This disposition of the mind soon leads them to contemn forms, which they regard as useless and inconvenient veils placed between them and the truth.
The Americans then have not required to extract their philosophical method from books; they have found it in themselves.

The same thing may be remarked in what has taken place in Europe.

This same method has only been established and made popular in Europe in proportion as the condition of society has become more equal, and men have grown more like each other.

Let us consider for a moment the connection of the periods in which this change may be traced.

In the sixteenth century the Reformers subjected some of the dogmas of the ancient faith to the scrutiny of private judgment; but they still withheld from it the judgment of all the rest.