When the past no longer illuminates the future, the spirit walks in darkness.

The position of the Americans is quite exceptional, and it may be believed that no democratic people will ever be placed in a similar one.

Not only does democracy make every man forget his ancestors, but also clouds their view of their descendants and isolates them from their contemporaries. Each man is for ever thrown back on himself alone, and there is danger that he may be shut up in the solitude of his own heart.

On this waterlogged landscape....are scattered palaces and hovels....It is here that the human spirit becomes perfect, and at the same time brutalised, that civilisation produces its marvels and that civilised man returns to the savage.

Religion, which never intervenes directly in the government of American society, should therefore be considered as the first of their political institutions

How could a society escape destruction if, when political ties are relaxed, moral ties are not tightened, and what can be done with a people master of itself if it not subject to God?

Comfort becomes a goal when distinctions of rank are abolished and privileges destroyed.