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Quotable Quotes: Walter Bagehot

by Miki Saxon

150 years ago Walter Bagehot focus probably wasn’t on entrepreneurs, but that just goes to show that wise thoughts may have multiple applications.

To start with, Bagehot’s take on what work really is should resonate, “The real essence of work is concentrated energy,” especially with entrepreneurs.

“Anyone can start a company” is today’s mantra, but it’s also true that “No great work has ever been produced except after a long interval of still and musing meditation.” Notice that he says, ‘great’.

However, at some point thought needs to become action because, “What impresses men is not mind, but the result of mind.”

Ever wonder why people are willing to put up with 100 hours weeks and financial deprivation to follow a dream? Bagehot sums it up perfectly, “The greatest pleasure in life is doing what people say you cannot do.”

A common idea that runs throughout all history it that “One of the greatest pains to human nature is the pain of a new idea.”

Long before the advent of focus groups and experts telling entrepreneurs to get out of their office and talk to people Bagehot pinned down the result of not listening to your market, as well as why some people don’t, “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.”

Finally, for all of us who truly love what we do, in spite of what other think, “Business is really more agreeable than pleasure; it interests the whole mind … more deeply. But it does not look as if it did.”

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