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Correspondence. - Alexis de Tocqueville, Correspondence and Conversations of Alexis de Tocqueville with Nassau William Senior from 1834-1859, vol. 1 (1834-1851) [1872]Edition used:Correspondence and Conversations of Alexis de Tocqueville with Nassau William Senior from 1834-1859, ed. M.C.M. Simpson, in Two Volumes (London: Henry S. King & Co., 1872). Vol. I.
Part of: Correspondence and Conversations of Alexis de Tocqueville with Nassau William Senior from 1834-1859, 2 vols.
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Correspondence.Alexis de Tocqueville to N. W. Senior.March 24, 1834. My dear Mr. Senior,—I hope that you have not yet entirely forgotten one who will always remember your kind reception with gratitude. I take to-day the liberty of asking you to bestow a portion of the same good will on my countryman, M. Guéry. M. Guéry, who is an advocate practising in the Cour Royale in Paris, is the author of a book which is much esteemed, called an ‘Essay on Moral Statistics in France.’ Perhaps you have already heard of this work, which has been noticed in your reviews. The Académie Française considered it of so much utility and importance that they bestowed on it a prize. M. Guéry is going to England in order to continue his statistical studies: he intends to spend six months there. I think that the work which he will publish on his return will be full of interest for us, and will be no doubt of real use to the English themselves. Now that, thank God, the two countries are on good terms, they ought to endeavour to enlighten each other. I wish no better fortune for M. Guéry than to find in England as excellent a friend as I did. I suppose that you have finished drawing up your important Report on the Poor Law. If so, I shall be much obliged if you will send me a copy through our Consul-general. The volume containing extracts from your Inquiry on the same subject has excited great interest here. The result of your labours cannot fail to be equally appreciated. . . . . . . &c. &c. &c.Alexis de Tocqueville. P.S.—In three months I shall publish my work upon ‘American Institutions.’ You may be sure that I shall send you an early copy. Lincoln’s Inn, February 17, 1835. My dear Sir,—Pray accept my best thanks for your excellent work, ‘De la Démocratie en Amérique,’ which I have read with great interest, delight, and I hope instruction. It appears to me one of the most remarkable books of the age. I am most anxious that it should be reviewed and translated here; but there is great difficulty in getting a review of any book requiring much thought. Those who are competent for such a work seldom like to write anonymously. If, however, you will sacrifice a few copies for the chance, and will send them to me, I will put them into the hands of the editors of our principal reviews, the ‘Edinburgh,’ ‘Quarterly,’ ‘Westminster,’ and ‘London.’ I think also that it would be worth your while to send a copy to the Athenæum Club, both in order to obtain readers, and to insure your admission to that club (the best I think in London) on your arrival. The best mode of sending books to me in London is to direct to me, at M. J. B. Baillière, Libraire, 13 bis Rue de l’École de Médecine, Paris. Their parcels leave Paris for London every Saturday evening, and will come to me without any expense to you. I think too that it might be well to send (by the same means) copies to Lord Brougham and Lord Lansdowne. A few remarks have occurred to me, principally in your second volume. Page 58. Is not a passage omitted after the eleventh line? Perhaps the passage at p. 59, beginning ‘Je regarde,’ ought to be here inserted. P. 76. Has money fallen in value in France since the Empire? It has risen everywhere else. P. 76. Note. The expenditure on the poor arises not from the democratic nature of the American Government, but from the compulsory provision. In Denmark the most despotic, and England, the most aristocratic, country in Europe it is far greater than in America. P. 115. I do not think that in England the wealth of the poor has been sacrificed to that of the rich. As far as my investigations extend, the wages of the English labourer are higher than those of any labourer. He has not landed property, because it is more profitable to him to work for another than to cultivate; but this depends on the same ground which makes it more profitable to work for a cotton manufacturer than to make stockings for his own use. It is a part of the system of the division of labour, of which la grande culture is only an instance. P. 383. Note. What sort of milles carrés do you refer to? Not certainly English. P. 393. I cannot think that population is an element of wealth. It may rather be said to be an element of poverty. The wealth or poverty of the people of a country depends on the proportion between their numbers and the aggregate wealth of that country. Diminish their numbers, the wealth remaining the same, and they will be, individually, richer. The people of Ireland, and indeed of England, would be richer if they were fewer. I do not call a country like China, where there is an immense population, individually poor, a rich country, though the aggregate wealth of China is greater than the aggregate wealth of Holland, where the population is, comparatively, individually rich. I am delighted to hear that you are likely to be soon in London; and I trust to have the earliest information of your arrival. I shall send to you to-morrow by the Ambassador’s bag1 a little pamphlet, written by me, but not avowed, on National Property. It will show you the feelings of the Whig party here, as I wrote it in concurrence with some of the leaders of that party; and they have in general adopted its views. With our best regards, believe me, my dear Sir, yours very truly, Nassau W. Senior. Paris, February 21, 1835. My dear Mr. Senior,—I thank you much for the kind letter which you have just sent to me. There is no one whose approbation I was more anxious to gain, and I am proud of having obtained it. How much I wish that the book could be made generally accessible to your countrymen, and that they might share your opinion. Its success here much surpasses my expectations. But I shall not be satisfied unless it extends to what I consider, in an intellectual sense, my second country. I was glad to see that I had already taken the measures for insuring publicity which you advise. I had sent copies to the ‘Edinburgh,’ the ‘Quarterly,’ and the ‘Westminster,’ and I thank you for your kind offer of presenting them to the editors of those reviews, begging you at the same time to give them some account of the book and to ask them to grant it an early notice. You will understand that I am anxious that it should become known before my approaching visit to England. I shall be delighted to follow your advice by sending copies to Lord Brougham and Lord Lansdowne. I had already thought of so doing, but I confess that I was deterred by what