se in these States than elsewhere, but the temptation is stronger,
and of easier access at the same time. The result is a far more
extensive debasement of the characters of citizens.

Democratic republics extend the practice of currying favor with the
many, and they introduce it into a greater number of classes at once:
this is one of the most serious reproaches that can be addressed to
them. In democratic States organized on the principles of the American
republics, this is more especially the case, where the authority of the
majority is so absolute and so irresistible that a man must give up his
rights as a citizen, and almost abjure his quality as a human being, if
te intends to stray from the track which it lays down.

In that immense crowd which throngs the avenues to power in the United
States I found very few men who displayed any of that manly candor and
that masculine independence of opinion which frequently distinguished
the Americans in former times, and which constitutes the leading feature
in distinguished characters, wheresoever they may be found. It seems, at
first sight, as if all the minds of the Americans were formed upon one
model, so accurately do they correspond in their manner of judging. A
stranger does, indeed, sometimes meet with Americans who dissent from
these rigorous formularies; with men who deplore the defects of the
laws, the mutability and the ignorance of democracy; who even go so far
as to observe the evil tendencies which impair the national character,
and to point out such remedies as it might be possible to apply; but
no one is there to hear these things besides yourself, and you, to whom
these secret reflections are confided, are a stranger and a bird of
passage. They are very ready to communicate truths which are useless to
you, but they continue to hold a different language in public.

If ever these lines are read in America, I am well assured of two
things: in the first place, that all who peruse them will raise their
voices to condemn me; and in the second place, that very many of them
will acquit me at the bottom of their conscience.

I have heard of patriotism in the United States, and it is a virtue
which may be found among the people, but never among the leaders of
the people. This may be explained by analogy; despotism debases the
oppressed much more than the oppressor: in absolute monarchies the king
has often great virtues, but the courtiers are invariably servile. I