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A man’s admiration of absolute government is proportionate to the contempt he feels for those around him.

Alexis de Tocqueville

Generally speaking, only simple conceptions can grip the mind of a nation. An idea that is clear and precise even though false will always have greater power in the world than an idea that is true but complex.
ALEXIS DE TOCQUEVILLE

Greatness Ideas Mind Nation Power Simplicity True
All those who seek to destroy the liberties of a democratic nation ought to know that war is the surest and shortest means to accomplish it.
ALEXIS DE TOCQUEVILLE

Accomplishment Democracy Destroy Nation Peace Seek War
There is no country in the world in which everything can be provided for by the laws, or in which political institutions can prove a substitute for common sense and public morality.
ALEXIS DE TOCQUEVILLE

Country Institution Law Moral World
A democratic government is the only one in which those who vote for a tax can escape the obligation to pay it.
ALEXIS DE TOCQUEVILLE

Escape Government Oneself Politics
Rulers who destroy men’s freedom commonly begin by trying to retain its forms. … They cherish the illusion that they can combine the prerogatives of absolute power with the moral authority that comes from popular assent.
ALEXIS DE TOCQUEVILLE

Authority Beginning Freedom Illusion Men Moral Power Rule Try
I should have loved freedom, I believe, at all times, but in the time in which we live I am ready to worship it.
ALEXIS DE TOCQUEVILLE

Believe Freedom Liberty Live Love Myself Time
In the United States, the majority undertakes to supply a multitude of ready-made opinions for the use of individuals, who are thus relieved from the necessity of forming opinions of their own.
ALEXIS DE TOCQUEVILLE

Independent Necessary Opinion Politics relief
Christianity is the companion of liberty in all its conflicts, the cradle of its infancy, and the divine source of its claims.
ALEXIS DE TOCQUEVILLE

Divine Liberty
When a large number of organs of the press come to advance along the same track, their influence becomes almost irresistible in the long term, and public opinion, struck always from the same side, ends by yielding under their blows.
ALEXIS DE TOCQUEVILLE

End Media News Opinion Politics
It is easier for the world to accept a simple lie than a complex truth.
ALEXIS DE TOCQUEVILLE

Easy Lying Simplicity Truth World
Life is to be entered upon with courage.
ALEXIS DE TOCQUEVILLE

Courage Inspirational Life One Liner
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.
ALEXIS DE TOCQUEVILLE

Dangerous Fear Man Myself Revolution Theory
The Americans combine the notions of religion and liberty so intimately in their minds, that it is impossible to make them conceive of one without the other.
ALEXIS DE TOCQUEVILLE

Impossible Liberty Mindset Oneself Religion
There are many men of principle in both parties in America, but there is no party of principle.
ALEXIS DE TOCQUEVILLE

Democracy Man Politics Principle Rule
One of the happiest consequences of the absence of government is the development of individual strength that inevitably follows.
ALEXIS DE TOCQUEVILLE

Absence Development Government Strength
Equality is a slogan based on envy. It signifies in the heart of every republican: “Nobody is going to occupy a place higher than I.”
ALEXIS DE TOCQUEVILLE

Equality Heart Jealous Myself Place