Quotes from Sir William S. Gilbert

Though the Philistines may jostle, you will rank as an apostle in the high aesthetic band,If you walk down Piccadilly with a poppy or a lily in your medieval hand.And everyone will say,As you walk your flowery way,"If he's content with a vegetable love, which would certainly not suit me,Why, what a most particularly pure young man this pure young man must be!"

You must lie upon the daisies and discourse in novel phrases of your complicated state of mind,The meaning doesn't matter if it's only idle chatter of a transcendental kind.And everyone will say,As you walk your mystic way,"If this young man expresses himself in terms too deep for me,Why, what a very singularly deep young man this deep young man must be!"

I often think it's comicalHow nature always does contriveThat every boy and every gal,That's born into the world alive,Is either a little Liberal,Or else a little Conservative!

A wandering minstrel I—A thing of shreds and patches,Of ballads, songs and snatches,And dreamy lullaby!

As innocent as a new-laid egg.

When the footpads quail at the night-bird's wail, and black dogs bay at the moon,Then is the specters' holiday—then is the ghosts' high noon!

And I'm never, never sick at sea!What, never?No, never!What, never?Hardly ever!He's hardly ever sick at sea!Then give three cheers, and one cheer moreFor the hardy Captain of the Pinafore!

The Law is the true embodimentOf everything that's excellent.It has no kind of fault or flaw,And I, my Lords, embody the Law.

Come, friends, who plow the sea,Truce to navigation,Take another station;Let's vary piraceeWith a little burglaree.

For he might have been a Roosian,A French or Turk or Proosian,Or perhaps Itali-an.But in spite of all temptationsTo belong to other nations,He remains an Englishman.

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

A greenery-yallery, Grosvenor Gallery,Foot-in-the-grave young man!

That celebrated,Cultivated,UnderratedNobleman,The Duke of Plaza Toro!

On a cloth untrueWith a twisted cueAnd elliptical billiard balls.

Stick close to your desks and never go to sea,And you all may be Rulers of the Queen's Navee!

He is an Englishman!For he himself has said it,And it's greatly to his credit,That he is an Englishman!

Ah, pray make no mistake,We are not shy;We're very wide awake,The moon and I!

None shall part us from each other,One in life and death are we:All in all to one another—I to thee and thou to me!Thou the tree and I the flower—Thou the idol; I the throng—Thou the day and I the hour—Thou the singer; I the song!

Francesca da Rimini, miminy, piminy,Je-ne-sais-quoi young man!

And so do his sisters, and his cousins, and his aunts!His sisters and his cousins,Whom he reckons up by dozens,And his aunts!

He led his regiment from behind—He found it less exciting.

I can't help it. I was born sneering.

When I was a lad I served a termAs office boy to an Attorney's firm.I cleaned the windows and I swept the floorAnd I polished up the handle of the big front door.I polished up that handle so carefulleeThat now I am the Ruler of the Queen's Navee!

When you're lying awake with a dismal headache, and repose is taboo'd by anxiety,I conceive you may use any language you choose to indulge in, without impropriety.