troubled at the sight: they attend only to the amazing revolution which
is taking place before their eyes, and they imagine that mankind is
about to fall into perpetual anarchy: if they looked to the final
consequences of this revolution, their fears would perhaps assume a
different shape. For myself, I confess that I put no trust in the spirit
of freedom which appears to animate my contemporaries. I see well
enough that the nations of this age are turbulent, but I do not clearly
perceive that they are liberal; and I fear lest, at the close of
those perturbations which rock the base of thrones, the domination of
sovereigns may prove more powerful than it ever was before.

Chapter VI: What Sort Of Despotism Democratic Nations Have To Fear

I had remarked during my stay in the United States, that a democratic
state of society, similar to that of the Americans, might offer singular
facilities for the establishment of despotism; and I perceived, upon
my return to Europe, how much use had already been made by most of our
rulers, of the notions, the sentiments, and the wants engendered by this
same social condition, for the purpose of extending the circle of
their power. This led me to think that the nations of Christendom would
perhaps eventually undergo some sort of oppression like that which
hung over several of the nations of the ancient world. A more accurate
examination of the subject, and five years of further meditations, have
not diminished my apprehensions, but they have changed the object of
them. No sovereign ever lived in former ages so absolute or so powerful
as to undertake to administer by his own agency, and without the
assistance of intermediate powers, all the parts of a great empire: none
ever attempted to subject all his subjects indiscriminately to strict
uniformity of regulation, and personally to tutor and direct every
member of the community. The notion of such an undertaking never
occurred to the human mind; and if any man had conceived it, the want
of information, the imperfection of the administrative system, and above
all, the natural obstacles caused by the inequality of conditions, would
speedily have checked the execution of so vast a design. When the Roman
emperors were at the height of their power, the different nations of the
empire still preserved manners and customs of great diversity; although
they were subject to the same monarch, most of the provinces were
separately administered