Walter Bagehot: “The House has ceased to be one of latent directors, and has become one of temporary rejectors and palpable alterers.”

Just so the lines of our Constitution were framed in old eras of sparse population, few wants, and simple habits; and we adhere in seeming to their shape, though civilisation has come with its dangers, complications, and enjoyments.

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.

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.