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Stupidity is nature's favorite resource for preserving consistency of opinion.

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
Favorite
Resources
Opinion
Nature
Preserving
Resource
Consistency
Stupidity

More quotes by Walter Bagehot

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All people are most credulous when they are most happy.
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A man's mother is his misfortune, but his wife is his fault.
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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.
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Nothing is more unpleasant than a virtuous person with a mean mind.
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Whenever two people meet, there are really six people present. There is each man as he sees The greatest pleasure in life is doing what people say you cannot do.
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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.
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The great pleasure of life is doing for pleasure things I do not like to do.
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One cannot make men good by Act of Parliament.
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Royalty is a government in which the attention of the nation is concentrated on one person doing interesting actions.
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History is strewn with the wrecks of nations which have gained a little progressiveness at the cost of a great deal of hard manliness, and have thus prepared themselves for destruction as soon as the movements of the world have a chance for it.
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The caucus is a sort of representative meeting which sits voting and voting till they have cut out all the known men against whom much is to be said, and agreed on some unknown man against whom there is nothing known, and therefore nothing to be alleged.
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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.
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Persecution in intellectual countries produces a superficial conformity, but also underneath an intense, incessant, implacable doubt.
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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.
Walter Bagehot
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One of the greatest pains to human nature is the pain of a new idea.
Walter Bagehot
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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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What we opprobriously call stupidity, though not an enlivening quality in common society, is nature's favorite resource for preserving steadiness of conduct and consistency of opinion.
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We see but one aspect of our neighbor, as we see but one side of the moon in either case there is also a dark half, which is unknown to us. We all come down to dinner, but each has a room to himself.
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I'm not the kind of writer who's able to block out the world around me. I'm mindful of our own haves and have-nots, how our culture often blames and punishes the have-nots. I worry about our precarious economic and political climate.
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A democratic despotism is like a theocracy: it assumes its own correctness.
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