Walter Bagehot: “There are people to this day who would not permit in their house people to sit down thirteen to dinner.”

It is natural that those who by special and admirable culture have come to look at all things upon the artistic side, should start back from these queer peculiarities.

These anomalies, in a hundred instances, mark the old boundaries of a constitutional struggle.

Subject to this saving remark, however, I not only admit, but maintain, that our Constitution is full of curious oddities, which are impeding and mischievous, and ought to be struck out.

Political philosophy is still more imperfect; it has been framed from observations taken upon regular specimens of politics and States; as to these its teaching is most valuable.