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  ...of political things which he could not have imagined, which he could not make--to which he feels in himself scarcely anything analogous.
Philosophers may deride this superstition, but its results are inestimable. By the spectacle of this august society, countless ignorant men and women are induced to obey the few nominal electors- -the Ll0 borough renters, and the L50 county renters--who have nothing imposing about them, nothing which would attract the eye or fascinate the fancy. What impresses men is not mind, but the result of mind.   And the greatest of these results is this wonderful spectacle of society, which is ever new, and yet ever the same; in which accidents pass and essence remains; in which one generation dies and another succeeds, as if they were birds in a cage, or animals in a menagerie; of which it seems almost more than a metaphor to treat the parts as limbs of a perpetual living thing, so silently do they seem to change, so wonderfully and so perfectly does the conspicuous life of the new year take...   Bagehot, Walter

Excerpt from The English Constitution · This quote is tagged Mind · Search on Google Books to find all references and sources for this quotation.

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