they make them alternatively the playthings of the sovereign and its masters, more than kings and less than men. After

It seems that if despotism came to be established in the democratic nations of our day, it would have other characteristics: it would be more extensive and milder, and it would degrade men without tormenting them.*1

Despotism therefore appears to me particularly to be dreaded in democratic ages.

Subjection in small affairs manifests itself every day and makes itself felt without distinction by all citizens. It does not make them desperate; but it constantly thwarts them and brings them to renounce the use of their wills. Thus little by little, it extinguishes their spirits and enervates their souls, whereas obedience, which is due only in

tutelary

A constitution that was republican at the head and ultramonarchical in all other parts has always seemed to me to be an ephemeral monster. The vices of those who govern and the imbecility of the governed would not be slow to bring it to ruin; and the people, tired of their representatives and of themselves,

do not fear that in their chiefs they will find tyrants, but rather schoolmasters.

Each day the princes of Europe hold their delegates in a stricter dependence, and they invent new methods to direct them more closely and oversee them with less trouble. It is not enough for them to conduct all affairs by their agents;

see an innumerable crowd of like and equal men who revolve on themselves without repose, procuring the small and vulgar pleasures with which they fill their souls.