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Walter Bagehot

78 quotes

“The natural impulse of the English people is to resist authority.”
Walter Bagehot (1826–1877) said by 1877 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The great difficulty which history records is not that of the first step, but that of the second step. What is most evident is not the difficulty of getting a fixed law, but getting out of a fixed law; not of cementing (as upon a former occasion I phrased it) a cake of custom, but of breaking the cake of custom; not of making the first preservative habit, but of breaking through it, and reaching something better.”
Walter Bagehot (1826–1877) said by 1877 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Maternity," it has been said, "is a matter of fact, paternity is a matter of opinion.”
Walter Bagehot (1826–1877) said by 1877 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“One of the greatest pains to human nature is the pain of a new idea.”
Walter Bagehot (1826–1877) said by 1877 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“All the inducements of early society tend to foster immediate action; all its penalties fall on the man who pauses; the traditional wisdom of those times was never weary of inculcating that "delays are dangerous," and that the sluggish man — the man "who roasteth not that which he took in hunting" — will not prosper on the earth, and indeed will very soon perish out of it. And in consequence an inability to stay quiet, an irritable desire to act directly, is one of the most conspicuous failings of mankind.”
Walter Bagehot (1826–1877) said by 1877 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Most men of business think "Anyhow this system will probably last my time. It has gone on a long time, and is likely to go on still.”
Walter Bagehot (1826–1877) said by 1877 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Credit means that a certain confidence is given, and a certain trust reposed. Is that trust justified? and is that confidence wise? These are the cardinal questions. To put it more simply credit is a set of promises to pay; will those promises be kept?”
Walter Bagehot (1826–1877) said by 1877 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The less money lying idle the greater is the dividend.”
Walter Bagehot (1826–1877) said by 1877 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The owners of savings not finding, in adequate quantities, their usual kind of investments, rush into anything that promises speciously, and when they find that these specious investments can be disposed of at a high profit, they rush into them more and more. The first taste is for high interest, but that taste soon becomes secondary. There is a second appetite for large gains to be made by selling the principal which is to yield the interest. So long as such sales can be effected the mania continues; when it ceases to be possible to effect them, ruin begins.”
Walter Bagehot (1826–1877) said by 1877 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The name ‘London Banker’ had especially a charmed value. He was supposed to represent, and often did represent, a certain union of pecuniary sagacity and educated refinement which was scarcely to be found in any other part of society.”
Walter Bagehot (1826–1877) said by 1877 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“To a great experience one thing is essential — an experiencing nature.”
Walter Bagehot (1826–1877) said by 1877 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The purse strings tie us to our kind.”
Walter Bagehot (1826–1877) said by 1877 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The reason why so few good books are written is, that so few people that can write know anything. In general an author has always lived in a room, has read books, has cultivated science, is acquainted with the style and sentiments of the best authors, but he is out of the way of employing his own eyes and ears. He has nothing to hear and nothing to see. His life is a vacuum.”
Walter Bagehot (1826–1877) said by 1877 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“A highly developed moral nature joined to an undeveloped intellectual nature, an undeveloped artistic nature, and a very limited religious nature, is of necessity repulsive. It represents a bit of human nature — a good bit, of course, but a bit only — in disproportionate, unnatural and revolting prominence.”
Walter Bagehot (1826–1877) said by 1877 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The Ethiop gods have Ethiop lips, Bronze cheeks, and woolly hair; The Grecian gods are like the Greeks, As keen-eyed, cold and fair.”
Walter Bagehot (1826–1877) said by 1877 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“A constitutional statesman is in general a man of common opinions and uncommon abilities.”
Walter Bagehot (1826–1877) said by 1877 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“You may talk of the tyranny of Nero and Tiberius; but the real tyranny is the tyranny of your next-door neighbor... Public opinion is a permeating influence, and it exacts obedience to itself; it requires us to think other men's thoughts, to speak other men's words, to follow other men's habits.”
Walter Bagehot (1826–1877) said by 1877 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“It is good to be without vices, but it is not good to be without temptations.”
Walter Bagehot (1826–1877) said by 1877 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“[Of Guizot] A Puritan born in France by mistake.”
