USEUROPEAFRICAASIA 中文双语Français
Home / World

Everything changed, but nothing differed

By David Gosset | China Daily | Updated: 2013-02-25 07:57

Everything changed, but nothing differed

The Old Regime and the Revolution, written by the French thinker Alexis de Tocqueville in 1856, is now a bestseller in China, a phenomenon that can be explained in three ways.

First, the book published during the reign of Napoleon III is a masterpiece.

Second, if The Old Regime and the Revolution is one of the greatest analyses of a key historical event, the French Revolution, it also contains timeless wisdom. While a lot of literature pretends to anticipate the future state of the world, De Tocqueville's lucidity is sobering: "Philosophers and statesmen may learn a valuable lesson of modesty from the history of our revolution, for there never were events greater, better prepared, longer matured, and yet so little foreseen."

Everything changed, but nothing differed

Today's Top News

Editor's picks

Most Viewed

Copyright 1995 - . All rights reserved. The content (including but not limited to text, photo, multimedia information, etc) published in this site belongs to China Daily Information Co (CDIC). Without written authorization from CDIC, such content shall not be republished or used in any form. Note: Browsers with 1024*768 or higher resolution are suggested for this site.
License for publishing multimedia online 0108263

Registration Number: 130349
FOLLOW US