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Alexis De Tocqueville Quotes

Browse 3 quotes about Alexis De Tocqueville.

Alexis De Tocqueville Quotes

“Throughout this book I have tried to point out why interest, especially as it has been used by people such as Hume, Smith, Tocqueville, and Weber, is still a very useful concept. One reason why the concept of interest imparts a distinct dynamic to the analysis is that it is mainly interest which makes people takes action. It supplies the force that makes people get up at dawn and work very hard throughout the day. Combined with interests of others, it is a force that can move mountains and create new societies.”

Interest Adam Smith David Hume Economic Sociology Max Weber Alexis De Tocqueville

Book:Principles of Economic Sociology

Source: Principles of Economic Sociology

“In other words, neither oppression nor exploitation as such is ever the main cause for resentment; wealth without visible function is much more intolerable because nobody can understand why it should be tolerated. Antisemitism reached its climax when Jews had similarly lost their public functions and their influence, and were left with nothing but their wealth.”

Oppression Aristocracy French Revolution 1968 Antisemitism Political Struggle Wealth Disparity Alexis De Tocqueville

Book:The Origins of Totalitarianism

Source: The Origins of Totalitarianism

“With each surge of westward movement a new community came into being. These communities devoted themselves not to marching onward but to cultivating the earth. They plowed the virgin land and put in crops, and the great Interior Valley was transformed into a garden for the imagination, the Garden of the World. The vision of this vast and constantly growing agricultural society in the interior of the continent became one of the dominant symbols of nineteenth-century American society - a collective representation, a poetic idea (as [Alexis de] Tocqueville [1805-59] noted in the early 1830s) that defined the promise of American life. The master symbol of the garden embraced a cluster of metaphors expressing fecundity, growth, increase and blissful labor in the earth, all centring about the heroic figure of the idealized frontier farmer armed with that supreme agrarian weapon, the sacred plow.”

Frontier Farmer American West Plow Alexis De Tocqueville

Book:Virgin Land: The American West as Symbol and Myth

Source: Virgin Land: The American West as Symbol and Myth