happened to me eighteen months ago, when I sent a copy of the ‘Système Pénitentiaire’ to the Archbishop of Dublin with a letter of presentation. Since then I have not heard a syllable of His Grace, which has astonished me very much, for in our country there is no person so insignificant as not to expect some acknowledgment when he presents a book, or an answer when he writes a letter. I come now to your criticisms, which have given me almost as much pleasure as your praise, because they prove the attention with which you have read my book, and, besides, I intend to make use of several of them in preparing a second edition. You tell me that on page 58 of the second volume, a passage is misplaced. I have looked again at the passage: you are right. A note on p. 76 induces you to ask if money has fallen in value in France since the Empire? in other words, whether more money is wanted now than then for purchasing the same things? My answer is, that I have not made any particular inquiries upon this point. I followed the current opinion on the subject. I do not understand how it can be erroneous. Although much less was produced from the mines during the civil wars in America, I cannot believe the mass of gold and silver in circulation to be less now than it was twenty years ago. However, I intend to endeavour to clear up this point as regards France. You tell me with much truth respecting a note on p. 77, that a poor law is no proof of a republican government; but my reason for quoting America in this respect was to give French readers an instance of the expense willingly incurred by a democracy. There are many causes which may induce any government to relieve the poor at the expense of the state, but a republican government is from its nature forced to do so. In page 115 I said that in English legislation the bien du pauvre had in the end been sacrificed to that of the rich. You attack me on this point, of which you certainly are a competent judge. You must allow me, however, to differ from you. In the first place, it seems to me that you give to the expression le bien du pauvre a confined sense which was not mine; you translate it wealth, a word especially applied to money. I meant by it all that contributes to happiness; personal consideration, political right, easy justice, intellectual enjoyments, and many other indirect sources of contentment. I shall believe, till I have proof of the contrary, that in England the rich have gradually monopolised almost all the advantages that society bestows upon mankind. Taking the question in your own restricted sense, and admitting that a poor man is better paid when he works on another man’s land than when he cultivates his own, do you not think that there are political, moral, and intellectual advantages, which are a more than sufficient and, above all, a permanent compensation for the loss that you point out? I know, however, that this is one of the most important questions of the age, and perhaps the one on which we differ most entirely. Soon I hope that we shall have an opportunity for discussing it. In the meanwhile I cannot help telling you how dissatisfied I was at the way in which Mr. McCulloch, whose talent, however, I acknowledge, has treated this question. I was astonished at his quoting us Frenchmen in support of his arguments in favour of the non-division of landed property; and at his asserting that the physical well-being of the people deteriorates in proportion to the sub-division of property. I am convinced that up to the present time this is substantially false. Such an opinion would find no echo here, even from those who attack the law of succession as impolitic and dangerous in its ultimate tendency. Even they acknowledge that as yet the progress of our people in comfort and civilisation has been rapid and uninterrupted, and that in these respects the France of to-day is as unlike as possible to the France of twenty years ago. I repeat, however, that such questions cannot be treated in writing. They must be reserved for long conversations. My friend and former colleague, M. Gustave de Beaumont, has also just published a book upon America. If, as I hope, you have time to read it, I am sure that you will be pleased with it. The question of Slavery, which I could only touch upon, is treated thoroughly and with great ability in this work. M. de Beaumont hopes soon to have the honour of making your acquaintance, for he intends to accompany me to England. &c. &c. &c.A. de Tocqueville. Letter from Archbishop Whately.Dublin, March 2, 1835. My dear Senior,—I should have been glad to be able to send M. de Tocqueville, along with my thanks for his book, and the very flattering and gratifying letter that accompanied it, some specific remarks on the parts that should have most struck me on perusal. But I have been so incessantly harassed with business that I have not yet been able even to cut open the leaves; though I am still looking forward from day to day to an opportunity of deriving not only pleasure from it, but valuable instruction with a view to the reforms which I hope will ere long be commenced in our own system. In the meantime I ought at once to have returned my grateful acknowledgments for his present. I will beg you now to do so for me, and to apologise for a negligence which might seem unaccountable to anyone who does not actually see, and no one else can know, the variety of harassing business that besets me. Over and above all proper episcopal business, ‘that which cometh upon me daily, the care of all the Churches,’ I am a member of nearly thirty boards, infinitely varied in the matters pertaining to them and several of them very important and laborious. R. Dublin. Lincoln’s Inn, March 5, 1835. My dear Sir,—I send to you on the other side a copy of a letter which I have just received from the Archbishop of Dublin. You will see how it happens that you have not heard from him before. Your copies for Lord Lansdowne and Lord Brougham reached me, and were forwarded on Tuesday last. So did M. de Beaumont’s two copies of ‘Marie’ for the ‘Quarterly’ and ‘Athenæum.’ I have written to Lock-hart, the Editor of the ‘Quarterly;’ and have mentioned to him your work as demanding a review. He had not then seen it. I have read ‘Marie’ with great delight and instruction. It is very powerfully written, though perhaps with too much ‘onction’ for our colder tastes. Blanco White is preparing a review of ‘la Démocratie’ for the ‘New London Review.’1 He had only read the introduction when I heard from him. He says that it is the most profound view of society in Europe that he has ever seen. Dr. Bowring says that he will endeavour to have it reviewed in the ‘Westminster.’ But you must not be surprised if you see no reviews for two or three months. It is very difficult to get anyone to review works requiring much thought. Persons capable of doing so do not like to write anonymously. When I have the pleasure of seeing you I hope to discuss the question about ‘le bien des pauvres.’ I believe that, so far as they are in a worse situation here than in the rest of Europe (which is seldom, perhaps never, the case) it has arisen solely from the misguided benevolence of the aristocracy; and through an abuse of the poor laws. In Scotland, the most aristocratic portion of Great Britain, they are remarkably well off. Pray say to M. de Beaumont with how much pleasure I look forward to his acquaintance. Yours very truly,N. W. Senior. March 14, 1835. My dear Mr. Senior,—A thousand thanks for the steps you have taken respecting the English Reviews. I hope that they will produce some fruits. I do not, however, conceal from myself that in a country agitated as yours is at present, the curiosity of the public is little directed towards subjects of general and external interest, such as those of which my book treats. A scientific society in my province has asked me lately for a paper on Pauperism. I have begun it, but in order to finish it I ought to know what is going on in England, and particularly the New Poor Law, which was passed I think last year. Would it be possible for you to send me the Act of Parliament? you would render me a great service, especially if it came soon. I received the other day an extremely kind letter from Lord Lansdowne, for which I am very grateful. A. de Tocqueville. P.S.—I hope that when my visit to London takes place, the Archbishop of Dublin will have already arrived there, and that I shall have the pleasure of seeing him. Meantime pray remember me to him. March 18, 1835. My dear Sir,—I have directed two more pamphlets to be sent by the Ambassador’s bag. I cannot guess through whose fault the one already sent has miscarried. I have also directed a copy of the Poor Law Act, and of a preface of mine explaining it, to be sent. They will I hope go to-morrow. I had also directed copies of the Report of the Poor Law Commissioners, and of the Extracts of their evidence, and of Messrs. Cowell’s and Wrottesley’s reports, addressed to the Commissioners, to be forwarded to you. But they are too large for the bag, and I have not found any other opportunity. On consulting with my French bookseller, Baillière, he has reminded me that I sent copies of these three volumes to his brother, the bookseller at Paris, and that your best way will be to call there and take them from him, and I will, as soon as there is an opportunity, send him fresh ones. If you will do this, you will, I hope, find them ready for you, as Baillière has promised to write immediately to his brother on the subject. The three volumes are
The report, or at least three-fourths of it, was written by me, and all that was not written by me was re-written by me. The greater part of the Act, founded on it, was also written by me; and in fact I am responsible for the effects, good or evil (and they must be one or the other in an enormous degree), of the whole measure. When you are here I will show you the evidence in full. It fills fourteen folio volumes. Ever yours,N. W. Senior. London, May 1835. My dear Sir,—Not being able to call on you to-day, M. de Beaumont and I desire to express our thanks, first for the books which you have been so kind as to send to us, and likewise for the letter which we have just received from the Athenæum. Allow me also to tell you with what keen interest we read the political pamphlet which accompanied the book. For my part I have not read anything for many years throwing so much light upon the state of the country and the position of parties. I consider this pamphlet, and M. de Beaumont shares my opinion, as the most valuable document which could fall into the hands of a foreigner visiting England for the purpose of studying its peculiarities and completing his political education. I am, &c.,A. de Tocqueville. Lincoln’s Inn, November 20, 1835. My dear Sir,—The bearer of this note is Mr. Burnley of Trinidad, an old friend of mine, and the brother-in-law of Mr. Hume. He is anxious to make, or rather renew, his acquaintance with you. I say renew, because he once went over one of the American prisons in your company. I can give you little public news since your departure. The New Poor Law Bill is working admirably, and if the Report of the new Commissioners is out in time I will send it to you as a proof of our progress. Your work on America is exciting every day more and more attention. You have probably seen an excellent review of it, by John Mill, in the ‘London Review.’ Our Government1 is timid, afraid of O’Connell, afraid of Sir Robert Peel, afraid of the King; but yet I believe likely to last. The general prosperity of the country is an element in its favour not easily counterbalanced. And it is beyond all comparison the most honest administration that we have ever had. Much more so than a Tory administration can possibly be, since it believes whatever progress it makes in reform to be beneficial; whereas a Tory minister believes all the progress which is forced on him to be mischievous. When you have leisure I look forward to hearing that you are well and well employed in France, and with still more pleasure, to hearing that you are going to pay us another visit. Believe me, my dear Sir, yours very truly, Nassau W. Senior. Paris, January 27, 1836. My dear Mr. Senior,—Your letter dated November 20 reached me only eight or ten days ago, Mr. Burnley not having delivered it earlier. I received that gentleman as well as I could, but much less hospitably than I wished. I had, unfortunately, only too good an excuse for this. I have just had the misfortune of losing my mother; and you will feel that in the first moment of the grief caused by this sad event, I was not in a fit state to do the honours of Paris to a stranger. Happily Mr. Burnley proposes to spend the whole winter here, and I intend to do all I can to make myself agreeable to him. I am all the more sanguine as to my powers, as I have now an excellent interpreter. You are doubtless aware that three months ago I married a country-woman of yours, and I rejoice in telling you that I every day find fresh reasons for congratulating myself on my choice. Thank you very much for the details you give me as to your home politics. It seems that with you the Revolution, taking the word in the sense of a tranquil progress, is still going on; or rather the Revolution seems to me to have been accomplished on the day when you introduced the most democratic class into the Electoral Body. The rest is only a consequence. With us, for the moment at least, all things seem completely restored to their normal state. With the exception of agriculture, which is suffering a little, everything prospers in an astonishing manner. For the first time for five years the idea of stability seems to have entered men’s minds, and with it the desire for commercial enterprise. The almost feverish activity which has always characterised us is leaving the domain of politics for that of material well-being. If I am not greatly mistaken, we shall see during the next few years immense progress