The tytler Cycle – I need your help in clarifying this
While I was researching recently i found the following quote:
- A democracy is always temporary in nature; it simply cannot exist as a permanent form of government. A democracy will continue to exist up until the time that voters discover that they can vote themselves generous gifts from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates who promise the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that every democracy will finally collapse due to loose fiscal policy, which is always followed by a dictatorship.
The average age of the world’s greatest civilizations from the beginning of history has been about 200 years. During those 200 years, these nations always progressed through the following sequence:
- From bondage to spiritual faith;
- From spiritual faith to great courage;
- From courage to liberty;
- From liberty to abundance;
- From abundance to complacency;
- From complacency to apathy;
- From apathy to dependence;
- From dependence back into bondage.
- Origianlly I had thought this was attributed to Alexander D’Touceville, the french statesman, however when i google it the quote is mysteriously originally attributed to a Scottish judge and political figure named Alexander Fraser Tytler, also known as Lord Woodhouselee
Read more on wikipedia: Alexander Fraser Tytler, Lord Woodhouselee
This is where i need your help:
Have you ever heard this quote before?
Do you have any insight into this quote – so much of the internet is saying this is fictitious or a quote that is mis-attributed to either of these men, yet the content seems to have a parallel to our current state of the republic we live in.
Leave a comment. It is my latest fascination, and sadly if there is truth to the progression we appear to be at the last step of heading from dependence to bondage as a nation. That makes me very uncomfortable.
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