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The Business Of Banking Ought To Be Simple. If It Is Hard It Is Wrong. The Only Securities Which A Banker, Using Money That He May Be Asked At Short Notice To Repay, Ought To Touch, Are Those Which Are Easily Saleable And Easily Intelligible.

-Walter Bagehot

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The Business Of Banking

Walter Bagehot

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The Business Of Banking Ought To Be Simple. If It Is Hard It Is Wrong. The Only Securities Which A Banker, Using Money That He May Be Asked At Short Notice To Repay, Ought To Touch, Are Those Which Are Easily Saleable And Easily Intelligible.

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A Political Country Is Like An American Forest; You Have Only To Cut Down The Old Trees, And Immediately New Trees Come Up To Replace Them.

Not Only Does A Bureaucracy Tend To Under-government In Point Of Quality; It Tends To Over-government In Point Of Quantity.

A Parliament Is Nothing Less Than A Big Meeting Of More Or Less Idle People.

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.

A Great Pleasure In Life Is Doing What People Say You Cannot Do.

The Sovereign Has, Under A Constitutional Monarchy Such As Ours, Three Rights - The Right To Be Consulted, The Right To Encourage, The Right To Warn. And A King Of Great Sense And Sagacity Would Want No Others.

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.

When Great Questions End, Little Parties Begin.

The Peculiar Essence Of Our Banking System Is An Unprecedented Trust Between Man And Man. And When That Trust Is Much Weakened By Hidden Causes, A Small Accident May Greatly Hurt It, And A Great Accident For A Moment May Almost Destroy It.

A Highly Developed Moral Nature Joined To An Undeveloped Intellectual Nature, An Undeveloped Artistic Nature, And A Very Limited Religious Nature, Is Of Necessity Repulsive. It Represents A Bit Of Human Nature A Good Bit, Of Course, But A Bit Only In Disproportionate, Unnatural And Revolting Prominence.

The Cure For Admiring The House Of Lords Is To Go And Look At It.

If You Have To Prove You Are Worthy Of Credit, Your Credit Is Already Gone.

Royalty Is A Government In Which The Attention Of The Nation Is Concentrated On One Person Doing Interesting Actions. A Republic Is A Government In Which That Attention Is Divided Between Many, Who Are All Doing Uninteresting Actions. Accordingly, So Long As The Human Heart Is Strong And The Human Reason Weak, Royalty Will Be Strong Because It Appeals To Diffused Feeling, And Republics Weak Because They Appeal To The Understanding.

Stupidity Is Nature's Favorite Resource For Preserving Consistency Of Opinion.

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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.

The Cardinal Maxim Is, That Any Aid To A Present Bad Bank Is The Surest Mode Of Preventing The Establishment Of A Future Good Bank.

A Democratic Despotism Is Like A Theocracy: It Assumes Its Own Correctness.

The Great Pleasure Of Life Is Doing For Pleasure Things I Do Not Like To Do.

Pleasures Of Life

No Man Has Come So Near Our Definition Of A Constitutional Statesman - The Powers Of A First-rate Man And The Creed Of A Second-rate Man.

Our Law Very Often Reminds One Of Those Outskirts Of Cities Where You Cannot For A Long Time Tell How The Streets Come To Wind About In So Capricious And Serpent-like A Manner. At Last It Strikes You That They Grew Up, House By House, On The Devious Tracks Of The Old Green Lanes; And If You Follow On To The Existing Fields, You May Often Find The Change Half Complete.

What Impresses Men Is Not Mind, But The Result Of Mind.

There Seems To Be An Unalterable Contradiction Between The Human Mind And Its Employments. How Can A Soul Be A Merchant? What Relation To An Immortal Being Have The Price Of Linseed, The Brokerage On Hemp? Can An Undying Creature Debit Petty Expenses And Charge For Carriage Paid? The Soul Ties Its Shoes; The Mind Washes Its Hands In A Basin. All Is Incongruous.

A Constitutional Statesman Is In General A Man Of Common Opinions And Uncommon Abilities.

Progress Would Not Have Been The Rarity It Is If The Early Food Had Not Been The Late Poison.

The Most Intellectual Of Men Are Moved Quite As Much By The Circumstances Which They Are Used To As By Their Own Will. The Active Voluntary Part Of A Man Is Very Small, And If It Were Not Economized By A Sleepy Kind Of Habit, Its Results Would Be Null.

Nations Touch At Their Summits.

A Family On The Throne Is An Interesting Idea. It Brings Down The Pride Of Sovereignty To The Level Of Petty Life.

A Slight Daily Unconscious Luxury Is Hardly Ever Wanting To The Dwellers In Civilization; Like The Gentle Air Of A Genial Climate, It Is A Perpetual Minute Enjoyment.

To A Great Experience One Thing Is Essential, An Experiencing Nature.

Great Experiences

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.

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.

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.

Great And Terrible Systems Of Divinity And Philosophy Lie Round About Us, Which, If True, Might Drive A Wise Man Mad.

A Princely Marriage Is The Brilliant Edition Of A Universal Fact, And, As Such, It Rivets Mankind.

A Severe Though Not Unfriendly Critic Of Our Institutions Said That The Cure For Admiring The House Of Lords Was To Go And Look At It.

