Sublime

Belonging neither to the class which regarded the social revolution as an innovation to be resisted, nor to that which considered political equality the universal panacea for the evils of humanity, he resolved by personal observation of the results of democracy in the New World to ascertain its natural consequences, and to learn what the nations of

The more precarious and the more perilous the position of a people becomes, the more absolute is the want of a fixed and consistent external policy, and the more dangerous does the elective system of the Chief Magistrate become.

« Plus je vois ce pays-ci, écrivit-il à son père, plus j’avoue que je me pénètre de cette vérité qu’il n’y a presque pas d’institutions politiques radicalement bonnes ou mauvaises en elles-mêmes et que tout dépend des conditions physiques et de l’état social du peuple auquel on les applique. Je vois réussir ici des institutions qui bouleverseraient

The consequence of this arrangement is, that at every new election the fate of all the Federal public officers is in suspense.

Let us recollect the situation of France seven hundred years ago, when the territory was divided amongst a small number of families, who were the owners of the soil and the rulers of the inhabitants; the right of governing descended with the family inheritance from generation to generation; force was the only means by which man could act on man, an

when apprised by the legislature that the wheels of government are stopped; to see it carefully examine the extent of the evil, and patiently wait for two whole years until a remedy was discovered, which it voluntarily adopted without having wrung a tear or a drop of blood from mankind.

Democracy appears to me to be much better adapted for the peaceful conduct of society, or for an occasional effort of remarkable vigor, than for the hardy and prolonged endurance of the storms which beset the political existence of nations.

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

every kind of private business is very lucrative, and the State would not be served at all if it did not pay its servants. The country is in the position of a commercial undertaking, which is obliged to sustain an expensive competition, notwithstanding its tastes for economy.]