We can state with conviction, therefore, that a man’s support for absolute government is in direct proportion to the contempt he feels for his country.
ALEXIS DE TOCQUEVILLEI know of no country in which there is so little independence of mind and real freedom of discussion as in America.
More Alexis de Tocqueville Quotes
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The best laws cannot make a constitution work in spite of morals; morals can turn the worst laws to advantage.
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To remain silent is the most useful service that a mediocre speaker can render to the public good.
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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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Nothing is more wonderful than the art of being free, but nothing is harder to learn how to use than freedom.
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Slavery…dishonors labor. It introduces idleness into society, and with idleness, ignorance and pride, luxury and distress. It enervates the powers of the mind and benumbs the activity of man.
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History is a gallery of pictures in which there are few originals and many copies.
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I do not know if the people of the United States would vote for superior men if they ran for office, but there can be no doubt that such men do not run.
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Nothing is so dangerous as that of violence employed by well-meaning people for beneficial objects.
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As the past has ceased to throw its light upon the future, the mind of man wanders in obscurity.
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One of the most ordinary weaknesses of the human intellect is to seek to reconcile contrary principles, and to purchase peace at the expense of logic.
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Socialism is a new form of slavery.
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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?
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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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A democratic government is the only one in which those who vote for a tax can escape the obligation to pay it.
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Every central government worships uniformity: uniformity relieves it from inquiry into an infinity of details.
ALEXIS DE TOCQUEVILLE