A family on the throne is an interesting idea. It brings down the pride of sovereignty to the level of petty life.
- Walter Bagehot Quote

A great pleasure in life is doing what people say you cannot do.
- Walter Bagehot Quote

A man's mother is his misfortune, but his wife is his fault.
- Walter Bagehot Quote

A schoolmaster should have an atmosphere of awe, and walk wonderingly, as if he was amazed at being himself.
- Walter Bagehot Quote

A severe though not unfriendly critic of our institutions said that the cure for admiring the House of Lords was to go and look at it.
- Walter Bagehot Quote

All the best stories in the world are but one story in reality - the story of escape. It is the only thing which interests us all and at all times, how to escape.
- Walter Bagehot Quote

An ambassador is not simply an agent; he is also a spectacle.
- Walter Bagehot Quote

An element of exaggeration clings to the popular judgment: great vices are made greater, great virtues greater also; interesting incidents are made more interesting, softer legends more soft.
- Walter Bagehot Quote

An influential member of parliament has not only to pay much money to become such, and to give time and labour, he has also to sacrifice his mind too - at least all the characteristics part of it that which is original and most his own.
- Walter Bagehot Quote

Conquest is the missionary of valor, and the hard impact of military virtues beats meanness out of the world.
- Walter Bagehot Quote

Dullness in matters of government is a good sign, and not a bad one - in particular, dullness in parliamentary government is a test of its excellence, an indication of its success.
- Walter Bagehot Quote

Honor sinks where commerce long prevails.
- Walter Bagehot Quote

In every particular state of the world, those nations which are strongest tend to prevail over the others; and in certain marked peculiarities the strongest tend to be the best.
- Walter Bagehot Quote

It is good to be without vices, but it is not good to be without temptations.
- Walter Bagehot Quote

Life is a school of probability.
- Walter Bagehot Quote

Men who do not make advances to women are apt to become victims to women who make advances to them.
- Walter Bagehot Quote

No great work has ever been produced except after a long interval of still and musing meditation.
- Walter Bagehot Quote

No real English gentleman, in his secret soul, was ever sorry for the death of a political economist.
- Walter Bagehot Quote

One of the greatest pains to human nature is the pain of a new idea.
- Walter Bagehot Quote

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 Quote

Public opinion is a permeating influence, and it exacts obedience to itself; it requires us to drink other men's thoughts, to speak other men's words, to follow other men's habits.
- Walter Bagehot Quote

So long as war is the main business of nations, temporary despotism - despotism during the campaign - is indispensable.
- Walter Bagehot Quote

So long as war is the main business of nations, temporary despotism during the campaign is indispensable.
- Walter Bagehot Quote

The best history is but like the art of Rembrandt; it casts a vivid light on certain selected causes, on those which were best and greatest; it leaves all the rest in shadow and unseen.
- Walter Bagehot Quote

The cure for admiring the House of Lords is to go and look at it.
- Walter Bagehot Quote

The greatest mistake is trying to be more agreeable than you can be.
- Walter Bagehot Quote

The habit of common and continuous speech is a symptom of mental deficiency. It proceeds from not knowing what is going on in other people's minds.
- Walter Bagehot Quote

The real essence of work is concentrated energy.
- Walter Bagehot Quote

The reason that there are so few good books written is that so few people who write know anything.
- Walter Bagehot Quote

The whole history of civilization is strewn with creeds and institutions which were invaluable at first, and deadly afterwards.
- Walter Bagehot Quote

We must not let daylight in upon the magic.
- Walter Bagehot Quote

Woman absent is woman dead.
- Walter Bagehot Quote

Writers like teeth are divided into incisors and grinders.
- Walter Bagehot Quote

You may talk of the tyranny of Nero and Tiberius; but the real tyranny is the tyranny of your next-door neighbor.
- Walter Bagehot Quote