in this direction. But the Government would be very wrong to over-rate the consequences of this happy state of affairs. The nation has suffered horribly; she is now luxuriating in the repose which has at length been granted to her. But all our past experience teaches us that this repose may itself become fatal to the Government. In proportion as the fatigue of these latter years is less felt, we shall see political passion restored to life, and if whilst it is strong the Government does not redouble its prudence and treat with great circumspection the susceptibilities of the country, some day a sudden storm will burst upon its head; but will it ever understand this? I doubt. You saw the laws it proposed last year against the Press,—laws as odious as they were unnecessary, and of which the sole result would have been to restore the power of the Press if they had been carried into effect. But the same things are written now as formerly, because license in writing has become a habit with us, and habits are more powerful than laws. At present the great question with us is the conversion of the funds. The opposition proceeds from the King himself, who expressed himself so strongly in the Council against this financial measure, that ministers have been forced to assume an attitude which they cannot any longer sustain. The majority in the Chambers, which in reality, as I have often told you, serves the passions of the Government only when it shares them, has eagerly proclaimed itself in favour of the measure. No doubt it will gain the day, nevertheless I do not think that the measure will pass this year. . . . . A. de Tocqueville. Paris, January 11, 1837. My dear Mr. Senior,—I did not reach Paris until the end of December, and received only two days ago your Report on the Poor Laws and the Treatise on Political Economy, which you were so kind as to send me by Mr. Greg. A thousand thanks to you for having thought of me. You could not have given me anything that I should have liked better than your outline of Political Economy. I have often confessed to you that I was insufficiently informed on this important portion of human science, and I have many times thought that you were the man most capable of supplying this deficiency. All that you publish is much valued by me, but especially what you write on political economy. I have not yet, however, been able to read what you have sent. I am, at this moment, so wrapped up in my second work on America, that I scarcely see or hear what is going on around me. I think that my book will be finished in the summer, and published next autumn. I do not know if it will be good; but I can affirm that I cannot make it better. I devote to it all my time and all my intelligence. Our ministry is still in a dubious state.1 Its downfall does not appear to be imminent, but it may happen at any moment in consequence of the most trifling question; for the majority in the Chamber may be said rather to suffer the ministers to exercise the functions of government than to entrust them with its responsibilities. It would have a still worse chance if it were not for M. Molé, who attracts many members naturally hostile to the theorists.2 The material prosperity of the country is still very great and increases slowly but steadily; if we are able to preserve peace and our institutions, even in their present imperfect state, for twenty years longer, the internal aspect of France will be entirely metamorphosed. . . . . . . A. de Tocqueville. Kensington, February 15, 1838. My dear Sir,—Mr. Ellice, who has distinguished himself among our diplomatists and administrators, is on his way to Paris, and is very anxious to have the honour of making your acquaintance. I have ventured therefore to give him this note of introduction; and I have begged him to take charge of two little works of mine which may not yet have reached you; one of them indeed—the Instructions to Assistant Commissioners in the Handloom Inquiry—is not yet published, and what I send is only the proof. It may serve as a specimen of the inquiries which we are instituting as to the state of the labouring population. I was delighted to find from the note which I had the honour of receiving from you last summer, that you were then busily engaged on your work on American Manners. It is a great happiness that such a subject should have fallen into such hands. I shall be very anxious to hear of its completion, and still more so if I hear that the termination of your labours is likely to enable you to revisit England. I am thinking myself, if I can escape for a fortnight, of making, in the beginning of April, a short tour in Normandy with Lord Shelburne, Lord Lansdowne’s now only remaining son. I fear, however, that there is no chance of your being at that time in the country. Mrs. Senior begs me to present to you her compliments, and to say how anxious she is to renew her acquaintance with you, and to make that of Madame de Tocqueville. With our united regards, believe me, my dear Sir, yours very truly, N. W. Senior. Château de Baugy, February 29, 1838. The post has this instant brought me, my dear Mr. Senior, the letter of which Mr. Ellice was the bearer, and which he could not deliver in person as I have been away from Paris for some months, and shall continue to be so for some months longer. I sincerely regret that I was not able to make the acquaintance of Mr. Ellice, whose name, I need not say, was well known to me. Pray tell him how eagerly I should have sought and cultivated his society if I had been in Paris. I would myself write to him to express my regret if I knew his address. I hope, my dear Mr. Senior, that you will feel a great admiration for me when you hear that I have torn myself away from the charms of Paris, and of the whole political and literary world fermenting there, in order to shut myself up with my books, pens, and paper in the midst of forests almost as dense as those of the New World and much less poetical. I could find no other way of finishing the book at which I have been working almost incessantly for the last three years, and in spite of this effort I am not yet quite sure of completing it, as I want to do, by the middle of the summer. The subject is much more difficult and infinitely wider than I supposed when I undertook its treatment. I should probably have recoiled from the task had I been aware of its extent. I am staying here with one of my brothers, far enough from Paris to enjoy perfect liberty, but near enough to take a holiday there from time to time and fetch the books I require. I am leading a busy, monotonous, but very agreeable life, so do not pity me too much. Allow me to tell you that it is a very mistaken idea on your part to think of taking a pleasure trip in Normandy in the month of April. Do you not know France is of all countries the one where you most require a bright sun to make you forget the bad inns? You should instead pay a little visit to Paris, and let me know beforehand. I should certainly join you there, for I feel an intense desire for some conversation with you. I should also be very glad to make acquaintance with Lord Lansdowne’s son. Pray remember me particularly to his father. . . . . . . A. de Tocqueville. [Two letters follow asking for information on the measures taken by England for the emancipation of slaves. They consist merely of questions. I am sorry to say that Mr. Senior’s answers were not among the letters returned to me.—Ed.]
