The victory of consent over influence, and the elevation of human autonomy closely linked to it, has dramatic social and political effects, leaving nothing as it was. His exploration of the democratic universe was in part an attempt to master his fear. Manent carefully reconstructs Tocqueville's description of the democratic universe. Intellectual life would be substantially modified by democracy, as would the passions of men. Under pressure from individual autonomy, opinions would be relativized, mores softened.
Public opinion becomes the sole authoritative voice.
While individual rights govern the lives of men, the ends of man fall into neglect. The passion for equality, natural to democracy, trumps every other concern, and begins its endless struggle to eradicate the natural inequalities of men. It is not difficult to recognize ourselves in Tocqueville's mirror. What Manent stresses in Tocqueville is the tragic, and indeed paradoxical, realization that democracy is both natural to man and, if not moderated, destructive of human nature. Although Tocqueville understood the aristocratic regime to be unjust, based as it was on an unnatural convention of familial superiority, its hierarchical order still preserved room for standards transcending the individual will.