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.

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Business Is Really More Agreeable Than Pleasure; It Interests The Whole Mind, The Aggregate Nature Of Man More Continuously, And More Deeply. But It Does Not Look As If It Did.

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The Greatest Mistake Is Trying To Be More Agreeable Than You Can Be.

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Money Is Economic Power.

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Exaggeration Is

In The Faculty Of Writing Nonsense, Stupidity Is No Match For Genius.

Writers Like Teeth Are Divided Into Incisors And Grinders.

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Life Is A School Of Probability.

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An Ambassador Is Not Simply An Agent; He Is Also A Spectacle.

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No Real English Gentleman, In His Secret Soul, Was Ever Sorry For The Death Of A Political Economist.

Royalty Is A Government In Which The Attention Of The Nation Is Concentrated On One Person Doing Interesting Actions.

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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.

A Bureaucracy Is Sure To Think That Its Duty Is To Augment Official Power, Official Business, Or Official Members, Rather Than To Leave Free The Energies Of Mankind; It Overdoes The Quantity Of Government, As Well As Impairs Its Quality. The Truth Is, That A Skilled Bureaucracy Is, Though It Boasts Of An Appearance Of Science, Quite Inconsistent With The True Principles Of The Art Of Business.

An Inability To Stay Quiet Is One Of The Conspicuous Failings Of Mankind.

Go Ahead And Do The Impossible. It's Worth The Look On The Faces Of Those Who Said You Couldn't.

The Real Essence Of Work Is Concentrated Energy - People Who Really Have That In A Superior Degree By Nature Are Independent Of The Forms And Habits And Artifices By Which Less Able And Less Active People Are Kept Up To Their Labors.

The Whole History Of Civilization Is Strewn With Creeds And Institutions Which Were Invaluable At First, And Deadly Afterwards

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.

The Business Of Banking Ought To Be Simple. If It Is Hard It Is Wrong. The Only Securities Which A Banker, Using Money That He May Be Asked At Short Notice To Repay, Ought To Touch, Are Those Which Are Easily Saleable And Easily Intelligible.

The Best Security For People's Doing Their Duty Is That They Should Not Know Anything Else To Do.

An Influential Member Of Parliament Has Not Only To Pay Much Money To Become Such, And To Give Time And Labour, He Has Also To Sacrifice His Mind Too - At Least All The Characteristics Part Of It That Which Is Original And Most His Own.

The Ethiop Gods Have Ethiop Lips, Bronze Cheeks, And Woolly Hair; The Grecian Gods Are Like The Greeks, As Keen-eyed, Cold And Fair.

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The Characteristic Merit Of The English Constitutions Is, That Its Dignified Parts Are Very Complicated And Somewhat Imposing, Very Old And Rather Venerable, While Its Efficient Part, At Least When In Great And Critical Action, Is Decidedly Simple And Modern.

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War Both Needs And Generates Certain Virtues; Not The Highest, But What May Be Called The Preliminary Virtues, As Valor, Veracity, The Spirit Of Obedience, The Habit Of Discipline. Any Of These, And Of Others Like Them, When Possessed By A Nation, And No Matter How Generated, Will Give Them A Military Advantage, And Make Them More Likely To Stay In The Race Of Nations.

Every Banker Knows That If He Has To Prove That He Is Worthy Of Credit, However Good May Be His Arguments, In Fact His Credit Is Gone: But What We Have Requires No Proof.

The Mystic Reverence, The Religious Allegiance, Which Are Essential To A True Monarchy, Are Imaginative Sentiments That No Legislature Can Manufacture In Any People.

You May Talk Of The Tyranny Of Nero And Tiberius; But The Real Tyranny Is The Tyranny Of Your Next-door Neighbor.

Civilized Ages Inherit The Human Nature Which Was Victorious In Barbarous Ages, And That Nature Is, In Many Respects, Not At All Suited To Civilized Circumstances.

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.

The Being Without An Opinion Is So Painful To Human Nature That Most People Will Leap To A Hasty Opinion Rather Than Undergo It.

A Schoolmaster Should Have An Atmosphere Of Awe, And Walk Wonderingly, As If He Was Amazed At Being Himself.

One Of The Greatest Pains To Human Nature Is The Pain Of A New Idea.

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?

The Habit Of Common And Continuous Speech Is A Symptom Of Mental Deficiency. It Proceeds From Not Knowing What Is Going On In Other People's Minds.

Persecution In Intellectual Countries Produces A Superficial Conformity, But Also Underneath An Intense, Incessant, Implacable Doubt.

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.

Whatever Expenditure Is Sanctioned - Even When It Is Sanctioned Against The Ministry's Wish - The Ministry Must Find The Money. Accordingly, They Have The Strongest Motive To Oppose Extra Outlay. The Ministry Is (so To Speak) The Breadwinner Of The Political Family, And Has To Meet The Cost Of Philanthropy And Glory; Just As The Head Of A Family Has To Pay For The Charities Of His Wife And The Toilette Of His Daughters.

Poverty Is An Anomaly To Rich People; It Is Very Difficult To Make Out Why People Who Want Dinner Do Not Ring The Bell.

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