I do not find fault with equality for drawing
men into the pursuit of forbidden pleasures, but for absorbing
them entirely in the search for the pleasures that are
permitted. - Vol. 2, ch. 32 (1840)
If there ever are great revolutions there, they
will be caused by the presence of the blacks upon American soil.
That is to say, it will not be the equality of social conditions
but rather their inequality which may give rise to it. - Vol. 2, pt. 3, ch. 21 (1840)
In democratic ages men rarely sacrifice
themselves for another, but they show a general compassion for
all the human race. One never sees them inflict pointless
suffering, and they are glad to relieve the sorrows of others
when they can do so without much trouble to themselves. They are
not disinterested, but they are gentle. - Vol. 2, pt. 3, ch. 1 (1840)
I cannot help fearing that men may reach a point
where they look on every new theory as a danger, every
innovation as a toilsome trouble, every social advance as a
first step toward revolution, and that they may absolutely
refuse to move at all for fear of being carried off their feet.
The prospect really does frighten me that they may finally
become so engrossed in a cowardly love of immediate pleasures
that their interest in their own future and in that of their
descendants may vanish, and that they will prefer tamely to
follow the course of their destiny rather than make a sudden
energetic effort necessary to set things right. - Vol. 2, pt. 3, ch. 21 (1840)
I know of no country in which there is so little
independence of mind and real freedom of discussion as in
America. - Vol. 1, ch. 15 (1835)
Despotism may govern without faith, but liberty
cannot. . . . How is it possible that society should escape
destruction if the moral tie is not strengthened in proportion
as the political tie is relaxed? And what can be done with a
people who are their own masters if they are not submissive to
the Deity? - Vol. 1, ch. 17 (1835)
However energetically society in general may
strive to make all the citizens equal and alike, the personal
pride of each individual will always make him try to escape from
the common level, and he will form some inequality somewhere to
his own profit. - Vol. 2, pt. 3, ch. 13 (1840)
Though it is very important for man as an
individual that his religion should be true, that is not the
case for society. Society has nothing to fear or hope from
another life; what is most important for it is not that all
citizens profess the true religion but that they should profess
religion. - Vol. 1, pt. 2, ch. 9 (1835)
When an opinion has taken root in a democracy
and established itself in the minds of the majority, if
afterward persists by itself, needing no effort to maintain it
since no one attacks it. Those who at first rejected it as false
come in the end to adopt it as accepted, and even those who
still at the bottom of their hearts oppose it keep their views
to themselves, taking great care to avoid a dangerous and futile
contest. - Vol. 2, pt. 3, ch. 21 (1840)
I am obliged to confess that I do not regard the
abolition of slavery as a means of warding off the struggle of
the two races in the Southern states. The Negroes may long
remain slaves without complaining; but if they are once raised
to the level of freemen, they will soon revolt at being deprived
of almost all their civil rights; and as they cannot become the
equals of the whites, they will speedily show themselves as
enemies. Vol. 1, ch. 18 (1835).
As one digs deeper into the national character
of the Americans, one sees that they have sought the value of
everything in this world only in the answer to this single
question: how much money will it bring in? - Letter, 9 June 1831 (published in Selected
Letters on Politics and Society, 1985).
