a domestic struggle, in which the son has obtained by a sort of
moral violence the liberty that his father refused him. The same habits, the
same principles which impel the one to assert his independence, predispose
the other to consider the use of that independence as an incontestable right.
The former does not exhibit any of those rancorous or irregular passions
which disturb men long after they have shaken off an established authority;
the latter feels none of that bitter and angry regret which is apt to survive a
bygone power. The father foresees the limits of his authority long
beforehand, and when the time arrives he surrenders it without a struggle:
the son looks forward to the exact period at which he will be his own

master; and he enters upon his freedom without precipitation and without
effort, as a possession which is his own and which no one seeks to wrest
from him. *a
a
[ The Americans, however, have not yet thought fit to strip
the parent, as has been done in France, of one of the chief
elements of parental authority, by depriving him of the
power of disposing of his property at his death. In the United
States there are no restrictions on the powers of a testator. In
this respect, as in almost all others, it is easy to perceive, that
if the political legislation of the Americans is much more
democratic than that of the French, the civil legislation of
the latter is infinitely more democratic than that of the
former. This may easily be accounted for. The civil
legislation of France was the work of a man who saw that it
was his interest to satisfy the democratic passions of his
contemporaries in all that was not directly and immediately
hostile to his own power. He was willing to allow some
popular principles to regulate the distribution of property
and the government of families, provided they were not to
be introduced into the administration of public affairs.
Whilst the torrent of democracy overwhelmed the civil laws
of the country, he hoped to find an easy shelter behind its
political institutions. This policy was at once both adroit and
selfish; but a compromise of this kind could not last; for in
the end political institutions never fail to become the image
and expression of civil society; and in this sense it may be
said that nothing is more political in a nation than its civil
legislation.]
It may perhaps not be without utility to show how these changes which
take place in family relations, are closely connected with the social and
political revolution which is approaching its consummation under our own
observation. There are certain great social principles, which a people either
introduces everywhere, or tolerates nowhere. In countries which are
aristocratically constituted with all the gradations of rank, the government
never makes a direct appeal to the mass of the governed: as men are united
together, it is enough to lead the foremost, the rest will follow. This is
equally applicable to the family, as to all aristocracies which have a head.
Amongst aristocratic nations, social institutions recognize, in truth, no one
in the family but the father; children are received by society at his hands;
society governs him, he governs them. Thus the parent has not only a
natural right, but he acquires a political right, to command them: he is the
author and the support of his family; but he is also its constituted ruler. In

democracies, where the government picks out every individual singly from
the mass, to make him subservient to the general laws of the community, no
such intermediate person is required: a father is there, in the eye of the law,
only a member of the community, older and richer than his sons.
When most of the conditions of life are extremely unequal, and the
inequality of these conditions is permanent, the notion of a superior grows
upon the imaginations of men: if the law invested him with no privileges,
custom and public opinion would concede them. When, on the contrary,
men differ but little from each other, and do not always remain in dissimilar
conditions of life, the general notion of a superior becomes weaker and less
distinct: it is vain for legislation to strive to place him who obeys very much
beneath him who commands; the manners of the time bring the two men
nearer to one another, and draw them daily towards the same level.
Although the legislation of an aristocratic people should grant no peculiar
privileges to the heads of families; I shall not be the less convinced that
their power is more respected and more extensive than in a democracy; for I
know that, whatsoever the laws may be, superiors always appear higher and
inferiors lower in aristocracies than amongst democratic nations.
When men live more for the remembrance of what has been than for the
care of what is, and when they are more given to attend to what their
ancestors thought than to think themselves, the father is the natural and
necessary tie between the past and the present—the link by which the ends
of these two chains are connected. In aristocracies, then, the father is not
only the civil head of the family, but the oracle of its traditions, the
expounder of its customs, the arbiter of its manners. He is listened to with
deference, he is addressed with respect, and the love which is felt for him is
always tempered with fear. When the condition of society becomes
democratic, and men adopt as their general principle that it is good and
lawful to judge of all things for one's self, using former points of belief not
as a rule of faith but simply as a means of information, the power which the
opinions of a father exercise over those of his sons diminishes as well as his
legal power.
Perhaps the subdivision of estates which democracy brings with it
contributes more than anything else to change the relations existing
between a father and his children. When the property of the father of a
family is scanty, his son and himself constantly live in the same place, and

share the same occupations: habit and necessity bring them together, and
force them to hold constant communication: the inevitable consequence is a
sort of familiar intimacy, which renders authority less absolute, and which
can ill be reconciled with the external forms of respect. Now in democratic
countries the class of those who are possessed of small fortunes is precisely
that which gives strength to the notions, and a particular direction to the
manners, of the community. That class makes its opinions preponderate as
universally as its will, and even those who are most inclined to resist its
commands are carried away in the end by its example. I have known eager
opponents of democracy who allowed their children to address them with
perfect colloquial equality.
Thus, at the same time that the power of aristocracy is declining, the
austere, the conventional, and the legal part of parental authority vanishes,
and a species of equality prevails around the domestic hearth. I know not,
upon the whole, whether society loses by the change, but I am inclined to
believe that man individually is a gainer by it. I think that, in proportion as
manners and laws become more democratic, the relation of father and son
becomes more intimate and more affectionate; rules and authority are less
talked of; confidence and tenderness are oftentimes increased, and it would
seem that the natural bond is drawn closer in proportion as the social bond
is loosened. In a democratic family the father exercises no other power than
that with which men love to invest the affection and the experience of age;
his orders would perhaps be disobeyed, but his advice is for the most part
authoritative. Though he be not hedged in with ceremonial respect, his sons
at least accost him with confidence; no settled form of speech is
appropriated to the mode of addressing him, but they speak to him
constantly, and are ready to consult him day by day; the master and the
constituted ruler have vanished—the father remains. Nothing more is
needed, in order to judge of the difference between the two states of society
in this respect, than to peruse the family correspondence of aristocratic
ages. The style is always correct, ceremonious, stiff, and so cold that the
natural warmth of the heart can hardly be felt in the language. The
language, on the contrary, addressed by a son to his father in democratic
countries is always marked by mingled freedom, familiarity and affection,
which at once show that new relations have sprung up in the bosom of the
family.

A similar revolution takes place in the mutual relations of children. In
aristocratic families, as well as in aristocratic society, every place is marked
out beforehand. Not only does the father occupy a separate rank, in which
he enjoys extensive privileges, but even the children are not equal amongst
themselves. The age and sex of each irrevocably determine his rank, and
secure to him certain privileges: most of these distinctions are abolished or
diminished by democracy. In aristocratic families the eldest son, inheriting
the greater part of the property, and almost all the rights of the family,
becomes the chief, and, to a certain extent, the master, of his brothers.
Greatness and power are for him—for them, mediocrity and dependence.
Nevertheless it would be wrong to suppose that, amongst aristocratic
nations, the privileges of the eldest son are advantageous to himself alone,
or that they excite nothing but envy and hatred in those around him. The
eldest son commonly endeavors to procure wealth and power for his
brothers, because the general splendor of the house is reflected back on him
who represents it; the younger sons seek to back the elder brother in all his
undertakings, because the greatness and power of the head of the family
better enable him to provide for all its branches. The different members of
an aristocratic family are therefore very closely bound together; their
interests are connected, their minds agree, but their hearts are seldom in
harmony.
Democracy also binds brothers to each other, but by very different
means. Under democratic laws all the children are perfectly equal, and
consequently independent; nothing brings them forcibly together, but
nothing keeps them apart; and as they have the same origin, as they are
trained under the same roof, as they are treated with the same care, and as
no peculiar privilege distinguishes or divides them, the affectionate and
youthful intimacy of early years easily springs up between them. Scarcely
any opportunities occur to break the tie thus formed at the outset of life; for
their brotherhood brings them daily together, without embarrassing them. It
is not, then, by interest, but by common associations and by the free
sympathy of opinion and of taste, that democracy unites brothers to each
other. It divides their inheritance, but it allows their hearts and minds to
mingle together. Such is the charm of these democratic manners, that even
the partisans of aristocracy are caught by it; and after having experienced it
for some time, they are by no means tempted to revert to the respectful and
frigid observance of aristocratic families. They would be glad to retain the

domestic habits of democracy, if they might throw off its social conditions
and its laws; but these elements are indissolubly united, and it is impossible
to enjoy the former without enduring the latter. The remarks I have made on
filial love and fraternal affection are applicable to all the passions which
emanate spontaneously from human nature itself. If a certain mode of
thought or feeling is the result of some peculiar condition of life, when that
condition is altered nothing whatever remains of the thought or feeling.
Thus a law may bind two members of the community very closely to one
another; but that law being abolished, they stand asunder. Nothing was
more strict than the tie which united the vassal to the lord under the feudal
system; at the present day the two men know not each other; the fear, the
gratitude, and the affection which formerly connected them have vanished,
and not a vestige of the tie remains. Such, however, is not the case with
those feelings which are natural to mankind. Whenever a law attempts to
tutor these feelings in any particular manner, it seldom fails to weaken
them; by attempting to add to their intensity, it robs them of some of their
elements, for they are never stronger than when left to themselves.
Democracy, which destroys or obscures almost all the old conventional
rules of society, and which prevents men from readily assenting to new
ones, entirely effaces most of the feelings to which these conventional rules
have given rise; but it only modifies some others, and frequently imparts to
them a degree of energy and sweetness unknown before. Perhaps it is not
impossible to condense into a single proposition the whole meaning of this
chapter, and of several others that preceded it. Democracy loosens social
ties, but it draws the ties of nature more tight; it brings kindred more closely
together, whilst it places the various members of the community more
widely apart.

