Walter Bagehot: “In the course of a long reign a sagacious king would acquire an experience with which few Ministers could contend.”

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.

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