DEMOCRACY AT WAR
I as therefore of opinion that when a democratic people engages in a war after a long peace it incurs much more risk of defeat than any other nation; but it ought not easily to be cast down by its reverses, for the chances of success for such an army are increased by the duration of the war. When a war has by its long continuance roused the whole community from their peace- ful occupations and ruined their minor undertakings, the same passions which made them attach so much importance to the maintenance of peace will be turned to arms. War, after it has destroyed all modes of speculation, becomes itself the great and sole speculation, to which all the ardent and ambitious desires which equality engenders are exclusively directed. Hence it is that the self-same democratic nations which are so reluctant to engage in hostilities sometimes perform prodigious achievements when they have taken the field.
Democ. in America, by Alexis de Tocqueville, Vol. IV, 1840.
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