February 27, 1841. My dear Sir,—I take advantage of the privilege of General Hamilton to send to you a copy of a Report on Handloom Weavers, which I printed a few days ago, after having given to it the leisure of nearly two years. If you can find time to look through it, you will find that it treats at some length many important questions. During the course of the last two months I have read through, not for the first or even the second time, your great work. Will you allow me to offer to you the following observations? You appear to consider France as eminently democratic, England as eminently aristocratic. And yet many of the qualities which you describe as marking democratic societies appear to belong to us much more than to you. For instance, the desire for bien-être. In England the desire to make and increase a fortune seems to me to urge many more people, and more constantly and forcibly, than in France. A French tradesman spends much more of his time and of his money on amusement and dress than an English one; he retires much sooner from business, satisfied with his fortune. I believe that next to the United States there is no population so sedulously intent on fortune as the English and Scotch. Take again individualism. Except on questions affecting religious opinions and religious feelings, such as Church questions, slavery, or slave trade, little interest is felt in politics by the English people. No ordinances of the Crown would produce in London barricades or insurrection. Probably there are not one hundred people out of London who have taken the pains to know where Ghilzie is, or what has been the nature of the Indian war, in which an empire is supposed to have been conquered.1 The Eastern question, which you thought and think so much of, has never elicited with us the least interest, except so far as we have feared that it might bring war. Whether Mehemet Ali reigned in Constantinople and Alexandria, or Mahmoud in both these countries, not two persons out of London, and not ten persons in London, care one sixpence. Lord Palmerston has not acquired a grain of popularity by his success. The only remark is, ‘We wish he would keep quiet.’ Again you say that a democratic nation is pacific, an aristocratic one warlike. Now nothing, I fear, is more warlike than the feeling in France, nothing is more pacific than the feeling in England. All that we require from our foreign minister is, to keep peace. Lord Palmerston’s only defence is, that he thought he used the best means to avoid war. He never thought of defending himself by saying that he was anxious to extend English influence, or by any appeals to the desire of national aggrandisement; for he knows that we have no such desire. The speech which you addressed to the French Chamber would have been utterly ruinous to any English statesman. What, it would have been said, to think of going to war merely to prevent our being excluded from taking part in the affairs of Syria or Egypt? or to show that we are not unable to go to war? Or because, we, being one, are, in a business taken up by the five Powers, required to yield to the opinion of the four? Now you laid down to the French Chamber these three cases as fit causes of war. In the English House, either of Lords or Commons, we should consider such proposals as scarcely deserving a serious answer. The passage which you struck out of the Address—namely, that if you were attacked you would resist, forms the groundwork of all English feeling on peace and war. Will you let me add some politico-economical remarks? In vol. iv. p. 51, you appear to consider the rate of wages as affected by other causes than those to which I have been accustomed to refer it. I have always been accustomed to consider wages as governed by the comparative supply of labour on the one hand, and of capital on the other, and by the productiveness of labour. Where the capital, in proportion to the number of labourers is large, and the labour is productive, wages are high, because the labourer produces much, and has a large share of what he produces. This is the case in our manufacturing towns. Where the capital is large, but the labour is comparatively unproductive, as in our best agricultural counties, the labourer gets less. Where the capital is small, and the labour also unproductive, as in Ireland, he gets still less. It does not seem to me that the institutions of a country (except slavery or serfage) have anything to do with the matter. P. 291. You appear to consider public debts as capital. It must be recollected that the capital of a public debt has been all spent. It may be a sort of capital in the hands of a public creditor, but certainly the obligation to pay is not capital. P. 295. We have no exceptional tribunals. P. 299. As the desire for railroads, &c. increases, so, with us, does the power of creating them by associations. The Government does not interfere. Believe me, my dear Sir, yours ever truly, N. W. Senior. [A short note of introduction is omitted here.—Ed.] London, May 10, 1842. My dear M. de Tocqueville,—M. Ritter duly presented himself, dined with us one day, but two days afterwards wrote to say that, finding his ignorance of English an obstacle in London, he had retired for six months to the country. On his return I hope he will be bi-linguis, and I have no doubt that the honour of an introduction from you will enable him to establish himself. A wish to understand German is rapidly extending itself, and his general knowledge will enable him to teach it philosophically. I fear there is not much chance of our meeting in Paris. August, September, and October, the months in which I can be absent from England, are those in which Paris is empty, always excepting the hotels, which are full while all the other habitations are deserted. This circumstance, added to the absence of steam communications, and some troublesome regulations as to carriages and passports, have made me in general prefer the Rhine as the access to the Continent. But is there no chance of your visiting England? or of our meeting in Germany or Switzerland or Italy? I should be delighted indeed if your path and ours should coincide. We pursued your steps, as I found by the Visitors’ book, in 1838 for a considerable time, though we never overtook you. While I am writing this letter your discours has been forwarded to me. I had already read it, with the delight and instruction which it has afforded to everyone here. And I am proud that you have honoured me with a copy ex dono. If M. de St. Aulaire is not alarmed at