English economist and political analyst (1826-1877)
The least veracious man will tell truly the color of his coat, the hour of his dinner, the materials of his shoes.
WALTER BAGEHOT
Literary Studies
Books are for various purposes—tracts to teach, almanacs to sell, poetry to make pastry, but this is the rarest sort of book, a book to read.
WALTER BAGEHOT
Literary Studies
Yet it must be allowed that Shakespeare was worldly, and the proof of it is, that he succeeded in the world. Possibly this is the point on which we are most richly indebted to tradition. We see generally indeed in Shakespeare's works the popular author, the successful dramatist; there is a life and play in his writings rarely to be found, except in those who have had habitual good luck, and who, by the tact of experience, feel the minds of their readers at every word, as a good rider feels the mouth of his horse.
WALTER BAGEHOT
Literary Studies
The heart and passions of men are moved by things more within their attainment; the essential nature is stirred by the essential life; by the real actual existence of love, and hope, and character, and by the real literature which takes in its spirit, and which is in some sort its undefecated essence.
WALTER BAGEHOT
Biographical Studies
The most difficult of problems is how to change late foes into free friends.
WALTER BAGEHOT
The English Constitution
The courage which strengthens an enemy and which so loses, not only the present battle, but many after battles, is a heavy curse to men and nations.
WALTER BAGEHOT
The English Constitution
I conceive, therefore, that the great power of the House of Lords should be exercised very timidly and very cautiously. For the sake of keeping the headship of the plutocracy, and through that of the nation, they should not offend the plutocracy; the points upon which they have to yield are mostly very minor ones, and they should yield many great points rather than risk the bottom of their power. They should give large donations out of income, if by so doing they keep, as they would keep, their capital intact. The Duke of Wellington guided the House of Lords in this manner for years, and nothing could prosper better for them or for the country, and the Lords have only to go back to the good path in which he directed them.
WALTER BAGEHOT
The English Constitution
There are indeed practical men who reject the dignified parts of Government. They say, we want only to attain results, to do business: a constitution is a collection of political means for political ends, and if you admit that any part of a constitution does no business, or that a simpler machine would do equally well what it does, you admit that this part of the constitution, however dignified or awful it may be, is nevertheless in truth useless.
WALTER BAGEHOT
The English Constitution
Grave and careful men may have domestic virtues on a constitutional throne, but even these fail sometimes, and to imagine that men of more eager temperaments will commonly produce them, is to expect grapes from thorns and figs from thistles.
WALTER BAGEHOT
The English Constitution
The order of nobility is of great use, too, not only in what it creates, but in what it prevents. It prevents the rule of wealth—the religion of gold. This is the obvious and natural idol of the Anglo-Saxon. He is always trying to make money; he reckons everything in coin; he bows down before a great heap and sneers as he passes a little heap. He has a "natural instinctive admiration of wealth for its own sake". And within good limits the feeling is quite right. So long as we play the game of industry vigorously and eagerly (and I hope we shall long play it, for we must be very different from what we are if we do anything better), we shall of necessity respect and admire those who play successfully, and a little despise those who play unsuccessfully. Whether this feeling be right or wrong, it is useless to discuss; to a certain degree, it is involuntary; it is not for mortals to settle whether we will have it or not; nature settles for us that, within moderate limits, we must have it. But the admiration of wealth in many countries goes far beyond this; it ceases to regard in any degree the skill of acquisition; it respects wealth in the hands of the inheritor just as much as in the hands of the maker; it is a simple envy and love of a heap of gold as a heap of gold. From this our aristocracy preserves us. There is no country where a "poor devil of a millionaire is so ill off as in England". The experiment is tried every day, and every day it is proved that money alone—money pure and simple—will not buy "London Society". Money is kept down, and, so to say, cowed by the predominant authority of a different power.
WALTER BAGEHOT
The English Constitution
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.
WALTER BAGEHOT
Physics and Politics
But what are nations? What are these groups which are so familiar to us, and yet if we stop to think, so strange; which are as old as history ... what breaks the human race up into fragments so unlike one another, and yet each in its interior so monotonous?
WALTER BAGEHOT
Physics and Politics
No barbarian can bear to see one of his nation deviate from the old barbarous customs and usages of their tribe. Very commonly all the tribe would expect a punishment from the gods if any one of them refrained from what was old, or began what was new.
WALTER BAGEHOT
Physics and Politics
Even if we had a profound and far-seeing statesman, his deep ideas and long-reaching vision would be useless to us, unless we could impart a confidence in them to the mass of influential persons, to the unelected Commons, the unchosen Council, who assist at the deliberations of the nation.
WALTER BAGEHOT
Literary Studies
Much musing, little studying,—fair scholarship, an atmosphere of the classics, curious fancies, much perusing of pamphlets, light thoughts on heavy folios —these make the meditative poet, but not the technical and patient-headed scholar.
WALTER BAGEHOT
Literary Studies
Shakespeare was too wise not to know that for most of the purposes of human life stupidity is a most valuable element. He had nothing of the impatience which sharp logical narrow minds habitually feel when they come across those who do not apprehend their quick and precise deductions. No doubt he talked to the stupid players, to the stupid doorkeeper, to the property man, who considers paste jewels "very preferable, besides the expense "—talked with the stupid apprentices of stupid Fleet Street, and had much pleasure in ascertaining what was their notion of " King Lear".
WALTER BAGEHOT
Literary Studies
I should venture so far as to lay down for an approximate rule, that the House of Lords ought, on a first-class subject, to be slow—very slow—in rejecting a Bill passed even once by a large majority of the House of Commons. I would not of course lay this down as an unvarying rule; as I have said, I have for practical purposes no belief in unvarying rules. Majorities may be either genuine or fictitious, and if they are not genuine, if they do not embody the opinion of the representative as well as the opinion of the constituency, no one would wish to have any attention paid to them. But if the opinion of the nation be strong and be universal, if it be really believed by members of Parliament, as well as by those who send them to Parliament, in my judgment the Lords should yield at once, and should not resist it.
WALTER BAGEHOT
The English Constitution
The experiment of a strictly Parliamentary Republic—of a Republic where the Parliament appoints the executive—is being tried in France at an extreme disadvantage, because in France a Parliament is unusually likely to be bad, and unusually likely also to be free enough to show its badness.
WALTER BAGEHOT
The English Constitution
A weak mind yields a passive obedience to those among whom it is thrown.
WALTER BAGEHOT
Literary Studies
Early science, it has been said, begins in utter nonsense; it would be truer to say that it starts with boyish fancies.
WALTER BAGEHOT
Literary Studies