Chapter IX: Education Of Young Women In The
United States
No free communities ever existed without morals; and, as I observed in
the former part of this work, morals are the work of woman. Consequently,
whatever affects the condition of women, their habits and their opinions,
has great political importance in my eyes. Amongst almost all Protestant
nations young women are far more the mistresses of their own actions than
they are in Catholic countries. This independence is still greater in
Protestant countries, like England, which have retained or acquired the right
of self-government; the spirit of freedom is then infused into the domestic
circle by political habits and by religious opinions. In the United States the
doctrines of Protestantism are combined with great political freedom and a
most democratic state of society; and nowhere are young women
surrendered so early or so completely to their own guidance. Long before
an American girl arrives at the age of marriage, her emancipation from
maternal control begins; she has scarcely ceased to be a child when she
already thinks for herself, speaks with freedom, and acts on her own
impulse. The great scene of the world is constantly open to her view; far
from seeking concealment, it is every day disclosed to her more completely,
and she is taught to survey it with a firm and calm gaze. Thus the vices and
dangers of society are early revealed to her; as she sees them clearly, she
views them without illusions, and braves them without fear; for she is full
of reliance on her own strength, and her reliance seems to be shared by all
who are about her. An American girl scarcely ever displays that virginal
bloom in the midst of young desires, or that innocent and ingenuous grace
which usually attends the European woman in the transition from girlhood
to youth. It is rarely that an American woman at any age displays childish
timidity or ignorance. Like the young women of Europe, she seeks to
please, but she knows precisely the cost of pleasing. If she does not
abandon herself to evil, at least she knows that it exists; and she is
remarkable rather for purity of manners than for chastity of mind. I have
been frequently surprised, and almost frightened, at the singular address and
happy boldness with which young women in America contrive to manage

their thoughts and their language amidst all the difficulties of stimulating
conversation; a philosopher would have stumbled at every step along the
narrow path which they trod without accidents and without effort. It is easy
indeed to perceive that, even amidst the independence of early youth, an
American woman is always mistress of herself; she indulges in all permitted
pleasures, without yielding herself up to any of them; and her reason never
allows the reins of self-guidance to drop, though it often seems to hold them
loosely.
In France, where remnants of every age are still so strangely mingled in
the opinions and tastes of the people, women commonly receive a reserved,
retired, and almost cloistral education, as they did in aristocratic times; and
then they are suddenly abandoned, without a guide and without assistance,
in the midst of all the irregularities inseparable from democratic society.
The Americans are more consistent. They have found out that in a
democracy the independence of individuals cannot fail to be very great,
youth premature, tastes ill-restrained, customs fleeting, public opinion often
unsettled and powerless, paternal authority weak, and marital authority
contested. Under these circumstances, believing that they had little chance
of repressing in woman the most vehement passions of the human heart,
they held that the surer way was to teach her the art of combating those
passions for herself. As they could not prevent her virtue from being
exposed to frequent danger, they determined that she should know how best
to defend it; and more reliance was placed on the free vigor of her will than
on safeguards which have been shaken or overthrown. Instead, then, of
inculcating mistrust of herself, they constantly seek to enhance their
confidence in her own strength of character. As it is neither possible nor
desirable to keep a young woman in perpetual or complete ignorance, they
hasten to give her a precocious knowledge on all subjects. Far from hiding
the corruptions of the world from her, they prefer that she should see them
at once and train herself to shun them; and they hold it of more importance
to protect her conduct than to be over-scrupulous of her innocence.
Although the Americans are a very religious people, they do not rely on
religion alone to defend the virtue of woman; they seek to arm her reason
also. In this they have followed the same method as in several other
respects; they first make the most vigorous efforts to bring individual
independence to exercise a proper control over itself, and they do not call in
the aid of religion until they have reached the utmost limits of human

strength. I am aware that an education of this kind is not without danger; I
am sensible that it tends to invigorate the judgment at the expense of the
imagination, and to make cold and virtuous women instead of affectionate
wives and agreeable companions to man. Society may be more tranquil and
better regulated, but domestic life has often fewer charms. These, however,
are secondary evils, which may be braved for the sake of higher interests.
At the stage at which we are now arrived the time for choosing is no longer
within our control; a democratic education is indispensable to protect
women from the dangers with which democratic institutions and manners
surround them.

Chapter X: The Young Woman In The Character
Of A Wife
In America the independence of woman is irrevocably lost in the bonds
of matrimony: if an unmarried woman is less constrained there than
elsewhere, a wife is subjected to stricter obligations. The former makes her
father's house an abode of freedom and of pleasure; the latter lives in the
home of her husband as if it were a cloister. Yet these two different
conditions of life are perhaps not so contrary as may be supposed, and it is
natural that the American women should pass through the one to arrive at
the other.
Religious peoples and trading nations entertain peculiarly serious notions
of marriage: the former consider the regularity of woman's life as the best
pledge and most certain sign of the purity of her morals; the latter regard it
as the highest security for the order and prosperity of the household. The
Americans are at the same time a puritanical people and a commercial
nation: their religious opinions, as well as their trading habits, consequently
lead them to require much abnegation on the part of woman, and a constant
sacrifice of her pleasures to her duties which is seldom demanded of her in
Europe. Thus in the United States the inexorable opinion of the public
carefully circumscribes woman within the narrow circle of domestic interest
and duties, and forbids her to step beyond it.
Upon her entrance into the world a young American woman finds these
notions firmly established; she sees the rules which are derived from them;
she is not slow to perceive that she cannot depart for an instant from the
established usages of her contemporaries, without putting in jeopardy her
peace of mind, her honor, nay even her social existence; and she finds the
energy required for such an act of submission in the firmness of her
understanding and in the virile habits which her education has given her. It
may be said that she has learned by the use of her independence to
surrender it without a struggle and without a murmur when the time comes
for making the sacrifice. But no American woman falls into the toils of
matrimony as into a snare held out to her simplicity and ignorance. She has

been taught beforehand what is expected of her, and voluntarily and freely
does she enter upon this engagement. She supports her new condition with
courage, because she chose it. As in America paternal discipline is very
relaxed and the conjugal tie very strict, a young woman does not contract
the latter without considerable circumspection and apprehension.
Precocious marriages are rare. Thus American women do not marry until
their understandings are exercised and ripened; whereas in other countries
most women generally only begin to exercise and to ripen their
understandings after marriage.
I by no means suppose, however, that the great change which takes place
in all the habits of women in the United States, as soon as they are married,
ought solely to be attributed to the constraint of public opinion: it is
frequently imposed upon themselves by the sole effort of their own will.
When the time for choosing a husband is arrived, that cold and stern
reasoning power which has been educated and invigorated by the free
observation of the world, teaches an American woman that a spirit of levity
and independence in the bonds of marriage is a constant subject of
annoyance, not of pleasure; it tells her that the amusements of the girl
cannot become the recreations of the wife, and that the sources of a married
woman's happiness are in the home of her husband. As she clearly discerns
beforehand the only road which can lead to domestic happiness, she enters
upon it at once, and follows it to the end without seeking to turn back.
The same strength of purpose which the young wives of America display,
in bending themselves at once and without repining to the austere duties of
their new condition, is no less manifest in all the great trials of their lives. In
no country in the world are private fortunes more precarious than in the
United States. It is not uncommon for the same man, in the course of his
life, to rise and sink again through all the grades which lead from opulence
to poverty. American women support these vicissitudes with calm and
unquenchable energy: it would seem that their desires contract, as easily as
they expand, with their fortunes. *a
a
[ See Appendix S.]
The greater part of the adventurers who migrate every year to people the
western wilds, belong, as I observed in the former part of this work, to the
old Anglo-American race of the Northern States. Many of these men, who
rush so boldly onwards in pursuit of wealth, were already in the enjoyment

of a competency in their own part of the country. They take their wives
along with them, and make them share the countless perils and privations
which always attend the commencement of these expeditions. I have often
met, even on the verge of the wilderness, with young women, who after
having been brought up amidst all the comforts of the large towns of New
England, had passed, almost without any intermediate stage, from the
wealthy abode of their parents to a comfortless hovel in a forest. Fever,
solitude, and a tedious life had not broken the springs of their courage.
Their features were impaired and faded, but their looks were firm: they
appeared to be at once sad and resolute. I do not doubt that these young
American women had amassed, in the education of their early years, that
inward strength which they displayed under these circumstances. The early
culture of the girl may still therefore be traced, in the United States, under
the aspect of marriage: her part is changed, her habits are different, but her
character is the same.

Chapter XI: That The Equality Of Conditions
Contributes To The Maintenance Of Good Morals
In America
Some philosophers and historians have said, or have hinted, that the
strictness of female morality was increased or diminished simply by the
distance of a country from the equator. This solution of the difficulty was an
easy one; and nothing was required but a globe and a pair of compasses to
settle in an instant one of the most difficult problems in the condition of
mankind. But I am not aware that this principle of the materialists is
supported by facts. The same nations have been chaste or dissolute at
different periods of their history; the strictness or the laxity of their morals
depended therefore on some variable cause, not only on the natural qualities
of their country, which were invariable. I do not deny that in certain
climates the passions which are occasioned by the mutual attraction of the
sexes are peculiarly intense; but I am of opinion that this natural intensity
may always be excited or restrained by the condition of society and by
political institutions.
Although the travellers who have visited North America differ on a great
number of points, they all agree in remarking that morals are far more strict
there than elsewhere. It is evident that on this point the Americans are very
superior to their progenitors the English. A superficial glance at the two
nations will establish the fact. In England, as in all other countries of
Europe, public malice is constantly attacking the frailties of women.
Philosophers and statesmen are heard to deplore that morals are not
sufficiently strict, and the literary productions of the country constantly lead
one to suppose so. In America all books, novels not excepted, suppose
women to be chaste, and no one thinks of relating affairs of gallantry. No
doubt this great regularity of American morals originates partly in the
country, in the race of the people, and in their religion: but all these causes,
which operate elsewhere, do not suffice to account for it; recourse must be
had to some special reason. This reason appears to me to be the principle of
equality and the institutions derived from it. Equality of conditions does not

