Walter Bagehot: “The passion for action is quite as ready to pull down as to build up; probably it is more ready, for the task is easier.”

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

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

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.

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.