Page:Democracy in America (Reeve, v. 1).djvu/9



N presenting the translation of this work to the public, preceded by an Introduction in which the author calls the attention of the reader to the present social state of France, I may perhaps be allowed to say a few words on the inferences which are to be drawn from the democratic institutions of America relative to our own political condition. We live at a time when so many of the maxims of government are worn out, that in casting our eyes upon the aphorisms of the great statesmen of Europe, we are astonished to find that the authority they attempted to defend is vanished, and the principles by which they defended it are no more. The book of ‘The