De Tocqueville's Sense of Desire

Tocqueville says desire is checked even as it's encouraged to spread. In Revolution destroys the privileges of the few, de Tocquevilles says, people encounter the competition of everyone. So desire in the last analysis is metaphysical. It seeks not the things others have, but the others very being. I feel my emptiness, but the other always seems to have more of it than I have. Why is it that the other appears to have what I don't have?