Lifespan of Democracies

I received this from the Caelum et Terra forum today:

In the year 1787, Alexander Tyler (a Scottish history professor at the University of Edinborough) wrote this:

"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."

Finding the language of the quote suspiciouly modern, I decided to look into it more deeply. It turns out that the author is a Mr. Tytler, not Tyler. Here's a biography of the author: Significant Scots: Alexander Fraser Tytler. According to this page, Alexander Fraser Tytler, the above quote is from 1776 and the word "benefits" is used instead of "money," and according to this page Alexander Tytler, the word "largesse" is used.