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 TOCQUEVILLENothing is so dangerous as that of violence employed by well-meaning people for beneficial objects.
More Alexis de Tocqueville Quotes
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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.
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Everybody feels the evil, but no one has courage or energy enough to seek the cure.
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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.
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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.
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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.
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Not until I went into the churches of America and heard her pulpits flame with righteousness did I understand the secret of her genius and power. America is great because America is good, and if America ever ceases to be good, America will cease to be great.
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Men will not receive the truth from their enemies, and it is seldom offered to them by their friends.
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Those which we call necessary institutions are simply no more than institutions to which we have become accustomed.
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There is hardly a political question in the United States which does not sooner or later turn into a judicial one.
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Liberty cannot be established without morality, nor morality without faith.
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Every central government worships uniformity: uniformity relieves it from inquiry into an infinity of details.
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The most dangerous moment for a bad government is when it begins to reform.
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Christianity is the companion of liberty in all its conflicts, the cradle of its infancy, and the divine source of its claims.
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When I refuse to obey an unjust law, I do not contest the right of the majority to command, but I simply appeal from the sovereignty of the people to the sovereignty of mankind.
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Nothing is so dangerous as that of violence employed by well-meaning people for beneficial objects.
ALEXIS DE TOCQUEVILLE