of itself engender regularity of morals, but it unquestionably facilitates and
increases it. *a [Footnote a: See Appendix T.]
Amongst aristocratic nations birth and fortune frequently make two such
different beings of man and woman, that they can never be united to each
other. Their passions draw them together, but the condition of society, and
the notions suggested by it, prevent them from contracting a permanent and
ostensible tie. The necessary consequence is a great number of transient and
clandestine connections. Nature secretly avenges herself for the constraint
imposed upon her by the laws of man. This is not so much the case when
the equality of conditions has swept away all the imaginary, or the real,
barriers which separated man from woman. No girl then believes that she
cannot become the wife of the man who loves her; and this renders all
breaches of morality before marriage very uncommon: for, whatever be the
credulity of the passions, a woman will hardly be able to persuade herself
that she is beloved, when her lover is perfectly free to marry her and does
not.
The same cause operates, though more indirectly, on married life.
Nothing better serves to justify an illicit passion, either to the minds of
those who have conceived it or to the world which looks on, than
compulsory or accidental marriages. *b In a country in which a woman is
always free to exercise her power of choosing, and in which education has
prepared her to choose rightly, public opinion is inexorable to her faults.
The rigor of the Americans arises in part from this cause. They consider
marriages as a covenant which is often onerous, but every condition of
which the parties are strictly bound to fulfil, because they knew all those
conditions beforehand, and were perfectly free not to have contracted them.
b
[ The literature of Europe sufficiently corroborates this
remark. When a European author wishes to depict in a work
of imagination any of these great catastrophes in matrimony
which so frequently occur amongst us, he takes care to
bespeak the compassion of the reader by bringing before
him ill-assorted or compulsory marriages. Although habitual
tolerance has long since relaxed our morals, an author could
hardly succeed in interesting us in the misfortunes of his
characters, if he did not first palliate their faults. This artifice
seldom fails: the daily scenes we witness prepare us long
beforehand to be indulgent. But American writers could
never render these palliations probable to their readers; their
customs and laws are opposed to it; and as they despair of

rendering levity of conduct pleasing, they cease to depict it.
This is one of the causes to which must be attributed the
small number of novels published in the United States.]
The very circumstances which render matrimonial fidelity more
obligatory also render it more easy. In aristocratic countries the object of
marriage is rather to unite property than persons; hence the husband is
sometimes at school and the wife at nurse when they are betrothed. It
cannot be wondered at if the conjugal tie which holds the fortunes of the
pair united allows their hearts to rove; this is the natural result of the nature
of the contract. When, on the contrary, a man always chooses a wife for
himself, without any external coercion or even guidance, it is generally a
conformity of tastes and opinions which brings a man and a woman
together, and this same conformity keeps and fixes them in close habits of
intimacy.
Our forefathers had conceived a very strange notion on the subject of
marriage: as they had remarked that the small number of love-matches
which occurred in their time almost always turned out ill, they resolutely
inferred that it was exceedingly dangerous to listen to the dictates of the
heart on the subject. Accident appeared to them to be a better guide than
choice. Yet it was not very difficult to perceive that the examples which
they witnessed did in fact prove nothing at all. For in the first place, if
democratic nations leave a woman at liberty to choose her husband, they
take care to give her mind sufficient knowledge, and her will sufficient
strength, to make so important a choice: whereas the young women who,
amongst aristocratic nations, furtively elope from the authority of their
parents to throw themselves of their own accord into the arms of men whom
they have had neither time to know, nor ability to judge of, are totally
without those securities. It is not surprising that they make a bad use of their
freedom of action the first time they avail themselves of it; nor that they fall
into such cruel mistakes, when, not having received a democratic education,
they choose to marry in conformity to democratic customs. But this is not
all. When a man and woman are bent upon marriage in spite of the
differences of an aristocratic state of society, the difficulties to be overcome
are enormous. Having broken or relaxed the bonds of filial obedience, they
have then to emancipate themselves by a final effort from the sway of
custom and the tyranny of opinion; and when at length they have succeeded
in this arduous task, they stand estranged from their natural friends and

kinsmen: the prejudice they have crossed separates them from all, and
places them in a situation which soon breaks their courage and sours their
hearts. If, then, a couple married in this manner are first unhappy and
afterwards criminal, it ought not to be attributed to the freedom of their
choice, but rather to their living in a community in which this freedom of
choice is not admitted.
Moreover it should not be forgotten that the same effort which makes a
man violently shake off a prevailing error, commonly impels him beyond
the bounds of reason; that, to dare to declare war, in however just a cause,
against the opinion of one's age and country, a violent and adventurous
spirit is required, and that men of this character seldom arrive at happiness
or virtue, whatever be the path they follow. And this, it may be observed by
the way, is the reason why in the most necessary and righteous revolutions,
it is so rare to meet with virtuous or moderate revolutionary characters.
There is then no just ground for surprise if a man, who in an age of
aristocracy chooses to consult nothing but his own opinion and his own
taste in the choice of a wife, soon finds that infractions of morality and
domestic wretchedness invade his household: but when this same line of
action is in the natural and ordinary course of things, when it is sanctioned
by parental authority and backed by public opinion, it cannot be doubted
that the internal peace of families will be increased by it, and conjugal
fidelity more rigidly observed.
Almost all men in democracies are engaged in public or professional life;
and on the other hand the limited extent of common incomes obliges a wife
to confine herself to the house, in order to watch in person and very closely
over the details of domestic economy. All these distinct and compulsory
occupations are so many natural barriers, which, by keeping the two sexes
asunder, render the solicitations of the one less frequent and less ardent—
the resistance of the other more easy.
Not indeed that the equality of conditions can ever succeed in making
men chaste, but it may impart a less dangerous character to their breaches
of morality. As no one has then either sufficient time or opportunity to assail
a virtue armed in self-defence, there will be at the same time a great number
of courtesans and a great number of virtuous women. This state of things
causes lamentable cases of individual hardship, but it does not prevent the
body of society from being strong and alert: it does not destroy family ties,

or enervate the morals of the nation. Society is endangered not by the great
profligacy of a few, but by laxity of morals amongst all. In the eyes of a
legislator, prostitution is less to be dreaded than intrigue.
The tumultuous and constantly harassed life which equality makes men
lead, not only distracts them from the passion of love, by denying them time
to indulge in it, but it diverts them from it by another more secret but more
certain road. All men who live in democratic ages more or less contract the
ways of thinking of the manufacturing and trading classes; their minds take
a serious, deliberate, and positive turn; they are apt to relinquish the ideal,
in order to pursue some visible and proximate object, which appears to be
the natural and necessary aim of their desires. Thus the principle of equality
does not destroy the imagination, but lowers its flight to the level of the
earth. No men are less addicted to reverie than the citizens of a democracy;
and few of them are ever known to give way to those idle and solitary
meditations which commonly precede and produce the great emotions of
the heart. It is true they attach great importance to procuring for themselves
that sort of deep, regular, and quiet affection which constitutes the charm
and safeguard of life, but they are not apt to run after those violent and
capricious sources of excitement which disturb and abridge it.
I am aware that all this is only applicable in its full extent to America,
and cannot at present be extended to Europe. In the course of the last half-
century, whilst laws and customs have impelled several European nations
with unexampled force towards democracy, we have not had occasion to
observe that the relations of man and woman have become more orderly or
more chaste. In some places the very reverse may be detected: some classes
are more strict—the general morality of the people appears to be more lax. I
do not hesitate to make the remark, for I am as little disposed to flatter my
contemporaries as to malign them. This fact must distress, but it ought not
to surprise us. The propitious influence which a democratic state of society
may exercise upon orderly habits, is one of those tendencies which can only
be discovered after a time. If the equality of conditions is favorable to
purity of morals, the social commotion by which conditions are rendered
equal is adverse to it. In the last fifty years, during which France has been
undergoing this transformation, that country has rarely had freedom, always
disturbance. Amidst this universal confusion of notions and this general stir
of opinions—amidst this incoherent mixture of the just and unjust, of truth
and falsehood, of right and might—public virtue has become doubtful, and

private morality wavering. But all revolutions, whatever may have been
their object or their agents, have at first produced similar consequences;
even those which have in the end drawn the bonds of morality more tightly
began by loosening them. The violations of morality which the French
frequently witness do not appear to me to have a permanent character; and
this is already betokened by some curious signs of the times.
Nothing is more wretchedly corrupt than an aristocracy which retains its
wealth when it has lost its power, and which still enjoys a vast deal of
leisure after it is reduced to mere vulgar pastimes. The energetic passions
and great conceptions which animated it heretofore, leave it then; and
nothing remains to it but a host of petty consuming vices, which cling about
it like worms upon a carcass. No one denies that the French aristocracy of
the last century was extremely dissolute; whereas established habits and
ancient belief still preserved some respect for morality amongst the other
classes of society. Nor will it be contested that at the present day the
remnants of that same aristocracy exhibit a certain severity of morals;
whilst laxity of morals appears to have spread amongst the middle and
lower ranks. So that the same families which were most profligate fifty
years ago are nowadays the most exemplary, and democracy seems only to
have strengthened the morality of the aristocratic classes. The French
Revolution, by dividing the fortunes of the nobility, by forcing them to
attend assiduously to their affairs and to their families, by making them live
under the same roof with their children, and in short by giving a more
rational and serious turn to their minds, has imparted to them, almost
without their being aware of it, a reverence for religious belief, a love of
order, of tranquil pleasures, of domestic endearments, and of comfort;
whereas the rest of the nation, which had naturally these same tastes, was
carried away into excesses by the effort which was required to overthrow
the laws and political habits of the country. The old French aristocracy has
undergone the consequences of the Revolution, but it neither felt the
revolutionary passions nor shared in the anarchical excitement which
produced that crisis; it may easily be conceived that this aristocracy feels
the salutary influence of the Revolution in its manners, before those who
achieve it. It may therefore be said, though at first it seems paradoxical,
that, at the present day, the most anti-democratic classes of the nation
principally exhibit the kind of morality which may reasonably be
anticipated from democracy. I cannot but think that when we shall have

obtained all the effects of this democratic Revolution, after having got rid of
the tumult it has caused, the observations which are now only applicable to
the few will gradually become true of the whole community.

