Sublime

The boldest theories of the human reason were put into practice by a community so humble that not a statesman condescended to attend to it; and a legislation without a precedent was produced offhand by the imagination of the citizens.

Various forces have put an end to this state of affairs. First, democracy, as embodied in the French Revolution and its aftermath. The cultured gentlemen, as after the age of Pericles, had to defend their privileges against the populace, and in the process ceased to be either gentlemen or cultured. A second cause was the rise of industrialism, with

Avec Gustave de Beaumont, qui avait de son côté publié Marie ou l’Esclavage aux États-Unis14, il effectua à l’été 1835 un nouveau voyage en Angleterre et en Irlande. Chaleureusement accueilli à Londres, il rencontra John Stuart Mill, disciple de Jeremy Bentham, fondateur de l’utilitarisme, avec lequel il correspondit jusqu’à sa mort.