the size of the packet, I shall venture to accompany this note by four brochures of mine. Two are on our English Poor Laws, a matter from which I cannot extricate myself, and the other two on our financial measures of 1841 and 1842. The remarks by a Guardian contain (p. 2), a passage not intended for French eyes, which I will beg you to consider as not sent to you. With our united best regards, believe me, my dear M. de Tocqueville, ever yours truly, N. W. Senior. I hear a rumour of your coming to England. I trust there is some foundation for it. Paris, December 14, 1842. My dear Mr. Senior,—I have been occupied lately in studying with reference to our political affairs a great constitutional question which must have arisen and been discussed in England. The manner in which you may have treated and decided it cannot fail to exercise great influence upon my opinion. I think I cannot do better than to apply to you for information. This is the question: You are aware that last year M. Guizot signed a treaty1 which the Chamber prevented him from ratifying. Was the Chamber right or wrong? this is a point which it is unnecessary and which it would take too long to examine. All that I want to know is, whether, such being the case, according to your constitutional principles the result would or would not be the resignation of the ministers who had signed the treaty. I fancy that there must have been precedents in your constitutional history, at any rate the question must have been discussed in works upon public and political law. It is quite new in France, and on this account as much as for the sake of its practical importance, I have a great wish to study it thoroughly. If you can assist me you will render me a real service. I should be much obliged if you could give me an early answer. I am naturally desirous of forming a definite opinion before the beginning of the session, which will be on the 9th of next month, because, in the first place, it is possible that the question may be debated; and, secondly, because when once the session is opened, it is impossible to study anything consecutively. Again, forgive my importunity; my excuse is the motive which induces me to apply to you. I should not do so did I not believe that from your information and your talents you were of all my English acquaintance the most capable of enlightening me. A. de Tocqueville. London, December 20, 1842. My dear M. de Tocqueville,—I have always hitherto been delighted to hear from you and to answer you; but I am less so this time, as I fear some portion of what I must say may appear unfriendly or presumptuous. I do not believe that a parallel case to M. Guizot’s has ever occurred in England or ever could occur. An English minister finding a treaty signed by his ambassador, after a negotiation in which the ambassador had not exceeded his powers, would have felt himself bound, for the sake of his own honour or for the honour of his country, to ratify it. And would have done so, even in the case—also I think an impossible one—of the House or Houses of Parliament declaring their disapprobation. He would have said, This is an executive, not a legislative act, and I must ratify it, whatever be the consequence. Cases certainly have occurred, though rarely, of treaties signed, and not ratified, in other countries. But it has been either in absolute monarchies, where the king is in fact the minister, or in those constitutional countries, such as America, in which a treaty is a legislative, not an executive act. In America too the President is the minister, and he never resigns. I think, therefore, that you will find no precedent, and no discussion on the subject. But assuming the possibility of an English minister being in M. Guizot’s position, would he now resign? I think not, according to our present feelings. I say our present feelings, for since the Reform Act a great change has taken place in public opinion on this subject. Formerly, when the adverse parties were really only adverse personal factions, a minister used to resign at the first check. It was considered one of the rules of the game that he should do so. And it was a convenient rule, since it enabled the party in power to rule absolutely, and kept up the interest of the game by a frequent change of ministers. But now politics are not a game but a business. A change of ministry is now a national event, and a minister feels himself bound to remain in office as long as the majority of the House of Commons desire that he should do so. The example was set by Peel in 1835, and followed, indeed improved on, by his successors. An English minister in M. Guizot’s position would say, ‘I have been defeated in a measure which I think right, but the Chamber still confides in me, and while it does so, I remain at my post. If you think that I have lost the confidence of the Chamber, put that question to the vote; but while you fear to take that step I will continue minister.’ So much for politics. Indeed I most earnestly wish that I could have the pleasure of seeing you again. But unfortunately at the times when I can best quit England (August, September, and October) you are never in Paris. And this circumstance, joined to the absence of railroads and steamboats, has made me turn my steps rather towards Germany than France. Is there any chance of our meeting abroad? Next autumn we remain in England, but in 1844 we shall be in Bohemia, Silesia, and Saxony. Ever yours truly,N. W. Senior. February 12, 1844. My dear Mr. Senior,—I did not answer your letter immediately, because I did not wish to do so until I had read your pamphlet,1 and the excitement of our parliamentary debates did not allow me to read it for a long time. I have just finished it, and I can assure you that I have never read anything on the subject of Ireland which has appeared to me more worthy of the consideration of statesmen. It would be impossible to put a more complete and striking picture into a smaller frame. Most of the things you say are, as you yourself remark, already known. Nothing new can, in fact, be said upon a subject which has for so many years attracted the attention of the whole world, and has been studied by so many eminent men. But you have succeeded so well in bringing out the chief features of this immense and confused picture that it seems as if one saw it for the first time in your pages. As for the remedies you propose, a great deal might be said about them; even a long letter would be insufficient to discuss them. I would rather wait for the opportunity, which I hope soon to have, of conversing with you. The announcement that you are coming soon gives me great pleasure. This is not the first time that I have told you of the value I set on your friendship, and on the pleasure and instruction I derive from your conversation. You will meet here many who share my opinion, and a great many more who earnestly wish to know you. You ask for my advice as to your journey. Here it is: I think that your best plan would be to go to Havre. From Havre to Rouen there is a very agreeable mode of transport by steam-boat, and a quick land journey. When once you have reached Rouen, the railroad takes you to Paris in four hours. I am, &c.,A. de Tocqueville. [There is a gap here in the correspondence.