Societies are formed to resist enemies which are exclusively of a moral nature, and to diminish the vice of intemperance
 Alexis de Tocqueville, Democracy in America (1835). copy citation

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Author Alexis de Tocqueville
Source Democracy in America
Topic society vice
Date 1835
Language English
Reference
Note Translated by Henry Reeve
Weblink http://www.gutenberg.org/files/815/815-h/815-h.htm

Context

“and this extemporaneous assembly gives rise to an executive power which remedies the inconvenience before anybody has thought of recurring to an authority superior to that of the persons immediately concerned. If the public pleasures are concerned, an association is formed to provide for the splendor and the regularity of the entertainment. Societies are formed to resist enemies which are exclusively of a moral nature, and to diminish the vice of intemperance: in the United States associations are established to promote public order, commerce, industry, morality, and religion; for there is no end which the human will, seconded by the collective exertions of individuals, despairs of attaining.” source