Our Founders noted that this Constitution was made for a moral population, and that it would be unsuitable for any other. We are no longer a nation of moral people. As such, the sole question remains.... what do those moral people who yearn for a nation built upon the ideal of limited government do? Where do they go? It seems beyond question that this nation cannot be changed back. Honor, honesty, duty, loyalty, patience, temperance, hard work, humility, charity... these are simply not an integral part of the majority of the people of the United States, and there is little that can change that.
The first state constitutions relied on the virtue you speak of. From 1776 to the mid 1780s the overly democratic governments indeed relied on large helpings of virtue. A religious people who possessed enough virtue to carry out a war against the most powerful nation on earth had to endure unnecessary turmoil caused by faulty government design.
The constitution was designed to correct the faults not only of the hapless Articles of Confederation, but also among the states themselves.
The first few issues of The Federalist deal with the problems and the constitutional solution.