Chapter XII: How The Americans Understand
The Equality Of The Sexes
I Have shown how democracy destroys or modifies the different
inequalities which originate in society; but is this all? or does it not
ultimately affect that great inequality of man and woman which has seemed,
up to the present day, to be eternally based in human nature? I believe that
the social changes which bring nearer to the same level the father and son,
the master and servant, and superiors and inferiors generally speaking, will
raise woman and make her more and more the equal of man. But here, more
than ever, I feel the necessity of making myself clearly understood; for there
is no subject on which the coarse and lawless fancies of our age have taken
a freer range.
There are people in Europe who, confounding together the different
characteristics of the sexes, would make of man and woman beings not only
equal but alike. They would give to both the same functions, impose on
both the same duties, and grant to both the same rights; they would mix
them in all things—their occupations, their pleasures, their business. It may
readily be conceived, that by thus attempting to make one sex equal to the
other, both are degraded; and from so preposterous a medley of the works
of nature nothing could ever result but weak men and disorderly women. It
is not thus that the Americans understand that species of democratic
equality which may be established between the sexes. They admit, that as
nature has appointed such wide differences between the physical and moral
constitution of man and woman, her manifest design was to give a distinct
employment to their various faculties; and they hold that improvement does
not consist in making beings so dissimilar do pretty nearly the same things,
but in getting each of them to fulfil their respective tasks in the best
possible manner. The Americans have applied to the sexes the great
principle of political economy which governs the manufactures of our age,
by carefully dividing the duties of man from those of woman, in order that
the great work of society may be the better carried on.

In no country has such constant care been taken as in America to trace
two clearly distinct lines of action for the two sexes, and to make them keep
pace one with the other, but in two pathways which are always different.
American women never manage the outward concerns of the family, or
conduct a business, or take a part in political life; nor are they, on the other
hand, ever compelled to perform the rough labor of the fields, or to make
any of those laborious exertions which demand the exertion of physical
strength. No families are so poor as to form an exception to this rule. If on
the one hand an American woman cannot escape from the quiet circle of
domestic employments, on the other hand she is never forced to go beyond
it. Hence it is that the women of America, who often exhibit a masculine
strength of understanding and a manly energy, generally preserve great
delicacy of personal appearance and always retain the manners of women,
although they sometimes show that they have the hearts and minds of men.
Nor have the Americans ever supposed that one consequence of
democratic principles is the subversion of marital power, of the confusion
of the natural authorities in families. They hold that every association must
have a head in order to accomplish its object, and that the natural head of
the conjugal association is man. They do not therefore deny him the right of
directing his partner; and they maintain, that in the smaller association of
husband and wife, as well as in the great social community, the object of
democracy is to regulate and legalize the powers which are necessary, not to
subvert all power. This opinion is not peculiar to one sex, and contested by
the other: I never observed that the women of America consider conjugal
authority as a fortunate usurpation of their rights, nor that they thought
themselves degraded by submitting to it. It appeared to me, on the contrary,
that they attach a sort of pride to the voluntary surrender of their own will,
and make it their boast to bend themselves to the yoke, not to shake it off.
Such at least is the feeling expressed by the most virtuous of their sex; the
others are silent; and in the United States it is not the practice for a guilty
wife to clamor for the rights of women, whilst she is trampling on her
holiest duties.
It has often been remarked that in Europe a certain degree of contempt
lurks even in the flattery which men lavish upon women: although a
European frequently affects to be the slave of woman, it may be seen that
he never sincerely thinks her his equal. In the United States men seldom
compliment women, but they daily show how much they esteem them.

They constantly display an entire confidence in the understanding of a wife,
and a profound respect for her freedom; they have decided that her mind is
just as fitted as that of a man to discover the plain truth, and her heart as
firm to embrace it; and they have never sought to place her virtue, any more
than his, under the shelter of prejudice, ignorance, and fear. It would seem
that in Europe, where man so easily submits to the despotic sway of
women, they are nevertheless curtailed of some of the greatest qualities of
the human species, and considered as seductive but imperfect beings; and
(what may well provoke astonishment) women ultimately look upon
themselves in the same light, and almost consider it as a privilege that they
are entitled to show themselves futile, feeble, and timid. The women of
America claim no such privileges.
Again, it may be said that in our morals we have reserved strange
immunities to man; so that there is, as it were, one virtue for his use, and
another for the guidance of his partner; and that, according to the opinion of
the public, the very same act may be punished alternately as a crime or only
as a fault. The Americans know not this iniquitous division of duties and
rights; amongst them the seducer is as much dishonored as his victim. It is
true that the Americans rarely lavish upon women those eager attentions
which are commonly paid them in Europe; but their conduct to women
always implies that they suppose them to be virtuous and refined; and such
is the respect entertained for the moral freedom of the sex, that in the
presence of a woman the most guarded language is used, lest her ear should
be offended by an expression. In America a young unmarried woman may,
alone and without fear, undertake a long journey.
The legislators of the United States, who have mitigated almost all the
penalties of criminal law, still make rape a capital offence, and no crime is
visited with more inexorable severity by public opinion. This may be
accounted for; as the Americans can conceive nothing more precious than a
woman's honor, and nothing which ought so much to be respected as her
independence, they hold that no punishment is too severe for the man who
deprives her of them against her will. In France, where the same offence is
visited with far milder penalties, it is frequently difficult to get a verdict
from a jury against the prisoner. Is this a consequence of contempt of
decency or contempt of women? I cannot but believe that it is a contempt of
one and of the other.

Thus the Americans do not think that man and woman have either the
duty or the right to perform the same offices, but they show an equal regard
for both their respective parts; and though their lot is different, they
consider both of them as beings of equal value. They do not give to the
courage of woman the same form or the same direction as to that of man;
but they never doubt her courage: and if they hold that man and his partner
ought not always to exercise their intellect and understanding in the same
manner, they at least believe the understanding of the one to be as sound as
that of the other, and her intellect to be as clear. Thus, then, whilst they have
allowed the social inferiority of woman to subsist, they have done all they
could to raise her morally and intellectually to the level of man; and in this
respect they appear to me to have excellently understood the true principle
of democratic improvement. As for myself, I do not hesitate to avow that,
although the women of the United States are confined within the narrow
circle of domestic life, and their situation is in some respects one of extreme
dependence, I have nowhere seen woman occupying a loftier position; and
if I were asked, now that I am drawing to the close of this work, in which I
have spoken of so many important things done by the Americans, to what
the singular prosperity and growing strength of that people ought mainly to
be attributed, I should reply—to the superiority of their women.

Chapter XIII: That The Principle Of Equality
Naturally Divides The Americans Into A Number
Of Small Private Circles
It may probably be supposed that the final consequence and necessary
effect of democratic institutions is to confound together all the members of
the community in private as well as in public life, and to compel them all to
live in common; but this would be to ascribe a very coarse and oppressive
form to the equality which originates in democracy. No state of society or
laws can render men so much alike, but that education, fortune, and tastes
will interpose some differences between them; and, though different men
may sometimes find it their interest to combine for the same purposes, they
will never make it their pleasure. They will therefore always tend to evade
the provisions of legislation, whatever they may be; and departing in some
one respect from the circle within which they were to be bounded, they will
set up, close by the great political community, small private circles, united
together by the similitude of their conditions, habits, and manners.
In the United States the citizens have no sort of pre-eminence over each
other; they owe each other no mutual obedience or respect; they all meet for
the administration of justice, for the government of the State, and in general
to treat of the affairs which concern their common welfare; but I never
heard that attempts have been made to bring them all to follow the same
diversions, or to amuse themselves promiscuously in the same places of
recreation. The Americans, who mingle so readily in their political
assemblies and courts of justice, are wont on the contrary carefully to
separate into small distinct circles, in order to indulge by themselves in the
enjoyments of private life. Each of them is willing to acknowledge all his
fellow-citizens as his equals, but he will only receive a very limited number
of them amongst his friends or his guests. This appears to me to be very
natural. In proportion as the circle of public society is extended, it may be
anticipated that the sphere of private intercourse will be contracted; far from
supposing that the members of modern society will ultimately live in

common, I am afraid that they may end by forming nothing but small
coteries.
Amongst aristocratic nations the different classes are like vast chambers,
out of which it is impossible to get, into which it is impossible to enter.
These classes have no communication with each other, but within their pale
men necessarily live in daily contact; even though they would not naturally
suit, the general conformity of a similar condition brings them nearer
together. But when neither law nor custom professes to establish frequent
and habitual relations between certain men, their intercourse originates in
the accidental analogy of opinions and tastes; hence private society is
infinitely varied. In democracies, where the members of the community
never differ much from each other, and naturally stand in such propinquity
that they may all at any time be confounded in one general mass, numerous
artificial and arbitrary distinctions spring up, by means of which every man
hopes to keep himself aloof, lest he should be carried away in the crowd
against his will. This can never fail to be the case; for human institutions
may be changed, but not man: whatever may be the general endeavor of a
community to render its members equal and alike, the personal pride of
individuals will always seek to rise above the line, and to form somewhere
an inequality to their own advantage.
In aristocracies men are separated from each other by lofty stationary
barriers; in democracies they are divided by a number of small and almost
invisible threads, which are constantly broken or moved from place to
place. Thus, whatever may be the progress of equality, in democratic
nations a great number of small private communities will always be formed
within the general pale of political society; but none of them will bear any
resemblance in its manners to the highest class in aristocracies.