—Ed.] To N. W. Senior, Esq.Tocqueville, August 25, 1847. Many thanks for your route; not that I hope to fall in with you in Italy, but because I hope to be able to meet you in Paris. I shall be delighted to see you again after so long an absence, and to talk over with you all that has been going on, and is going on in the world. You will find France calm and not unprosperous, but anxious. Men’s minds have been subject for some time to a strange uneasiness. In the midst of tranquillity more profound than any that we have enjoyed for a very long time, the idea that our present position is unstable besets them. As for myself, though not without alarm, I am less anxious; I do not exaggerate our danger. I believe that our social edifice will continue to rest on its present basis, because no one, even if he wish to change its foundation, can point out another. But yet the state of public feeling disturbs me. The middle classes, cajoled and bribed for the last seventeen years by the Government, have gradually assumed towards the rest of the nation the position of a little aristocracy, and without its higher feelings: one feels ashamed of being led by such a vulgar and corrupt aristocracy, and if this feeling should prevail among the lower classes it may produce great calamities. And yet how can a Government be prevented from using corruption, when the nature of our constituencies makes corruption so convenient, and our centralisation makes it so easy? The fact is that we are trying an experiment of which I cannot foresee the result. We are trying to employ at the same time two instruments which, I believe, have never been combined before: an elected Assembly and a highly centralised Executive. It is the greatest problem of modern times. We have proposed it to the world, but it has not yet been solved. I am anxious for your inferences from what you have seen in Germany, and are now seeing in Italy. Kind and affectionate regards. A. de Tocqueville. Splügen, September 30, 1847. My dear M. de Tocqueville,—I have not ventured to write to you while I was on the other side of the Alps, as I know from experience that it is not safe to form plans depending on their being passable—but now, having left the formidable Splügen behind me, I can say that we shall be in Paris on October 12. I have written to engage rooms at the Hôtel Wagram, Rue de Rivoli. We take the route of the Rhine and Brussels, and certainly the first thing I do in Paris will be to go to the Rue de la Madeleine. I must own that the great difficulty in France appears to me the weakness, almost the want, of the aristocratic element in your Government. We perhaps have too much of it—though it is so rapidly diminishing that perhaps I ought rather to say we had too much. On the other hand, you seem to me to have too much of the monarchical element. We have succeeded in reducing the Crown to a mere ceremony. Our queen is a phantom, put there not to act, but merely to fill space; to prevent anyone else from being there. We have spent a month in the north of Italy, in the Austrian dominions. It is a melancholy country. Everywhere there are the traces of a civilisation which exceeded what now exists. I am glad to get out of it, and leave behind me fine bad inns, begging children, and a peasantry in rags, but handsomer than the higher orders. Ever yours,N. W. Senior. [We spent a pleasant fortnight in Paris in October, enjoying the society of M. de Tocqueville and of some of our other friends; but at that time Mr. Senior kept no notes of his travels. In the following February the Revolution took place. Mr. Senior’s account of the events which led to it and of the crisis itself precedes the journals kept in France and Italy. The letter to which the following is an answer is not among those returned to me.—Ed.] Paris, April 10, 1848. My dear Mr. Senior,—I was away when your letter came. I found it on my return only three days ago. I immediately went to Mr. Austin’s, to know what had prevented your visit to Paris. I was grieved to hear that your health had forced you to change your plans. I am doubly sorry not to see you, on account of the cause. I had been the more anxious for your arrival as I expected to have derived from your conversation some ideas which would have been of special value at this juncture in our affairs. It has not escaped your notice that our greatest evils are not the result of fierce political excitement, but of the frightful ignorance of the masses as to the real conditions of production and of social prosperity. Our sufferings are caused less by false ideas on politics properly so called, than by false notions on political economy. I do not think that a poor-law such as you suggest would, at least at present, remedy the evil. The Revolution was not brought about by the privations of the working classes. In some districts they certainly suffered from want, but in general, I may say that in no other country or period had the working classes been better off than they were in France. This was especially true of those who were employed in agriculture. There the labourer did not need work, but work needed labourers. In consequence of the sub-division of landed property, there was a deficiency of hands. The crisis from which the workmen in large manufactories were suffering, lasted a very short time, and though severe was not unexampled. It was not want, but ideas, that brought about that violent subversion; chimerical ideas on the relations between labour and capital, extravagant theories as to the degree in which the Government might interfere between the working man and the employer, doctrines of ultra-centralisation which had at last persuaded large numbers that it depended on the State not only to save them from want but to place them in easy comfortable circumstances. You must feel that to these diseased imaginations a poor-law would not be an efficient remedy. I am far, however, from saying that recourse must not be had to it. I even think that the people ought long ago to have obtained one; but this law would not be enough to extricate us from our present difficulties, for, I repeat, we have to contend with ideas rather than with wants. Three weeks before the Revolution, I made a speech1 which was taken down at the time in short-hand, and reproduced in the ‘Moniteur.’ I have just had it printed exactly as it stands in the ‘Moniteur.’ I send you a copy; pray read it; you will see that though I knew not how or when a revolution would take place, the proximity of such an event was clearly manifest to me. I have often been reminded of this speech, which aroused at the time violent murmurs in the Chamber, from those who are now willing to own that they were wrong, and that I was right. I believed that I pointed out, as much as was possible in half an hour, the primary and deeply seated causes of that revolution. All my recent experience has had the effect of confirming me in the same opinions. The great and real cause of the Revolution was the detestable spirit which animated the Government during this long reign; a spirit of trickery, of baseness, and of bribery, which has enervated and degraded the middle classes, destroyed their public spirit, and filled them with a selfishness so blind as to induce them to separate their interests entirely from those of the lower classes whence they sprang, which consequently have been abandoned to the counsels of men who, under pretence of serving the lower orders, have filled their heads with false ideas. This is the root of the matter, all the rest were accidents, strange and violent in themselves, I confess, but still insufficient to produce alone such an effect. Consider, on the one hand, the causes which I have pointed out, and on the other our system of centralisation, which makes the fate of France depend on a single blow struck in Paris, and you will have the explanation of the Revolution of 1848, such as one day it will appear in history, and as I myself intend to write it if God preserves my life. Will you be so good as to present a copy of my speech to Lord Lansdowne, and remember me particularly to him? I have alluded only to the past in this letter; to treat of the future more than a letter would be required. We are in the most extraordinary position that a great nation has ever been thrown into. We are forced to witness great misfortunes; we are surrounded by great dangers. My chief hope is in the lower orders. They are deficient in intelligence, but they have instincts which are worthy of all admiration. I am myself astonished, and a foreigner would be even more surprised, to see how strong a feeling for order and true patriotism prevails: to see their good sense in all things of which they are capable of judging, and in all matters on which they have not been deceived by the ambitious dreamers to whom they were abandoned. Adieu, dear Senior, &c.A. de Tocqueville. Paris, April 17, 1848. My dear Mr. Senior,—I received with great pleasure the papers you sent to me. They are very valuable to me, as indeed everything is which comes from you. I have not yet been able to call upon Mr. Rogers. In these troubled times one cannot command a moment. During the whole of yesterday I had a musket instead of a pen in my hand. However, the day went off capitally, and would have been decisive if the moderate party had a man of action at its head. The violent party tried to get up an insurrection. The news which reached them from the departments announcing the certain triumph of the moderate party in the elections showed the necessity for striking a blow in Paris. Yesterday, therefore, an experiment was tried for overturning the Provisional Government. 30,000 or 40,000 workmen assembled in the Champs de Mars. The drum was immediately beaten in Paris. In half an hour more than 100,000 National Guards were under arms. Battalions were formed in an instant and ran to the Hôtel de Ville crying, ‘Long live the Provisional Government!’ ‘Down with the Communists!’ At the end of an hour Paris was in their hands, and the mob, after vainly attempting to enter the Hôtel de Ville, dispersed. This is the first decisive victory which has been gained by the moderate party for the last two months. God grant that they may understand how to derive from it all the advantages which it may afford! I am glad to hear that you have resumed your project of visiting us. All who, like you, are interested in witnessing the great dramas presented from time to time by human affairs, should come to Paris. I shall be much obliged if you will bring me some documents which I think will be very useful at this juncture. 1. First, relating to the regulation of the House of Commons, i.e. all the rules followed by the House in conducting its business. We probably could learn much from it for the regulation of our Assembly. 2. In the second place, I want some papers containing information as to your income tax. We shall not be able to avoid a similar tax, and we are anxious to know how it is imposed and collected in your country. To explain: I wish to know how it is imposed, according to what rules, what is the cost of collection, how much it has lately produced, what effects, economical or others, it has caused, and what are the exemptions? I shall write no more as I am extremely busy I leave Paris to-day for Normandy for the elections. I shall be back in ten days. A. de Tocqueville. [A proposal made by M. Wolowski in the Chamber of Deputies to consider the prayer of the Polish delegates asking the assistance of France in restoring the independence of their country, had an effect which had never been anticipated by the distinguished speaker. It was the pretext for a Red conspiracy. On May 15, a violent attack was made on the Assembly. A body of workmen marched along the Boulevards towards the Place de la Concorde, where they were met by a small detachment of National Guards quite inadequate to resist them. Nor was any opposition offered to their progress by a body of 1,000 Gardes Mobiles posted in front of the Assembly. The rioters rushed into the Chamber, imposed the reading of their petition on the members, and carried everything in their own way till a large detachment of National Guards under the command of General Clément Thomas came to the rescue. Barbès and the other ringleaders marched to the Hôtel de Ville, where they proclaimed themselves a provisional government. Towards six o’clock Lamartine, accompanied by a strong body of National Guards, penetrated into the Hôtel de Ville, arrested Barbès, Albert, and their colleagues, and consigned them to Vincennes. These were the events which induced Mr. Senior to write his first journal in May, 1848.—Ed.] [1]Extracts from this pamphlet are published in Mr. Senior’s Ireland. Longmans, 1868. The portions, however, which relate to English politics are for the most part omitted.—Ed. [1]The New London Review was started in 1829, under the editorship of Blanco White. See J. H. Newman’s Essays, vol. i. p. 27.—Ed. [1]Lord Melbourne was Prime Minister.—Ed. [1]Sic in Original.—Ed. [2]Doctrinaires is the French expression.—Ed. [1]The war in Cabul and Affghanistan.—Ed. [1]The treaty for the suppression of the slave trade—signed December 20, 1841—ratified by Austria, Great Britain, Prussia, and Russia, February 19, 1842—never ratified by France. See Guizot, Mémoires pour servir, &c., vol. vi. p. 130, et seq.—Ed. [1]An article in the Edinburgh Review for January 1844, re-published in Mr. Senior’s Ireland. Longmans, 1868.—Ed. [1]This was the passage in M. de Tocqueville’s speech on January 27, 1848:—‘It is supposed,’ said he, ‘that there is no danger because there is no collision. It is said, that as there is no actual disturbance of the surface of society, revolution is far off. |
