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Under a Presidential government, a nation has, except at the electing moment, no influence it has not the ballot-box before it its virtue is gone, and it must wait till its instant of despotism again returns.

Walter Bagehot

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Walter Bagehot
Age: 51 †
Born: 1826
Born: February 3
Died: 1877
Died: March 24
Businessperson
Economist
Engineer
Journalist
Political Scientist
Politician
Sociologist
Langport
Somerset
Waiting
Instant
Nations
Till
Electing
Gone
Wait
Ballot
Moment
Except
Ballots
Moments
Nation
Despotism
Government
Return
Returns
Must
Influence
Presidential
Virtue
Boxes

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What impresses men is not mind, but the result of mind.
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The greatest mistake is trying to be more agreeable than you can be.
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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.
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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.
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The real essence of work is concentrated energy.
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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.
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The great pleasure of life is doing for pleasure things I do not like to do.
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Nothing is more unpleasant than a virtuous person with a mean mind.
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Nine tenths of modern science is in this respect the same: it is the produce of men whom their contemporaries thought dreamers - who were laughed at for caring for what did not concern them - who, as the proverb went, 'walked into a well from looking at the stars' - who were believed to be useless, if anyone could be such.
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In early times every sort of advantage tends to become a military advantage such is the best way, then, to keep it alive. But the Jewish advantage never did so beginning in religion, contrary to a thousand analogies, it remained religious.
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The most essential mental quality for a free people, whose liberty is to be progressive, permanent and on a large scale, is much stupidity.
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Life is a compromise of what your ego wants to do, what experience tells you to do, and what your nerves let you do.
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In my youth I hoped to do great things now I shall be satisfied to get through without scandal.
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A cabinet is a combining committee, a hyphen which joins, a buckle which fastens, the legislative part of the state to the executive part of the state. In its origin it belongs to the one, in its functions it belongs to the other.
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If you have to prove you are worthy of credit, your credit is already gone.
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The reason why so few good books are written is that so few people who can write know anything.
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A schoolmaster should have an atmosphere of awe, and walk wonderingly, as if he was amazed at being himself.
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But of all nations in the world the English are perhaps the least a nation of pure philosophers.
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So long as war is the main business of nations, temporary despotism - despotism during the campaign - is indispensable.
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Conquest is the missionary of valor, and the hard impact of military virtues beats meanness out of the world.
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