Chapter XIV: Some Reflections On American
Manners
Nothing seems at first sight less important than the outward form of
human actions, yet there is nothing upon which men set more store: they
grow used to everything except to living in a society which has not their
own manners. The influence of the social and political state of a country
upon manners is therefore deserving of serious examination. Manners are,
generally, the product of the very basis of the character of a people, but they
are also sometimes the result of an arbitrary convention between certain
men; thus they are at once natural and acquired. When certain men perceive
that they are the foremost persons in society, without contestation and
without effort—when they are constantly engaged on large objects, leaving
the more minute details to others—and when they live in the enjoyment of
wealth which they did not amass and which they do not fear to lose, it may
be supposed that they feel a kind of haughty disdain of the petty interests
and practical cares of life, and that their thoughts assume a natural
greatness, which their language and their manners denote. In democratic
countries manners are generally devoid of dignity, because private life is
there extremely petty in its character; and they are frequently low, because
the mind has few opportunities of rising above the engrossing cares of
domestic interests. True dignity in manners consists in always taking one's
proper station, neither too high nor too low; and this is as much within the
reach of a peasant as of a prince. In democracies all stations appear
doubtful; hence it is that the manners of democracies, though often full of
arrogance, are commonly wanting in dignity, and, moreover, they are never
either well disciplined or accomplished.
The men who live in democracies are too fluctuating for a certain number
of them ever to succeed in laying down a code of good breeding, and in
forcing people to follow it. Every man therefore behaves after his own
fashion, and there is always a certain incoherence in the manners of such
times, because they are moulded upon the feelings and notions of each
individual, rather than upon an ideal model proposed for general imitation.
This, however, is much more perceptible at the time when an aristocracy

has just been overthrown than after it has long been destroyed. New
political institutions and new social elements then bring to the same places
of resort, and frequently compel to live in common, men whose education
and habits are still amazingly dissimilar, and this renders the motley
composition of society peculiarly visible. The existence of a former strict
code of good breeding is still remembered, but what it contained or where it
is to be found is already forgotten. Men have lost the common law of
manners, and they have not yet made up their minds to do without it; but
everyone endeavors to make to himself some sort of arbitrary and variable
rule, from the remnant of former usages; so that manners have neither the
regularity and the dignity which they often display amongst aristocratic
nations, nor the simplicity and freedom which they sometimes assume in
democracies; they are at once constrained and without constraint.
This, however, is not the normal state of things. When the equality of
conditions is long established and complete, as all men entertain nearly the
same notions and do nearly the same things, they do not require to agree or
to copy from one another in order to speak or act in the same manner: their
manners are constantly characterized by a number of lesser diversities, but
not by any great differences. They are never perfectly alike, because they do
not copy from the same pattern; they are never very unlike, because their
social condition is the same. At first sight a traveller would observe that the
manners of all the Americans are exactly similar; it is only upon close
examination that the peculiarities in which they differ may be detected.
The English make game of the manners of the Americans; but it is
singular that most of the writers who have drawn these ludicrous
delineations belonged themselves to the middle classes in England, to
whom the same delineations are exceedingly applicable: so that these
pitiless censors for the most part furnish an example of the very thing they
blame in the United States; they do not perceive that they are deriding
themselves, to the great amusement of the aristocracy of their own country.
Nothing is more prejudicial to democracy than its outward forms of
behavior: many men would willingly endure its vices, who cannot support
its manners. I cannot, however, admit that there is nothing commendable in
the manners of a democratic people. Amongst aristocratic nations, all who
live within reach of the first class in society commonly strain to be like it,
which gives rise to ridiculous and insipid imitations. As a democratic

people does not possess any models of high breeding, at least it escapes the
daily necessity of seeing wretched copies of them. In democracies manners
are never so refined as amongst aristocratic nations, but on the other hand
they are never so coarse. Neither the coarse oaths of the populace, nor the
elegant and choice expressions of the nobility are to be heard there: the
manners of such a people are often vulgar, but they are neither brutal nor
mean. I have already observed that in democracies no such thing as a
regular code of good breeding can be laid down; this has some
inconveniences and some advantages. In aristocracies the rules of propriety
impose the same demeanor on everyone; they make all the members of the
same class appear alike, in spite of their private inclinations; they adorn and
they conceal the natural man. Amongst a democratic people manners are
neither so tutored nor so uniform, but they are frequently more sincere.
They form, as it were, a light and loosely woven veil, through which the
real feelings and private opinions of each individual are easily discernible.
The form and the substance of human actions often, therefore, stand in
closer relation; and if the great picture of human life be less embellished, it
is more true. Thus it may be said, in one sense, that the effect of democracy
is not exactly to give men any particular manners, but to prevent them from
having manners at all.
The feelings, the passions, the virtues, and the vices of an aristocracy
may sometimes reappear in a democracy, but not its manners; they are lost,
and vanish forever, as soon as the democratic revolution is completed. It
would seem that nothing is more lasting than the manners of an aristocratic
class, for they are preserved by that class for some time after it has lost its
wealth and its power—nor so fleeting, for no sooner have they disappeared
than not a trace of them is to be found; and it is scarcely possible to say
what they have been as soon as they have ceased to be. A change in the state
of society works this miracle, and a few generations suffice to consummate
it. The principal characteristics of aristocracy are handed down by history
after an aristocracy is destroyed, but the light and exquisite touches of
manners are effaced from men's memories almost immediately after its fall.
Men can no longer conceive what these manners were when they have
ceased to witness them; they are gone, and their departure was unseen,
unfelt; for in order to feel that refined enjoyment which is derived from
choice and distinguished manners, habit and education must have prepared
the heart, and the taste for them is lost almost as easily as the practice of

them. Thus not only a democratic people cannot have aristocratic manners,
but they neither comprehend nor desire them; and as they never have
thought of them, it is to their minds as if such things had never been. Too
much importance should not be attached to this loss, but it may well be
regretted.
I am aware that it has not unfrequently happened that the same men have
had very high-bred manners and very low-born feelings: the interior of
courts has sufficiently shown what imposing externals may conceal the
meanest hearts. But though the manners of aristocracy did not constitute
virtue, they sometimes embellish virtue itself. It was no ordinary sight to
see a numerous and powerful class of men, whose every outward action
seemed constantly to be dictated by a natural elevation of thought and
feeling, by delicacy and regularity of taste, and by urbanity of manners.
Those manners threw a pleasing illusory charm over human nature; and
though the picture was often a false one, it could not be viewed without a
noble satisfaction.

Chapter XV: Of The Gravity Of The Americans,
And Why It Does Not Prevent Them From Often
Committing Inconsiderate Actions
Men who live in democratic countries do not value the simple, turbulent,
or coarse diversions in which the people indulge in aristocratic
communities: such diversions are thought by them to be puerile or insipid.
Nor have they a greater inclination for the intellectual and refined
amusements of the aristocratic classes. They want something productive
and substantial in their pleasures; they want to mix actual fruition with their
joy. In aristocratic communities the people readily give themselves up to
bursts of tumultuous and boisterous gayety, which shake off at once the
recollection of their privations: the natives of democracies are not fond of
being thus violently broken in upon, and they never lose sight of their own
selves without regret. They prefer to these frivolous delights those more
serious and silent amusements which are like business, and which do not
drive business wholly from their minds. An American, instead of going in a
leisure hour to dance merrily at some place of public resort, as the fellows
of his calling continue to do throughout the greater part of Europe, shuts
himself up at home to drink. He thus enjoys two pleasures; he can go on
thinking of his business, and he can get drunk decently by his own fireside.
I thought that the English constituted the most serious nation on the face
of the earth, but I have since seen the Americans and have changed my
opinion. I do not mean to say that temperament has not a great deal to do
with the character of the inhabitants of the United States, but I think that
their political institutions are a still more influential cause. I believe the
seriousness of the Americans arises partly from their pride. In democratic
countries even poor men entertain a lofty notion of their personal
importance: they look upon themselves with complacency, and are apt to
suppose that others are looking at them, too. With this disposition they
watch their language and their actions with care, and do not lay themselves
open so as to betray their deficiencies; to preserve their dignity they think it
necessary to retain their gravity.

But I detect another more deep-seated and powerful cause which
instinctively produces amongst the Americans this astonishing gravity.
Under a despotism communities give way at times to bursts of vehement
joy; but they are generally gloomy and moody, because they are afraid.
Under absolute monarchies tempered by the customs and manners of the
country, their spirits are often cheerful and even, because as they have some
freedom and a good deal of security, they are exempted from the most
important cares of life; but all free peoples are serious, because their minds
are habitually absorbed by the contemplation of some dangerous or difficult
purpose. This is more especially the case amongst those free nations which
form democratic communities. Then there are in all classes a very large
number of men constantly occupied with the serious affairs of the
government; and those whose thoughts are not engaged in the direction of
the commonwealth are wholly engrossed by the acquisition of a private
fortune. Amongst such a people a serious demeanor ceases to be peculiar to
certain men, and becomes a habit of the nation.
We are told of small democracies in the days of antiquity, in which the
citizens met upon the public places with garlands of roses, and spent almost
all their time in dancing and theatrical amusements. I do not believe in such
republics any more than in that of Plato; or, if the things we read of really
happened, I do not hesitate to affirm that these supposed democracies were
composed of very different elements from ours, and that they had nothing in
common with the latter except their name. But it must not be supposed that,
in the midst of all their toils, the people who live in democracies think
themselves to be pitied; the contrary is remarked to be the case. No men are
fonder of their own condition. Life would have no relish for them if they
were delivered from the anxieties which harass them, and they show more
attachment to their cares than aristocratic nations to their pleasures.
I am next led to inquire how it is that these same democratic nations,
which are so serious, sometimes act in so inconsiderate a manner. The
Americans, who almost always preserve a staid demeanor and a frigid air,
nevertheless frequently allow themselves to be borne away, far beyond the
bound of reason, by a sudden passion or a hasty opinion, and they
sometimes gravely commit strange absurdities. This contrast ought not to
surprise us. There is one sort of ignorance which originates in extreme
publicity. In despotic States men know not how to act, because they are told
nothing; in democratic nations they often act at random, because nothing is

