1. Chapter I: That Equality Naturally Gives Men A Taste For Free
Institutions
I should imperfectly fulfil the purpose of this book, if,
after having shown what opinions and sentiments are suggested by
the principle of equality, I did not point out, ere I conclude,
the general influence which these same opinions and sentiments
may exercise upon the government of human societies. To succeed
in this object I shall frequently have to retrace my steps; but I
trust the reader will not refuse to follow me through paths
already known to him, which may lead to some new truth.
The principle of equality, which makes men independent of
each other, gives them a habit and a taste for following, in
their private actions, no other guide but their own will. This
complete independence, which they constantly enjoy towards their
equals and in the intercourse of private life, tends to make them
look upon all authority with a jealous eye, and speedily suggests
to them the notion and the love of political freedom. Men living
at such times have a natural bias to free institutions. Take any
one of them at a venture, and search if you can his most
deep-seated instincts; you will find that of all governments he
will soonest conceive and most highly value that government,
whose head he has himself elected, and whose administration he
may control. Of all the political effects produced by the
equality of conditions, this love of independence is the first to
strike the observing, and to alarm the timid; nor can it be said
that their alarm is wholly misplaced, for anarchy has a more
formidable aspect in democratic countries than elsewhere. As the
citizens have no direct influence on each other, as soon as the
supreme power of the nation fails, which kept them all in their
several stations, it would seem that disorder must instantly
reach its utmost pitch, and that, every man drawing aside in a
different direction, the fabric of society must at once crumble
away.
I am, however, persuaded that anarchy is not the principal
evil which democratic ages have to fear, but the least. For the
principle of equality begets two tendencies; the one leads men
straight to independence, and may suddenly drive them into
anarchy; the other conducts them by a longer, more secret, but
more certain road, to servitude. Nations readily discern the
former tendency, and are prepared to resist it; they are led away
by the latter, without perceiving its drift; hence it is
peculiarly important to point it out. For myself, I am so far
from urging as a reproach to the principle of equality that it
renders men untractable, that this very circumstance principally
calls forth my approbation. I admire to see how it deposits in
the mind and heart of man the dim conception and instinctive love
of political independence, thus preparing the remedy for the evil
which it engenders; it is on this very account that I am attached
to it.