Walter Bagehot: “No barbarian can bear to see one of his nation deviate from the old barbarous customs and usages of their tribe.”

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.

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.

At last it strikes you that they grew up, house by house, on the devious tracks of the old green lanes; and if you follow on to the existing fields, you may often find the change half complete.

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