Walter Bagehot: “The great leaders of Parliament have varied much, but they have all had a certain firmness.”

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.

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