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He suffered much, but he still hoped. He became worse as the spring came on, and on the 16th of April, 1859, he died. He was fifty-four years old, but he had lived a long life, if life be measured by thought and moral progress. In his domestic life Tocqueville had been most happy, and it was in his own home that his character appeared in its most delightful aspect.
Just as Tocqueville said: "He who despises mankind will never get the best out of either others or himself." The best known of Vauvenargues' sayings, as it is the deepest and the broadest, is the far-reaching sentence already quoted, that "Great thoughts come from the heart." And this is the truth that shines out as we watch the voyagings of humanity from the "wide, grey, lampless depths" of time.
Reformation had become the order of the day there as in England; the Duchess of Orleans, the Grand Duchess of Mecklenburg, M. Guizot, the Duc de Broglie, M. de Tocqueville, M. Carnot, and other high and noble personages were much interested in the subject.
'Louis Napoleon had the merit or the luck to discover what few suspected the latent Bonapartism of the nation.... The memory of the Emperor, vague and undefined, but therefore the more imposing, still dwelt like an heroic legend in the imaginations of the people. All the educated, in the opinion of Tocqueville, condemned and repudiated the Coup d'état.
M. de Tocqueville, who was ill, threw his overcoat on the floor in the recess of a window, and lay down. He remained thus stretched upon the ground for several hours. These rooms were warmed very badly by cast-iron stoves, shaped like hives. A Representative wishing to poke the fire, upset one, and nearly set fire to the wooden flooring. The last of these rooms looked out on the quay.
Similarly we should stick to our province and not be British Americans. It would be introducing a source of radical weakness. It would ruin us in the eyes of the civilized world. All writers point out the errors of the United States. All the feelings prognosticated by Tocqueville are shown to be fulfilled. These and other arguments prevailed.
To borrow the words of De Tocqueville: "They cling to freedom for its native charms independent of its gifts, the pleasure of speaking, acting, and breathing without restraint, under no master but God and the Law." The Englishmen of the first half of the seventeenth century were the fathers of the men who fired shots at Lexington and Concord, "heard round the world."
"It is understood, and he makes no mystery of it, that he inclines towards the vague and undecided doctrine of the Unitarians." What M. Groen's idea of Unitarians is may be gathered from the statement about them which he gets from a letter of De Tocqueville.
Especially are we jealous of highly centralized authority. De Tocqueville argued that we would never be able to develop a strong central government, and that our democracy would be menaced with failure by that lack.
You are familiar with the writings of De Tocqueville, and must be aware of the intense sympathy which he felt for your institutions; and this sympathy is all the more valuable from the philosophic candour with which he points out not only your merits, but your defects and dangers.
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