English economist and political analyst (1826-1877)
But how far are the strongest nations really the best nations? how far is excellence in war a criterion of other excellence? I cannot answer this now fully, but three or four considerations are very plain. War, as I have said, nourishes the 'preliminary' virtues, and this is almost as much as to say that there are virtues which it does not nourish. All which may be called 'grace' as well as virtue it does not nourish; humanity, charity, a nice sense of the rights of others, it certainly does not foster. The insensibility to human suffering, which is so striking a fact in the world as it stood when history first reveals it, is doubtless due to the warlike origin of the old civilization. Bred in war, and nursed in war, it could not revolt from the things of war, and one of the principal of these is human pain. Since war has ceased to be the moving force in the world, men have become more tender one to another, and shrink from what they used to inflict without caring; and this not so much because men are improved (which may or may not be in various cases), but because they have no longer the daily habit of war—have no longer formed their notions upon war, and therefore are guided by thoughts and feelings which soldiers as such—soldiers educated simply by their trade—are too hard to understand.
WALTER BAGEHOT
Physics and Politics
In general, too, the conquerors would be better than the conquered (most merits in early society are more or less military merits), but they would not be very much better, for the lowest steps in the ladder of civilization are very steep, and the effort to mount them is slow and tedious.
WALTER BAGEHOT
Physics and Politics
If A kills B before B kills A, then A survives, and the human race is a race of A's.
WALTER BAGEHOT
Physics and Politics
This is the age of dramatic art, when men wonder at the big characters of old, as schoolboys at the words of Aeschylus, and try to find in their own breasts the roots of those monstrous, but artistically developed impersonations.
WALTER BAGEHOT
Literary Studies
But then the mist of battles passes away, and the sound of the daily conflict no longer hurtles in the air, and a generation arises skilled with the skill of peace, and refined with the refinement of civilization, yet still remembering the old world, still appreciating the old life, still wondering at the old men, and ready to receive, at the hand of the poet, a new telling of the old tale.
WALTER BAGEHOT
Literary Studies
Free government is self-government. A government of the people by the people. The best government of this sort is that which the people think best.
WALTER BAGEHOT
The English Constitution
The English Constitution, in a word, is framed on the principle of choosing a single sovereign authority, and making it good; the American, upon the principle of having many sovereign authorities, and hoping that their multitude may atone for their inferiority.
WALTER BAGEHOT
The English Constitution
The old excitement of thought has half died out, or rather it is diffused in quiet pleasure over a life instead of being concentrated in intense and eager spasms.
WALTER BAGEHOT
The English Constitution
We could not do every day out of our own heads all we have to do. We should accomplish nothing, for all our energies would be frittered away in minor attempts at petty improvement. One man, too, would go off from the known track in one direction, and one in another; so that when a crisis came requiring massed combination, no two men would be near enough to act together.
WALTER BAGEHOT
The English Constitution
The world knows what you seem; it does not know what you are.
WALTER BAGEHOT
The English Constitution
Those kinds of morals and that kind of religion which tend to make the firmest and most effectual character are sure to prevail, all else being the same; and creeds or systems that conduce to a soft limp mind tend to perish, except some hard extrinsic force keep them alive.
WALTER BAGEHOT
Physics and Politics
Ancient civilization may be compared with modern in many respects, and plausible arguments constructed to show that it is better; but you cannot compare the two in military power. Napoleon could indisputably have conquered Alexander; our Indian army would not think much of the Retreat of the Ten Thousand. And I suppose the improvement has been continuous: I have not the slightest pretense to special knowledge; but, looking at the mere surface of the facts, it seems likely that the aggregate battle array, so to say, of mankind, the fighting force of the human race, has constantly and invariably grown. It is true that the ancient civilization long resisted the 'barbarians,' and was then destroyed by the barbarians. But the barbarians had improved.
WALTER BAGEHOT
Physics and Politics
Theodora never married. Love did not, however, kill her—at least, if it did, it was a long time at the task, as she survived these events more than sixty years. She never, seemingly, forgot the past.
WALTER BAGEHOT
Literary Studies
The wind bloweth where it listeth; but it is scarcely more partial, more quick, more unaccountable, than the glow of an emotion excited by a supernatural and unseen object.
WALTER BAGEHOT
Literary Studies
In religion the appeal now is not to the technicalities of scholars, or the fiction of recluse schoolmen, but to the deep feelings, the sure sentiments, the painful strivings of all who think and hope. And this appeal to the many necessarily brings with it a consequence. We must speak to the many so that they will listen—that they will like to listen—that they will understand. It is of no use addressing them with the forms of science, or the rigor of accuracy, or the tedium of exhaustive discussion. The multitude are impatient of system, desirous of brevity, puzzled by formality.
WALTER BAGEHOT
Literary Studies
There is nothing in the life before us comparable in interest to the tragic, gradual cracking of the great mind; the overtasking of the great capital, and the ensuing failure; the spectacle of heaving genius breaking in the contact with misfortune.
WALTER BAGEHOT
Literary Studies
Space has failed us, and we must be unmeaningly brief.
WALTER BAGEHOT
Literary Studies
To exert itself, the will, like the arm, requires to have an obvious and a definite resistance, to know where it is, why it is, whence it comes, and whither it goes.
WALTER BAGEHOT
Literary Studies
To a great experience one thing is essential, an experiencing nature. It is not enough to have opportunity, it is essential to feel it. Some occasions come to all men; but to many they are of little use, and to some they are none.
WALTER BAGEHOT
Literary Studies
If anybody could have any doubt about the liveliness of Shakespeare, let them consider the character of Falstaff. When a man has created that without a capacity for laughter, then a blind man may succeed in describing colors. Intense animal spirits are the single sentiment (if they be a sentiment) of the entire character. If most men were to save up all the gaiety of their whole lives, it would come about to the gaiety of one speech in Falstaff.
WALTER BAGEHOT
Literary Studies