M. de Tocqueville on democracy in AmericaJohn W. Parker and son, 1859 |
Common terms and phrases
action apparent magnitude appears Aristotle Athenian Athens authority Bailey Bentham cause character Charlemagne Church civilization common condition Constitution cracy democracy democratic despotism distance doctrine Edinburgh Review elements England English equality Europe exist fact favour feelings feudal France French Grecian Greece Greek Grote Guizot habits happiness Hesiod human ideas Iliad improvement individual influence institutions intellect interest kings labour legislation less liberty Lord Brougham Louis Blanc Lycurgus mankind means ment Michelet middle ages mind mode modern moral nation nature never object opinion Patroclus peculiar Pericles persons philosophy Plato pleasure political popular principle produce progress Provisional Government racter reason recognised religious remarkable render retina Revolution rience Roman Roman empire rule sense sentiment social society Spartan speculations spirit supposed tendency theory things thought Thucydides tion Tocqueville truth virtue Whewell Whewell's whole women writers
Popular passages
Page 483 - The day may come, when the rest of the animal creation may acquire those rights which never could have been withholden from them but by the hand of tyranny. The French have already discovered that the blackness of the skin is no reason why a human being should be abandoned without redress to the caprice of a tormentor. It may...
Page 470 - A great multitude of people are continually talking of the Law of Nature; and then they go on giving you their sentiments about what is right and what is wrong: and these sentiments, you are to understand, are so many chapters and sections of the Law of Nature.
Page 500 - Essay on the Influence of Time and Place in Matters of Legislation...
Page 94 - It is, I think, agreed by all that Distance, of itself and immediately, cannot be seen. For, distance being a line directed endwise to the eye, it projects only one point in the fund of the eye, which point remains invariably the same, whether the distance be longer or shorter.
Page 468 - What one expects to find in a principle is something that points out some external consideration, as a means of warranting and guiding the internal sentiments of approbation and disapprobation: this expectation is but ill fulfilled by a proposition, which does neither more nor less than hold up each of those sentiments as a ground and standard for itself.
Page 469 - Because my moral sense tells me it is.' '2. Another man comes and alters the phrase: leaving out moral, and putting in common in the room of it. He then tells you that his common sense tells him what is right and wrong, as surely as the other's moral sense did: meaning by common sense a sense of some kind or other, which, he says, is possessed by all mankind: the sense of those whose sense is not the same as the author's being struck out as not worth taking.
Page 12 - The gradual development of the equality of conditions is therefore a providential fact, and it possesses all the characteristics of a divine decree: it is universal, it is durable, it constantly eludes all human interference, and all events as well as all men contribute to its progress.
Page 55 - 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.
Page 56 - ... 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.