Walter Bagehot: “It is only by the competition of customs that bad customs can be eliminated and good customs multiplied.”

The lessons are good where its primitive assumptions hold, but may be false where those assumptions fail.

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.

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.