to be left untold. The former do not know—the latter forget; and the chief
features of each picture are lost to them in a bewilderment of details.
It is astonishing what imprudent language a public man may sometimes
use in free countries, and especially in democratic States, without being
compromised; whereas in absolute monarchies a few words dropped by
accident are enough to unmask him forever, and ruin him without hope of
redemption. This is explained by what goes before. When a man speaks in
the midst of a great crowd, many of his words are not heard, or are
forthwith obliterated from the memories of those who hear them; but amidst
the silence of a mute and motionless throng the slightest whisper strikes the
ear.
In democracies men are never stationary; a thousand chances waft them
to and fro, and their life is always the sport of unforeseen or (so to speak)
extemporaneous circumstances. Thus they are often obliged to do things
which they have imperfectly learned, to say things they imperfectly
understand, and to devote themselves to work for which they are
unprepared by long apprenticeship. In aristocracies every man has one sole
object which he unceasingly pursues, but amongst democratic nations the
existence of man is more complex; the same mind will almost always
embrace several objects at the same time, and these objects are frequently
wholly foreign to each other: as it cannot know them all well, the mind is
readily satisfied with imperfect notions of each.
When the inhabitant of democracies is not urged by his wants, he is so at
least by his desires; for of all the possessions which he sees around him,
none are wholly beyond his reach. He therefore does everything in a hurry,
he is always satisfied with "pretty well," and never pauses more than an
instant to consider what he has been doing. His curiosity is at once
insatiable and cheaply satisfied; for he cares more to know a great deal
quickly than to know anything well: he has no time and but little taste to
search things to the bottom. Thus then democratic peoples are grave,
because their social and political condition constantly leads them to engage
in serious occupations; and they act inconsiderately, because they give but
little time and attention to each of these occupations. The habit of
inattention must be considered as the greatest bane of the democratic
character.

Chapter XVI: Why The National Vanity Of The
Americans Is More Restless And Captious Than
That Of The English
All free nations are vainglorious, but national pride is not displayed by all
in the same manner. The Americans in their intercourse with strangers
appear impatient of the smallest censure and insatiable of praise. The most
slender eulogium is acceptable to them; the most exalted seldom contents
them; they unceasingly harass you to extort praise, and if you resist their
entreaties they fall to praising themselves. It would seem as if, doubting
their own merit, they wished to have it constantly exhibited before their
eyes. Their vanity is not only greedy, but restless and jealous; it will grant
nothing, whilst it demands everything, but is ready to beg and to quarrel at
the same time. If I say to an American that the country he lives in is a fine
one, "Ay," he replies, "there is not its fellow in the world." If I applaud the
freedom which its inhabitants enjoy, he answers, "Freedom is a fine thing,
but few nations are worthy to enjoy it." If I remark the purity of morals
which distinguishes the United States, "I can imagine," says he, "that a
stranger, who has been struck by the corruption of all other nations, is
astonished at the difference." At length I leave him to the contemplation of
himself; but he returns to the charge, and does not desist till he has got me
to repeat all I had just been saying. It is impossible to conceive a more
troublesome or more garrulous patriotism; it wearies even those who are
disposed to respect it. *a
a
[ See Appendix U.]
Such is not the case with the English. An Englishman calmly enjoys the
real or imaginary advantages which in his opinion his country possesses. If
he grants nothing to other nations, neither does he solicit anything for his
own. The censure of foreigners does not affect him, and their praise hardly
flatters him; his position with regard to the rest of the world is one of
disdainful and ignorant reserve: his pride requires no sustenance, it
nourishes itself. It is remarkable that two nations, so recently sprung from

the same stock, should be so opposite to one another in their manner of
feeling and conversing.
In aristocratic countries the great possess immense privileges, upon
which their pride rests, without seeking to rely upon the lesser advantages
which accrue to them. As these privileges came to them by inheritance, they
regard them in some sort as a portion of themselves, or at least as a natural
right inherent in their own persons. They therefore entertain a calm sense of
their superiority; they do not dream of vaunting privileges which everyone
perceives and no one contests, and these things are not sufficiently new to
them to be made topics of conversation. They stand unmoved in their
solitary greatness, well assured that they are seen of all the world without
any effort to show themselves off, and that no one will attempt to drive
them from that position. When an aristocracy carries on the public affairs,
its national pride naturally assumes this reserved, indifferent, and haughty
form, which is imitated by all the other classes of the nation.
When, on the contrary, social conditions differ but little, the slightest
privileges are of some importance; as every man sees around himself a
million of people enjoying precisely similar or analogous advantages, his
pride becomes craving and jealous, he clings to mere trifles, and doggedly
defends them. In democracies, as the conditions of life are very fluctuating,
men have almost always recently acquired the advantages which they
possess; the consequence is that they feel extreme pleasure in exhibiting
them, to show others and convince themselves that they really enjoy them.
As at any instant these same advantages may be lost, their possessors are
constantly on the alert, and make a point of showing that they still retain
them. Men living in democracies love their country just as they love
themselves, and they transfer the habits of their private vanity to their
vanity as a nation. The restless and insatiable vanity of a democratic people
originates so entirely in the equality and precariousness of social conditions,
that the members of the haughtiest nobility display the very same passion in
those lesser portions of their existence in which there is anything fluctuating
or contested. An aristocratic class always differs greatly from the other
classes of the nation, by the extent and perpetuity of its privileges; but it
often happens that the only differences between the members who belong to
it consist in small transient advantages, which may any day be lost or
acquired. The members of a powerful aristocracy, collected in a capital or a
court, have been known to contest with virulence those frivolous privileges

which depend on the caprice of fashion or the will of their master. These
persons then displayed towards each other precisely the same puerile
jealousies which animate the men of democracies, the same eagerness to
snatch the smallest advantages which their equals contested, and the same
desire to parade ostentatiously those of which they were in possession. If
national pride ever entered into the minds of courtiers, I do not question that
they would display it in the same manner as the members of a democratic
community.

Chapter XVII: That The Aspect Of Society In The
United States Is At Once Excited And Monotonous
It would seem that nothing can be more adapted to stimulate and to feed
curiosity than the aspect of the United States. Fortunes, opinions, and laws
are there in ceaseless variation: it is as if immutable nature herself were
mutable, such are the changes worked upon her by the hand of man. Yet in
the end the sight of this excited community becomes monotonous, and after
having watched the moving pageant for a time the spectator is tired of it.
Amongst aristocratic nations every man is pretty nearly stationary in his
own sphere; but men are astonishingly unlike each other—their passions,
their notions, their habits, and their tastes are essentially different: nothing
changey, but everything differs. In democracies, on the contrary, all men are
alike and do things pretty nearly alike. It is true that they are subject to great
and frequent vicissitudes; but as the same events of good or adverse fortune
are continually recurring, the name of the actors only is changed, the piece
is always the same. The aspect of American society is animated, because
men and things are always changing; but it is monotonous, because all these
changes are alike.
Men living in democratic ages have many passions, but most of their
passions either end in the love of riches or proceed from it. The cause of
this is, not that their souls are narrower, but that the importance of money is
really greater at such times. When all the members of a community are
independent of or indifferent to each other, the co-operation of each of them
can only be obtained by paying for it: this infinitely multiplies the purposes
to which wealth may be applied, and increases its value. When the
reverence which belonged to what is old has vanished, birth, condition, and
profession no longer distinguish men, or scarcely distinguish them at all:
hardly anything but money remains to create strongly marked differences
between them, and to raise some of them above the common level. The
distinction originating in wealth is increased by the disappearance and
diminution of all other distinctions. Amongst aristocratic nations money
only reaches to a few points on the vast circle of man's desires—in
democracies it seems to lead to all. The love of wealth is therefore to be

traced, either as a principal or an accessory motive, at the bottom of all that
the Americans do: this gives to all their passions a sort of family likeness,
and soon renders the survey of them exceedingly wearisome. This perpetual
recurrence of the same passion is monotonous; the peculiar methods by
which this passion seeks its own gratification are no less so.
In an orderly and constituted democracy like the United States, where
men cannot enrich themselves by war, by public office, or by political
confiscation, the love of wealth mainly drives them into business and
manufactures. Although these pursuits often bring about great commotions
and disasters, they cannot prosper without strictly regular habits and a long
routine of petty uniform acts. The stronger the passion is, the more regular
are these habits, and the more uniform are these acts. It may be said that it
is the vehemence of their desires which makes the Americans so
methodical; it perturbs their minds, but it disciplines their lives.
The remark I here apply to America may indeed be addressed to almost
all our contemporaries. Variety is disappearing from the human race; the
same ways of acting, thinking, and feeling are to be met with all over the
world. This is not only because nations work more upon each other, and are
more faithful in their mutual imitation; but as the men of each country
relinquish more and more the peculiar opinions and feelings of a caste, a
profession, or a family, they simultaneously arrive at something nearer to
the constitution of man, which is everywhere the same. Thus they become
more alike, even without having imitated each other. Like travellers
scattered about some large wood, which is intersected by paths converging
to one point, if all of them keep, their eyes fixed upon that point and
advance towards it, they insensibly draw nearer together—though they seek
not, though they see not, though they know not each other; and they will be
surprised at length to find themselves all collected on the same spot. All the
nations which take, not any particular man, but man himself, as the object
of their researches and their imitations, are tending in the end to a similar
state of society, like these travellers converging to the central plot of the
forest.

