“The great difficulty which history records is not that of the first step, but that of the second step.”

—  Walter Bagehot

Source: Physics and Politics http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/etext03/phypl10.txt (1869), Ch. 2, The Use of Conflict <br class="br">Context: The great difficulty which history records is not that of the first step, but that of the second step. What is most evident is not the difficulty of getting a fixed law, but getting out of a fixed law; not of cementing (as upon a former occasion I phrased it) a cake of custom, but of breaking the cake of custom; not of making the first preservative habit, but of breaking through it, and reaching something better.

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Walter Bagehot42
British journalist, businessman, and essayist 1826–1877

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