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TO M. DE CORCELLE. - Alexis de Tocqueville, Memoir, Letters, and Remains of Alexis de Tocqueville, vol. 2 [1861]

Edition used:

Memoir, Letters, and Remains of Alexis de Tocqueville. Translated from the French by the translator of Napoleon’s Correspondence with King Joseph. With large Additions. In Two Volumes (London: Macamillan, 1861). 2 vols.

Part of: Memoir, Letters, and Remains of Alexis de Tocqueville, 2 vols.

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TO M. DE CORCELLE.

Tocqueville, August 1, 1850.

Dear Friend,

I cannot understand how it is that I have not written to you since the 6th of July. And yet your letter gave me great pleasure; and if it had been only to get another I ought to have answered it. I did not do so, however, because I live in a sort of apathy which makes unpleasant every exertion, even to gain some desirable result. I never could have believed that I could become, not indifferent by any means, but so little anxious about either the present or the future in a country where the present is so disturbed and the future so dark. I think, however, that when revolutions continue for so long, they produce more or less of the effect of a life at sea; though running every day a chance of being drowned, the sailor at last forgets even that he is on the ocean. Thank God, the helm is no longer in my charge; I am only a passenger, and I should like to remain one, at any rate for some time longer. But I think that the restoration of my health, at least of that which I call health, and which other people would call illness, will oblige me to resume my political duties when the Assembly meets.

* * * * * *

I know not if the circumstances in which I have latterly been placed, or the increased seriousness that one acquires with age; my solitary life, or some other cause of which I am not conscious, has affected my mind, and set it working; but the truth is, that I have never felt so much the want of an eternal foundation, the solid basis on which life ought to rest.

Doubt has always seemed to me to be the most unbearable of all evils; worse than death itself.

To turn to other things, I must tell you that I do not see without apprehension the operation here of the new law of elections.* It strikes heavily and blindly. I hope for little that is good from any of the efforts made or projected for the re-establishment of our social system. I fear that, by flying from one remedy to another, they will damage the vitals of liberty; I know that at present liberty is out of favour; but, whatever may happen, I am, and always shall remain, faithful to her. I do not think that modern society will be able to do long without her. The excesses lately committed in her name may make her appear hateful, but cannot destroy her beauty or make her less essential. I think, too, that we should treat all the principles which we have long professed, when, for the moment, they become less practicable, as we do our old friends when they behave ill; and that we owe, even to ourselves, not to abuse or attack them.

Forgive this long prose, for the sake of the great pleasure afforded to me by my unrestrained communications with you.

[*]The law of the 31st May, 1850, which restricted the suffrage.—Tr.