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 BagehotThe reason why so few good books are written is that so few people who can write know anything.
Walter BagehotMen who do not make advances to women are apt to become victims to women who make advances to them.
Walter BagehotThe apparent rulers of the English nation are like the most imposing personages of the a splendid procession; it is by them that the mob are influenced; it is they who the inspectors cheer. The real rulers are secreted in second hand carriages; no one cares for them or asks about them, but they are obeyed implicitly and unconsciously by reason of the splendour of those who eclipsed and preceded them.
Walter Bagehot