W. S. Gilbert Quotes - Page 2

It is a glorious thing To be a Pirate King.

If you're anxious to shine in the high aesthetic line as a man of culture rare, you must get up all the germs of the transcendental terms, and plant them everywhere.

Isn't your life extremely flat,With nothing to grumble at?

You must lie upon the daisies and discourse in novel phrases of complicated state of mind. The meaning doesn't matter if it's only idle chatter of a transcendental kind.

I know everybody's income and what everybody earns, And I carefully compare it with the income-tax returns

Roll on, thou ball, roll on! Through pathless realms of Space, Roll on!

The idiot who praises, with enthusiastic tone, All centuries but this, and every country but his own.

Let the punishment fit the crime.

Though I'm anything but clever, I could talk like that forever.

Is life a boon? If so, it must befall That Death, whene'er he call, Must call too soon.

To sit in solemn silence on a dull, dark dock in a pestilential prison with a life-long lock awaiting the sensation of a short, sharp shock from a cheap and chippy chopper on a big, black block.

Things are seldom what they seem.

If you give me your attention, I will tell you what I am: I'm a genuine philanthropist--all other kinds are sham. Each little fault of temper and each social defect In my erring fellow creatures, I endeavor to correct.

It's true I've got no shirts to wear; It's true my butcher's bill is due; It's true my prospects all look blue - But don't let that unsettle you.

My family pride is something inconceivable. I can't help it. I was born sneering.

every Jack He must study the knack If he wants to make sure of his Jill!

My object all sublime I shall achieve in time- To let the punishment fit the crime- The punishment fit the crime.

I love my fellow creatures - I do all the good I can - yet everybody says I'm such a disagreeable man!

Strike the concertina's melancholy string! Blow the spirit-stirring harp like any thing! Let the piano's martial blast Rouse the Echoes of the Past

When Wellington thrashed Bonaparte, As every child can tell, The House of Peers, throughout the war, Did nothing in particular, And did it very well

I always voted at my party's call, and I never thought of thinking for myself at all.

In the discovery of secret things and in the investigation of hidden causes, stronger reasons are obtained from sure experiments and demonstrated arguments than from probable conjectures and the opinions of philosophical speculators of the common sort.

I accept refreshment at any hands, however lowly.

For duty, duty must be done; The rule applies to everyone.

In all the woes that curse our race there is a lady in the case.