Chapter XVIII: Of Honor In The United States
And In Democratic Communities
It would seem that men employ two very distinct methods in the public
estimation *a of the actions of their fellowmen; at one time they judge them
by those simple notions of right and wrong which are diffused all over the
world; at another they refer their decision to a few very special notions
which belong exclusively to some particular age and country. It often
happens that these two rules differ; they sometimes conflict: but they are
never either entirely identified or entirely annulled by one another. Honor,
at the periods of its greatest power, sways the will more than the belief of
men; and even whilst they yield without hesitation and without a murmur to
its dictates, they feel notwithstanding, by a dim but mighty instinct, the
existence of a more general, more ancient, and more holy law, which they
sometimes disobey although they cease not to acknowledge it. Some actions
have been held to be at the same time virtuous and dishonorable—a refusal
to fight a duel is a case in point.
a
[ The word "honor" is not always used in the same sense
either in French or English. I. It first signifies the dignity,
glory, or reverence which a man receives from his kind; and
in this sense a man is said to acquire honor. 2. Honor
signifies the aggregate of those rules by the assistance of
which this dignity, glory, or reverence is obtained. Thus we
say that a man has always strictly obeyed the laws of honor;
or a man has violated his honor. In this chapter the word is
always used in the latter sense.]
I think these peculiarities may be otherwise explained than by the mere
caprices of certain individuals and nations, as has hitherto been the
customary mode of reasoning on the subject. Mankind is subject to general
and lasting wants that have engendered moral laws, to the neglect of which
men have ever and in all places attached the notion of censure and shame:
to infringe them was "to do ill"—"to do well" was to conform to them.
Within the bosom of this vast association of the human race, lesser
associations have been formed which are called nations; and amidst these
nations further subdivisions have assumed the names of classes or castes.

Each of these associations forms, as it were, a separate species of the human
race; and though it has no essential difference from the mass of mankind, to
a certain extent it stands apart and has certain wants peculiar to itself. To
these special wants must be attributed the modifications which affect in
various degrees and in different countries the mode of considering human
actions, and the estimate which ought to be formed of them. It is the general
and permanent interest of mankind that men should not kill each other: but
it may happen to be the peculiar and temporary interest of a people or a
class to justify, or even to honor, homicide.
Honor is simply that peculiar rule, founded upon a peculiar state of
society, by the application of which a people or a class allot praise or blame.
Nothing is more unproductive to the mind than an abstract idea; I therefore
hasten to call in the aid of facts and examples to illustrate my meaning.
I select the most extraordinary kind of honor which was ever known in
the world, and that which we are best acquainted with, viz., aristocratic
honor springing out of feudal society. I shall explain it by means of the
principle already laid down, and I shall explain the principle by means of
the illustration. I am not here led to inquire when and how the aristocracy of
the Middle Ages came into existence, why it was so deeply severed from
the remainder of the nation, or what founded and consolidated its power. I
take its existence as an established fact, and I am endeavoring to account
for the peculiar view which it took of the greater part of human actions. The
first thing that strikes me is, that in the feudal world actions were not
always praised or blamed with reference to their intrinsic worth, but that
they were sometimes appreciated exclusively with reference to the person
who was the actor or the object of them, which is repugnant to the general
conscience of mankind. Thus some of the actions which were indifferent on
the part of a man in humble life, dishonored a noble; others changed their
whole character according as the person aggrieved by them belonged or did
not belong to the aristocracy. When these different notions first arose, the
nobility formed a distinct body amidst the people, which it commanded
from the inaccessible heights where it was ensconced. To maintain this
peculiar position, which constituted its strength, it not only required
political privileges, but it required a standard of right and wrong for its own
especial use. That some particular virtue or vice belonged to the nobility
rather than to the humble classes—that certain actions were guiltless when
they affected the villain, which were criminal when they touched the noble

—these were often arbitrary matters; but that honor or shame should be
attached to a man's actions according to his condition, was a result of the
internal constitution of an aristocratic community. This has been actually
the case in all the countries which have had an aristocracy; as long as a
trace of the principle remains, these peculiarities will still exist; to debauch
a woman of color scarcely injures the reputation of an American—to marry
her dishonors him.
In some cases feudal honor enjoined revenge, and stigmatized the
forgiveness of insults; in others it imperiously commanded men to conquer
their own passions, and imposed forgetfulness of self. It did not make
humanity or kindness its law, but it extolled generosity; it set more store on
liberality than on benevolence; it allowed men to enrich themselves by
gambling or by war, but not by labor; it preferred great crimes to small
earnings; cupidity was less distasteful to it than avarice; violence it often
sanctioned, but cunning and treachery it invariably reprobated as
contemptible. These fantastical notions did not proceed exclusively from
the caprices of those who entertained them. A class which has succeeded in
placing itself at the head of and above all others, and which makes
perpetual exertions to maintain this lofty position, must especially honor
those virtues which are conspicuous for their dignity and splendor, and
which may be easily combined with pride and the love of power. Such men
would not hesitate to invert the natural order of the conscience in order to
give those virtues precedence before all others. It may even be conceived
that some of the more bold and brilliant vices would readily be set above
the quiet, unpretending virtues. The very existence of such a class in society
renders these things unavoidable.
The nobles of the Middle Ages placed military courage foremost amongst
virtues, and in lieu of many of them. This was again a peculiar opinion
which arose necessarily from the peculiarity of the state of society. Feudal
aristocracy existed by war and for war; its power had been founded by
arms, and by arms that power was maintained; it therefore required nothing
more than military courage, and that quality was naturally exalted above all
others; whatever denoted it, even at the expense of reason and humanity,
was therefore approved and frequently enjoined by the manners of the time.
Such was the main principle; the caprice of man was only to be traced in
minuter details. That a man should regard a tap on the cheek as an
unbearable insult, and should be obliged to kill in single combat the person

who struck him thus lightly, is an arbitrary rule; but that a noble could not
tranquilly receive an insult, and was dishonored if he allowed himself to
take a blow without fighting, were direct consequences of the fundamental
principles and the wants of military aristocracy.
Thus it was true to a certain extent to assert that the laws of honor were
capricious; but these caprices of honor were always confined within certain
necessary limits. The peculiar rule, which was called honor by our
forefathers, is so far from being an arbitrary law in my eyes, that I would
readily engage to ascribe its most incoherent and fantastical injunctions to a
small number of fixed and invariable wants inherent in feudal society.
If I were to trace the notion of feudal honor into the domain of politics, I
should not find it more difficult to explain its dictates. The state of society
and the political institutions of the Middle Ages were such, that the supreme
power of the nation never governed the community directly. That power did
not exist in the eyes of the people: every man looked up to a certain
individual whom he was bound to obey; by that intermediate personage he
was connected with all the others. Thus in feudal society the whole system
of the commonwealth rested upon the sentiment of fidelity to the person of
the lord: to destroy that sentiment was to open the sluices of anarchy.
Fidelity to a political superior was, moreover, a sentiment of which all the
members of the aristocracy had constant opportunities of estimating the
importance; for every one of them was a vassal as well as a lord, and had to
command as well as to obey. To remain faithful to the lord, to sacrifice one's
self for him if called upon, to share his good or evil fortunes, to stand by
him in his undertakings whatever they might be—such were the first
injunctions of feudal honor in relation to the political institutions of those
times. The treachery of a vassal was branded with extraordinary severity by
public opinion, and a name of peculiar infamy was invented for the offence
which was called "felony."
On the contrary, few traces are to be found in the Middle Ages of the
passion which constituted the life of the nations of antiquity—I mean
patriotism; the word itself is not of very ancient date in the language. *b
Feudal institutions concealed the country at large from men's sight, and
rendered the love of it less necessary. The nation was forgotten in the
passions which attached men to persons. Hence it was no part of the strict
law of feudal honor to remain faithful to one's country. Not indeed that the

love of their country did not exist in the hearts of our forefathers; but it
constituted a dim and feeble instinct, which has grown more clear and
strong in proportion as aristocratic classes have been abolished, and the
supreme power of the nation centralized. This may be clearly seen from the
contrary judgments which European nations have passed upon the various
events of their histories, according to the generations by which such
judgments have been formed. The circumstance which most dishonored the
Constable de Bourbon in the eyes of his contemporaries was that he bore
arms against his king: that which most dishonors him in our eyes, is that he
made war against his country; we brand him as deeply as our forefathers
did, but for different reasons.
b
[ Even the word "patrie" was not used by the French writers
until the sixteenth century.]
I have chosen the honor of feudal times by way of illustration of my
meaning, because its characteristics are more distinctly marked and more
familiar to us than those of any other period; but I might have taken an
example elsewhere, and I should have reached the same conclusion by a
different road. Although we are less perfectly acquainted with the Romans
than with our own ancestors, yet we know that certain peculiar notions of
glory and disgrace obtained amongst them, which were not solely derived
from the general principles of right and wrong. Many human actions were
judged differently, according as they affected a Roman citizen or a stranger,
a freeman or a slave; certain vices were blazoned abroad, certain virtues
were extolled above all others. "In that age," says Plutarch in the life of
Coriolanus, "martial prowess was more honored and prized in Rome than
all the other virtues, insomuch that it was called virtus, the name of virtue
itself, by applying the name of the kind to this particular species; so that
virtue in Latin was as much as to say valor." Can anyone fail to recognize
the peculiar want of that singular community which was formed for the
conquest of the world?
Any nation would furnish us with similar grounds of observation; for, as
I have already remarked, whenever men collect together as a distinct
community, the notion of honor instantly grows up amongst them; that is to
say, a system of opinions peculiar to themselves as to what is blamable or
commendable; and these peculiar rules always originate in the special
habits and special interests of the community. This is applicable to a certain

