Quote

The best security for people's doing their duty is that they should not know anything else to do.

Walter Bagehot

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Walter Bagehot
Age: 51 †
Born: 1826
Born: February 3
Died: 1877
Died: March 24
Businessperson
Economist
Engineer
Journalist
Political Scientist
Politician
Sociologist
Langport
Somerset
People
Duty
Security
Else
Anything
Best

More quotes by Walter Bagehot

Image
It has been said that England invented the phrase, 'Her Majesty's Opposition' that it was the first government which made a criticism of administration as much a part of the polity as administration itself. This critical opposition is the consequence of cabinet government.
Walter Bagehot
Image
All people are most credulous when they are most happy.
Walter Bagehot
Image
The reason why so few good books are written is that so few people who can write know anything.
Walter Bagehot
Image
In my youth I hoped to do great things now I shall be satisfied to get through without scandal.
Walter Bagehot
Image
Credit means that a certain confidence is given, and a certain trust reposed. Is that trust justified? And is that confidence wise? These are the cardinal questions. To put it more simply credit is a set of promises to pay will those promises be kept?
Walter Bagehot
Image
The purse strings tie us to our kind.
Walter Bagehot
Image
No real English gentleman, in his secret soul, was ever sorry for the death of a political economist.
Walter Bagehot
Image
The whole history of civilization is strewn with creeds and institutions which were invaluable at first, and deadly afterwards
Walter Bagehot
Image
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
Image
You may talk of the tyranny of Nero and Tiberius but the real tyranny is the tyranny of your next-door neighbor.
Walter Bagehot
Image
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
Image
The essence of Toryism is enjoyment?but as far as communicating and establishing your creed are concernedtrya little pleasure. The way to keep up old customs is, to enjoy old customs the way to be satisfied with the present state of things is, to enjoy that state of things.
Walter Bagehot
Image
We must not let daylight in upon the magic.
Walter Bagehot
Image
Life is not a set campaign, but an irregular work, and the main forces in it are not overt resolutions, but latent and half-involuntary promptings.
Walter Bagehot
Image
So long as there are earnest believers in the world, they will always wish to punish opinions, even if their judgment tells them it is unwise and their conscience that it is wrong.
Walter Bagehot
Image
A man's mother is his misfortune, but his wife is his fault.
Walter Bagehot
Image
To a great experience one thing is essential, an experiencing nature.
Walter Bagehot
Image
An inability to stay quiet is one of the conspicuous failings of mankind.
Walter Bagehot
Image
One of the greatest pains to human nature is the pain of a new idea. It...makes you think that after all, your favorite notions may be wrong, your firmest beliefs ill-founded....Naturally, therefore, common men hate a new idea, and are disposed more or less to ill-treat the original man who brings it.
Walter Bagehot
Image
Adventure is the life of commerce, but caution is the life of banking.
Walter Bagehot