Walter Bagehot: “Lastly, a polity of discussion not only tends to diminish our inherited defects, but also, in one case at least, to…”

The casual line was traced according to the strength of deceased combatants; succeeding generations fought elsewhere; and the hesitating line of a half-drawn battle was left to stand for a perpetual limit.

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 own that I do not entirely sympathise with the horror of these anomalies which haunts some of our best critics.

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.