extent to democratic communities as well as to others, as we shall now
proceed to prove by the example of the Americans. *c Some loose notions
of the old aristocratic honor of Europe are still to be found scattered
amongst the opinions of the Americans; but these traditional opinions are
few in number, they have but little root in the country, and but little power.
They are like a religion which has still some temples left standing, though
men have ceased to believe in it. But amidst these half-obliterated notions
of exotic honor, some new opinions have sprung up, which constitute what
may be termed in our days American honor. I have shown how the
Americans are constantly driven to engage in commerce and industry. Their
origin, their social condition, their political institutions, and even the spot
they inhabit, urge them irresistibly in this direction. Their present condition
is then that of an almost exclusively manufacturing and commercial
association, placed in the midst of a new and boundless country, which their
principal object is to explore for purposes of profit. This is the characteristic
which most peculiarly distinguishes the American people from all others at
the present time. All those quiet virtues which tend to give a regular
movement to the community, and to encourage business, will therefore be
held in peculiar honor by that people, and to neglect those virtues will be to
incur public contempt. All the more turbulent virtues, which often dazzle,
but more frequently disturb society, will on the contrary occupy a
subordinate rank in the estimation of this same people: they may be
neglected without forfeiting the esteem of the community—to acquire them
would perhaps be to run a risk of losing it.
c
[ I speak here of the Americans inhabiting those States
where slavery does not exist; they alone can be said to
present a complete picture of democratic society.]
The Americans make a no less arbitrary classification of men's vices.
There are certain propensities which appear censurable to the general
reason and the universal conscience of mankind, but which happen to agree
with the peculiar and temporary wants of the American community: these
propensities are lightly reproved, sometimes even encouraged; for instance,
the love of wealth and the secondary propensities connected with it may be
more particularly cited. To clear, to till, and to transform the vast
uninhabited continent which is his domain, the American requires the daily
support of an energetic passion; that passion can only be the love of wealth;
the passion for wealth is therefore not reprobated in America, and provided

it does not go beyond the bounds assigned to it for public security, it is held
in honor. The American lauds as a noble and praiseworthy ambition what
our own forefathers in the Middle Ages stigmatized as servile cupidity, just
as he treats as a blind and barbarous frenzy that ardor of conquest and
martial temper which bore them to battle. In the United States fortunes are
lost and regained without difficulty; the country is boundless, and its
resources inexhaustible. The people have all the wants and cravings of a
growing creature; and whatever be their efforts, they are always surrounded
by more than they can appropriate. It is not the ruin of a few individuals
which may be soon repaired, but the inactivity and sloth of the community
at large which would be fatal to such a people. Boldness of enterprise is the
foremost cause of its rapid progress, its strength, and its greatness.
Commercial business is there like a vast lottery, by which a small number
of men continually lose, but the State is always a gainer; such a people
ought therefore to encourage and do honor to boldness in commercial
speculations. But any bold speculation risks the fortune of the speculator
and of all those who put their trust in him. The Americans, who make a
virtue of commercial temerity, have no right in any case to brand with
disgrace those who practise it. Hence arises the strange indulgence which is
shown to bankrupts in the United States; their honor does not suffer by such
an accident. In this respect the Americans differ, not only from the nations
of Europe, but from all the commercial nations of our time, and accordingly
they resemble none of them in their position or their wants.
In America all those vices which tend to impair the purity of morals, and
to destroy the conjugal tie, are treated with a degree of severity which is
unknown in the rest of the world. At first sight this seems strangely at
variance with the tolerance shown there on other subjects, and one is
surprised to meet with a morality so relaxed and so austere amongst the
selfsame people. But these things are less incoherent than they seem to be.
Public opinion in the United States very gently represses that love of wealth
which promotes the commercial greatness and the prosperity of the nation,
and it especially condemns that laxity of morals which diverts the human
mind from the pursuit of well-being, and disturbs the internal order of
domestic life which is so necessary to success in business. To earn the
esteem of their countrymen, the Americans are therefore constrained to
adapt themselves to orderly habits—and it may be said in this sense that
they make it a matter of honor to live chastely.

On one point American honor accords with the notions of honor
acknowledged in Europe; it places courage as the highest virtue, and treats
it as the greatest of the moral necessities of man; but the notion of courage
itself assumes a different aspect. In the United States martial valor is but
little prized; the courage which is best known and most esteemed is that
which emboldens men to brave the dangers of the ocean, in order to arrive
earlier in port—to support the privations of the wilderness without
complaint, and solitude more cruel than privations—the courage which
renders them almost insensible to the loss of a fortune laboriously acquired,
and instantly prompts to fresh exertions to make another. Courage of this
kind is peculiarly necessary to the maintenance and prosperity of the
American communities, and it is held by them in peculiar honor and
estimation; to betray a want of it is to incur certain disgrace.
I have yet another characteristic point which may serve to place the idea
of this chapter in stronger relief. In a democratic society like that of the
United States, where fortunes are scanty and insecure, everybody works,
and work opens a way to everything: this has changed the point of honor
quite round, and has turned it against idleness. I have sometimes met in
America with young men of wealth, personally disinclined to all laborious
exertion, but who had been compelled to embrace a profession. Their
disposition and their fortune allowed them to remain without employment;
public opinion forbade it, too imperiously to be disobeyed. In the European
countries, on the contrary, where aristocracy is still struggling with the
flood which overwhelms it, I have often seen men, constantly spurred on by
their wants and desires, remain in idleness, in order not to lose the esteem
of their equals; and I have known them submit to ennui and privations
rather than to work. No one can fail to perceive that these opposite
obligations are two different rules of conduct, both nevertheless originating
in the notion of honor.
What our forefathers designated as honor absolutely was in reality only
one of its forms; they gave a generic name to what was only a species.
Honor therefore is to be found in democratic as well as in aristocratic ages,
but it will not be difficult to show that it assumes a different aspect in the
former. Not only are its injunctions different, but we shall shortly see that
they are less numerous, less precise, and that its dictates are less rigorously
obeyed. The position of a caste is always much more peculiar than that of a
people. Nothing is so much out of the way of the world as a small

community invariably composed of the same families (as was for instance
the aristocracy of the Middle Ages), whose object is to concentrate and to
retain, exclusively and hereditarily, education, wealth, and power amongst
its own members. But the more out of the way the position of a community
happens to be, the more numerous are its special wants, and the more
extensive are its notions of honor corresponding to those wants. The rules
of honor will therefore always be less numerous amongst a people not
divided into castes than amongst any other. If ever any nations are
constituted in which it may even be difficult to find any peculiar classes of
society, the notion of honor will be confined to a small number of precepts,
which will be more and more in accordance with the moral laws adopted by
the mass of mankind. Thus the laws of honor will be less peculiar and less
multifarious amongst a democratic people than in an aristocracy. They will
also be more obscure; and this is a necessary consequence of what goes
before; for as the distinguishing marks of honor are less numerous and less
peculiar, it must often be difficult to distinguish them. To this, other reasons
may be added. Amongst the aristocratic nations of the Middle Ages,
generation succeeded generation in vain; each family was like a never-
dying, ever-stationary man, and the state of opinions was hardly more
changeable than that of conditions. Everyone then had always the same
objects before his eyes, which he contemplated from the same point; his
eyes gradually detected the smallest details, and his discernment could not
fail to become in the end clear and accurate. Thus not only had the men of
feudal times very extraordinary opinions in matters of honor, but each of
those opinions was present to their minds under a clear and precise form.
This can never be the case in America, where all men are in constant
motion; and where society, transformed daily by its own operations,
changes its opinions together with its wants. In such a country men have
glimpses of the rules of honor, but they have seldom time to fix attention
upon them.
But even if society were motionless, it would still be difficult to
determine the meaning which ought to be attached to the word "honor." In
the Middle Ages, as each class had its own honor, the same opinion was
never received at the same time by a large number of men; and this
rendered it possible to give it a determined and accurate form, which was
the more easy, as all those by whom it was received, having a perfectly
identical and most peculiar position, were naturally disposed to agree upon

the points of a law which was made for themselves alone. Thus the code of
honor became a complete and detailed system, in which everything was
anticipated and provided for beforehand, and a fixed and always palpable
standard was applied to human actions. Amongst a democratic nation, like
the Americans, in which ranks are identified, and the whole of society
forms one single mass, composed of elements which are all analogous
though not entirely similar, it is impossible ever to agree beforehand on
what shall or shall not be allowed by the laws of honor. Amongst that
people, indeed, some national wants do exist which give rise to opinions
common to the whole nation on points of honor; but these opinions never
occur at the same time, in the same manner, or with the same intensity to
the minds of the whole community; the law of honor exists, but it has no
organs to promulgate it.
The confusion is far greater still in a democratic country like France,
where the different classes of which the former fabric of society was
composed, being brought together but not yet mingled, import day by day
into each other's circles various and sometimes conflicting notions of honor
—where every man, at his own will and pleasure, forsakes one portion of
his forefathers' creed, and retains another; so that, amidst so many arbitrary
measures, no common rule can ever be established, and it is almost
impossible to predict which actions will be held in honor and which will be
thought disgraceful. Such times are wretched, but they are of short duration.
As honor, amongst democratic nations, is imperfectly defined, its
influence is of course less powerful; for it is difficult to apply with certainty
and firmness a law which is not distinctly known. Public opinion, the
natural and supreme interpreter of the laws of honor, not clearly discerning
to which side censure or approval ought to lean, can only pronounce a
hesitating judgment. Sometimes the opinion of the public may contradict
itself; more frequently it does not act, and lets things pass.
The weakness of the sense of honor in democracies also arises from
several other causes. In aristocratic countries, the same notions of honor are
always entertained by only a few persons, always limited in number, often
separated from the rest of their fellow-citizens. Honor is easily mingled and
identified in their minds with the idea of all that distinguishes their own
position; it appears to them as the chief characteristic of their own rank;
they apply its different rules with all the warmth of personal interest, and