causes and circumstances which prepared our forefathers, gradually, for
the enjoyment of free institutions, and which enable them to sustain,
without abusing, the utmost liberty that was ever enjoyed by any people.
In tracing these causes, in examining how far they continue to influence
our conduct, manners, and opinions, and in searching for the means of
preventing their decay or destruction, the intelligent American reader
will find no better guide than M. DE TOCQUEVILLE.

Fresh from the scenes of the "three days" revolution in France, the
author came among us to observe, carefully and critically, the operation
of the new principle on which the happiness of his country, and, as he
seems to believe, the destinies of the civilized world, depend. Filled
with the love of liberty, but remembering the atrocities which, in its
name, had been committed under former dynasties at home, he sought to
discover the means by which it was regulated in America, and reconciled
with social order. By his laborious investigations, and minute
observations of the history of the settlement of the country, and of its
progress through the colonial state to independence, he found the object
of his inquiry in the manners, habits, and opinions, of a people who had
been gradually prepared, by a long course of peculiar circumstances, and
by their local position, for self-government; and he has explained, with
a pencil of light, the mystery that has baffled Europeans and perplexed
Americans. He exhibits us, in our present condition, a new, and to
Europeans, a strange people. His views of our political institutions are
more general, comprehensive, and philosophic than have been presented by
any writer, domestic or foreign. He has traced them from their source,
democracy--the power of the people--and has steadily pursued this
foundation-principle in all its forms and modifications: in the frame of
our governments, in their administration by the different executives, in
our legislation, in the arrangement of our judiciary, in our manners, in