The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from Democracy In America, Volume 2 by Alexis de Toqueville: sometimes eager to lend each other mutual aid; but this is not
contrary to my previous observation. These aristocratic
institutions, which made the beings of one and the same race so
different, nevertheless bound them to each other by close
political ties. Although the serf had no natural interest in the
fate of nobles, he did not the less think himself obliged to
devote his person to the service of that noble who happened to be
his lord; and although the noble held himself to be of a
different nature from that of his serfs, he nevertheless held
that his duty and his honor constrained him to defend, at the
risk of his own life, those who dwelt upon his domains.
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