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

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.

The apparent rulers of the English nation are like the most imposing personages of a splendid procession: it is by them the mob are influenced; it is they whom the spectators cheer. The real rulers are secreted in second-rate carriages; no one cares for them or asks about them, but they are obeyed implicitly and unconsciously by reason of the splendour of those who eclipsed and preceded them.

A new Constitution does not produce its full effect as long as all its subjects were reared under an old Constitution, as long as its statesmen were trained by that old Constitution. It is not really tested till it comes to be worked by statesmen and among a people neither of whom are guided by a different experience.