On the record
To this day many semi-civilised races have great difficulty in regarding any arrangement as binding and conclusive unless they can also manage to look at it as an inherited usage.
Said by
Walter Bagehot
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gutenberg.orgWalter Bagehot: “To this day many semi-civilised races have great difficulty in regarding any arrangement as binding and conclusive…”
Editor's note · Context
He discusses how semi-civilized societies struggle to view agreements as binding unless they are seen as inherited customs, emphasizing the importance of tradition.
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More from Walter Bagehot
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.
Our law very often reminds one of those outskirts of cities where you cannot for a long time tell how the streets come to wind about in so capricious and serpent-like a manner.
I cannot, therefore, join in the full cry against anomalies; in my judgment it may quickly overrun the scent, and so miss what we should be glad to find.
But it is natural also that persons used to analyse political institutions should look at these anomalies with a little tenderness and a little interest.
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