Walter Bagehot: “And one of these notions is that its own members--the persons it sees every day--whose qualities it knows, whose minds…”

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

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.

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

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.