Walter Bagehot (1826–1877) said by 1877 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“In truth, poverty is an anomaly to rich people. It is very difficult to make out why people who want dinner do not ring the bell.”
Walter Bagehot (1826–1877) first seen 1858 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Chapter: Walter Bagehot on Scott National Review 1858, p404
“Every trouble in life is a joke compared to madness.”
Walter Bagehot (1826–1877) said by 1877 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“... For ancient heroes the exhaustive method is possible: all that can be known of them is contained in a few short passages of Greek and Latin, and it is quite possible to say whatever can be said about every one of these; the result would not be unreasonably bulky, though it might be dull. But in the case of men who have lived in the thick of the crowded modern world, no such course is admissible; overmuch may be said, and we must choose what we will say. Biographers, however, are rarely bold enough to adopt the selective method consistently. They have, we suspect, the fear of the critics before their eyes.”
Walter Bagehot (1826–1877) said by 1877 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“... Nothing is so simple as the subject matter of his works. The two greatest of his creations, the character of Satan and the character of Eve, are two of the simplest—the latter probably the very simplest—in the whole field of literature. On this side, Milton's art is classical. On the other hand, in no writer is the imagery more profuse, the illustrations more various, the dress altogether more splendid; and in this respect the style of his art seems romantic and modern. In real truth, however, it is only ancient art in a modern disguise: the dress is a mere dress, and can be stripped off when we will.—we all of us do perhaps in memory strip it off for ourselves.”
Walter Bagehot (1826–1877) said by 1877 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Under a cabinet constitution at a sudden emergency this people can choose a ruler for the occasion. It is quite possible and even likely that he would not be ruler before the occasion. The great qualities, the imperious will, the rapid energy, the eager nature fit for a great crisis are not required—are impediments—in common times. A Lord Liverpool is better in everyday politics than a Chatham—a Louis Philippe far better than a Napoleon. By the structure of the world we want, at the sudden occurrence of a grave tempest, to change the helmsman—to replace the pilot of the calm by the pilot of the storm.”
Walter Bagehot (1826–1877) said by 1877 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“For the most part, a constitutional king is a damaged common man; not forced to business by necessity as a despot often is, but yet spoiled for business by most of the temptations which spoil a despot. History, too, seems to show that hereditary royal families gather from the repeated influence of their corrupting situation some dark taint in the blood, some transmitted and growing poison which hurts their judgments, darkens all their sorrow, and is a cloud on half their pleasure. It has been said, not truly, but with a possible approximation to truth, “That in 1802 every hereditary monarch was insane.”
Walter Bagehot (1826–1877) said by 1877 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Our constitution is full of curious oddities, which are impeding and mischievous, and ought to be struck out. Our law very often reminds one of those outskirts of cities where you cannot for a long time tell how the streets come to wind about in so capricious and serpent-like a manner. 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. 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. These anomalies, in a hundred instances, mark the old boundaries of a constitutional struggle. 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.”
Walter Bagehot (1826–1877) said by 1877 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I wish the art of benefiting men had kept pace with the art of destroying them; for though war has become slow, philanthropy has remained hasty. The most melancholy of human reflections, perhaps, is that, on the whole, it is a question whether the, benevolence of mankind does most good or harm. Great good, no doubt, philanthropy does, but then it also does great evil. It augments so much vice, it multiplies so much suffering, it brings to life such great populations to suffer and to be vicious, that it is open to argument whether it be or be not an evil to the world, and this is entirely because excellent people fancy that they can do much by rapid action — that they will most benefit the world when they most relieve their own feelings; that as soon as an evil is seen "something" ought to be done to stay and prevent it.”
Walter Bagehot (1826–1877) said by 1877 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The best way for the bank or banks who have the custody of the bank reserve to deal with a drain arising from internal discredit, is to lend freely. The first instinct of everyone is the contrary. There being a large demand on a fund which you want to preserve, the most obvious way to preserve it is to hoard it—to get in as much as you can, and to let nothing go out which you can help. But every banker knows that this is not the way to diminish discredit. This discredit means, 'an opinion that you have not got any money,' and to dissipate that opinion, you must, if possible, show that you have money: you must employ it for the public benefit in order that the public may know that you have it.”
Walter Bagehot (1826–1877) said by 1877 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source