e only advanced
step by step. It may be remarked with surprise, that in a democratic
army after a long peace all the soldiers are mere boys, and all the
superior officers in declining years; so that the former are wanting in
experience, the latter in vigor. This is a strong element of defeat,
for the first condition of successful generalship is youth: I should not
have ventured to say so if the greatest captain of modern times had not
made the observation. These two causes do not act in the same manner
upon aristocratic armies: as men are promoted in them by right of birth
much more than by right of seniority, there are in all ranks a certain
number of young men, who bring to their profession all the early vigor
of body and mind. Again, as the men who seek for military honors amongst
an aristocratic people, enjoy a settled position in civil society, they
seldom continue in the army until old age overtakes them. After having
devoted the most vigorous years of youth to the career of arms, they
voluntarily retire, and spend at home the remainder of their maturer
years.

A long peace not only fills democratic armies with elderly officers,
but it also gives to all the officers habits both of body and mind which
render them unfit for actual service. The man who has long lived amidst
the calm and lukewarm atmosphere of democratic manners can at first ill
adapt himself to the harder toils and sterner duties of warfare; and if
he has not absolutely lost the taste for arms, at least he has assumed a
mode of life which unfits him for conquest.

Amongst aristocratic nations, the ease of civil life exercises less
influence on the manners of the army, because amongst those nations the
aristocracy commands the army: and an aristocracy, however plunged in
luxurious pleasures, has always many other passions besides that of
its own well-being, and to satisfy those passions more thoroughly its
well-being will be readily sacrificed. *a

[Footnote a: See Appendix V.]

I have shown that in democratic armies, in time of peace, promotion is
extremely slow. The officers at first support this state of things with
impatience, they grow excited, restless, exasperated, but in the end
most of them make up their minds to it. Those who have the largest
share of ambition and of resources quit the army; others, adapting their
tastes and their desires to their scanty fortunes, ultimately look upon
the military profession in a civil point of view. The