But in proportion as caste and class-distinction disappear, the vision of an ideal perfection arises before the human mind. Continual changes are ever taking place, some of them to his disadvantage, but the majority to his advantage, and the democrat concludes that man in general is capable of arriving at perfection. His reverses teach him that no one has yet discovered absolute good, and his frequent successes excite him to pursue it. Always seeking, falling, and rising again, often deceived, but never discouraged, he hastens towards an immense grandeur which he dimly conceives as the goal of humanity. This theory of perfectibility exercises prodigious influence even on those who have never thought of it. For instance, I ask an American sailor why the ships of his country are built to last only a few years; and he tells me without hesitation that the art of shipbuilding makes such rapid progress every day, that the finest ship constructed to-day must be useless after a very short time. From these words, spoken at random by an uneducated man, I can perceive the general and systematic idea which guides this great people in every matter.
VI.—American Vanity
All free people are proud of themselves, but national pride takes different forms. The Americans, in their relations with strangers, are impatient of the least criticism, and absolutely insatiable for praise. The slightest congratulation pleases them, but the most extravagant eulogium is not enough to satisfy them; they are all the time touting for your praise, and if you are slow to give it they begin praising themselves. It is as if they were doubtful of their own merit. Their vanity is not only hungry, but anxious and envious. It gives nothing, and asks insistently. It is both supplicant and pugnacious. If I tell an American that his country is a fine one, he replies, "It is the finest in the world." If I admire the liberty which it enjoys, he answers, "There are few people worthy of such liberty." I remark on the purity of manners in the United States, and he says, "Yes, a stranger who knows the corruption of other nations must indeed be astonished at us." At length I leave him to the contemplation of his country and of himself, but he presently runs after me, and will not go away until I have repeated it all over again. It is a kind of patriotism that worries even those who honour it.
The Englishman, on the contrary, tranquilly enjoys the real or imaginary advantages which his country affords. He cares nothing for the blame nor for the praise of strangers. His attitude towards the whole world is one of disdainful and ignorant reserve. His pride seeks no nourishment; it lives on itself. It is very remarkable that the two people who have arisen from the same stock should differ so radically in their way of feeling and speaking.
In aristocratic countries, great families possess enormous privileges, on which their pride rests. They consider these privileges as a natural right inherent in their person, and their feeling of superiority is therefore a peaceful one. They have no reason to boast of the prerogatives which everyone concedes to them without question. So, when public affairs are directed by an aristocracy, the national pride tends to take this reserved, haughty, and independent form.
Under democratic conditions, on the contrary, the least advantage which anyone gains has great importance in his eyes; for everyone is surrounded by millions very nearly his equal. His pride therefore becomes anxious and insatiable; he founds it on miserable trifles and defends it obstinately. Again, most Americans have recently acquired the advantages which they possess, and therefore have inordinate pleasure in contemplating these advantages, and in showing them to others; and as these advantages may escape at any moment, they are always uneasy about them, and look at them again and again to see that they still have them. Men who live in democracies love their country as they love themselves, and model their national vanity upon their private vanity. The close dependence of this anxious and insatiable vanity of democratic peoples upon the equality and fragility of their conditions is seen from the fact that the members of the proudest nobility show exactly the same passionate jealousy for the most trifling circumstances of their life when these become unstable or are contested.