R. S. Rait on A. V. Dicey

“His Introduction to the Study of the Law of the Constitution, originally published in 1885, was at once recognized to be no mere technical discussion but a literary contribution to the analysis and interpretation of the fundamental ideas which underlie the political thought and life of the nation.”

“Lectures on the relation between Law and Public Opinion in England during the Nineteenth Century was published in 1905 and was received as a notable contribution to political philosophy—"the esprit des lois of our times".”

“Dicey's intellectual and critical powers were accompanied by a lovable simplicity of character and a lively wit. "It is better to be flippant than dull" he used to tell his pupils, and it was the force of his epigrams that made his early reputation as a speaker in the Oxford Union. His remarkable faculty of exposition, acquired by persistent revision of his compositions, was sometimes marred by a tendency to redundancy of which he could not rid himself.”