Quotes by Alexis de Tocqueville

About Alexis de Tocqueville:

Alexis-Charles-Henri Clérel de Tocqueville is today considered an early work of sociology and political science.
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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

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

The French want no-one to be their superior. The English want inferiors. The Frenchman constantly raises his eyes above him with anxiety. The Englishman lowers his beneath him with satisfaction.

Alexis de Tocqueville

In a revolution, as in a novel, the most difficult part to invent is the end.

Alexis de Tocqueville

Grant me thirty years of equal division of inheritances and a free press, and I will provide you with a republic.

Alexis de Tocqueville

The Indian knew how to live without wants, to suffer without complaint, and to die singing.

Alexis de Tocqueville

There is hardly a political question in the United States which does not sooner or later turn into a judicial one.

Alexis de Tocqueville

In America the majority raises formidable barriers around the liberty of opinion; within these barriers an author may write what he pleases, but woe to him if he goes beyond them.

Alexis de Tocqueville

Ainsi donc, en s’alliant à un pouvoir politique, la religion augmente sa puissance sur quelques-uns, et perd l’espérance de régner sur tous.

Alexis de Tocqueville

America is great because she is good. If America ceases to be good, America will cease to be great.

Alexis de Tocqueville

America is a land of wonders, in which everything is in constant motion and every change seems an improvement.

Alexis de Tocqueville

It's not an endlessly expanding list of rights — the 'right' to education, the 'right' to health care, the 'right' to food and housing. That's not freedom, that's dependency. Those aren't rights, those are the rations of slavery — hay and a barn ...

Alexis de Tocqueville

These diverse effects of slavery and freedom are easily understood: … the men in Kentucky [neither] have zeal nor enlightenment … cross over into Ohio in order to utilize their industry and to be able to exercise it without shame … in Kentucky,...

Alexis de Tocqueville

The Americans of the United States do not let their dogs hunt the Indians as do the Spaniards in Mexico, but at bottom it is the same pitiless feeling which here, as everywhere else, animates the European race. This world here belongs to us, they tel...

Alexis de Tocqueville

Society will develop a new kind of servitude which covers the surface of society with a network of complicated rules, through which the most original minds and the most energetic characters cannot penetrate. It does not tyrannise but it compresses, e...

Alexis de Tocqueville

I follow the course marked out by my principles and, what is more, enjoy a deep and noble pleasure in following it. You deeply despise the human race, at least our part of it; you think it not only fallen but incapable of ever rising again... For my ...

Alexis de Tocqueville

The free worker receives a wage; the slave an education, food, care, clothing; the money that the master spends to keep the slave is drained little by little and in detail; one hardly perceives it.1

Alexis de Tocqueville

I have always thought it rather interesting to follow the involuntary movements of fear in clever people. Fools coarsely display their cowardice in all its nakedness, but the others are able to cover it with a veil so delicate, so daintily woven with...

Alexis de Tocqueville

It is indeed difficult to imagine how men who have entirely renounced the habit of managing their own affairs could be successful in choosing those who ought to lead them. It is impossible to believe that a liberal, energetic, and wise government can...

Alexis de Tocqueville

It is above all in the present democratic age that the true friends of liberty and human grandeur must remain constantly vigilant and ready to prevent the social power from lightly sacrificing the particular rights of a few individuals to the general...

Alexis de Tocqueville

Every nation that has ended in tyranny has come to that end by way of good order. It certainly does not follow from this that peoples should scorn public peace, but neither should they be satisfied with that and nothing more. A nation that asks nothi...

Alexis de Tocqueville

Author Bio

  • NameAlexis de Tocqueville
  • DescriptionFrench political thinker and historian
  • AliasesAlexis-Charles-Henri Clérel de Tocqueville
  • BornJuly 29, 1805
  • DiedApril 16, 1859
  • CountryFrance
  • ProfessionPhilosopher; Politician; Historian; Author
  • WorksDemocracy In America
  • AwardsKnight Of The Legion Of Honour