The Oxford dictionary of modern quotations (24 page)

3.46 Arthur Chapman =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

1873-1935

Out where the handclasp's a little stronger,

Out where the smile dwells a little longer,

That's where the West begins.

Out Where the West Begins (1916) p. 1

3.47 Graham Chapman, John Cleese, Terry Gilliam, Eric Idle, Terry Jones, Michael Palin =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Graham Chapman 1941-1989

John Cleese 1939-

Terry Gilliam 1940-

Eric Idle 1943-

Terry Jones 1942-

Michael Palin 1943-

I'm a lumberjack

And I'm OK

I sleep all night

And I work all day.

Monty Python's Big Red Book (1971)

And now for something completely different.

Catch-phrase popularized in Monty Python's Flying Circus (BBC TV

programme, 1969-74)

Your wife interested in...photographs? Eh? Know what I mean--photographs?

He asked him knowingly...nudge nudge, snap snap, grin grin, wink wink, say

no more.

Monty Python's Flying Circus (BBC TV programme, 1969), in Roger Wilmut

From Fringe to Flying Circus (1980) ch. 11

customer: I wish to complain about this parrot what I purchased not

half an hour ago from this very boutique.

shopkeeper: Oh yes, the Norwegian Blue--what's wrong with it?

customer: I'll tell you what's wrong with it--it's dead that's what's

wrong with it.

shopkeeper: No, no--it's resting....It's probably pining for the

fiords....

customer: It's not pining--it's passed on! This parrot is no more! It

has ceased to be! It's expired and gone to meet its maker! This is a late

parrot! It's a stiff! Bereft of life it rests in peace--if you hadn't

nailed it to the perch it would be pushing up the daisies! It's rung down

the curtain and joined the choir invisible! This is an ex-parrot!

Monty Python's Flying Circus (BBC TV programme, 1969), in Roger Wilmut

From Fringe to Flying Circus (1980) ch. 11

Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition! Our chief weapon is

surprisesemdash.surprise and fear...fear and surprise...our two weapons

are fear and surprise--and ruthless efficiency...our three weapons are

fear and surprise and ruthless efficiency and an almost fanatical devotion

to the Pope...our four...no....Amongst our weapons--amongst our

weaponry--are such elements as fear, surprise....I'll come in again.

Monty Python's Flying Circus (BBC TV programme, 1970), in Roger Wilmut

From Fringe to Flying Circus (1980) ch. 11

3.48 Prince Charles (Charles Philip Arthur George, Prince of Wales) =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

1948-

I have not the slightest hesitation in making the observation that much of

British management doesn't seem to understand the importance of the human

factor.

Speech to Parliamentary and Scientific Committee, 21 Feb. 1979, in Daily

Telegraph 22 Feb. 1979

I just come and talk to the plants, really--very important to talk to

them, they respond I find.

Television interview, 21 Sept. 1986, in Daily Telegraph 22 Sept. 1986

We do need a sense of urgency in our outlook in the regeneration of

industry and enterprise, because otherwise what really worries me is that

we are going to end up as a fourth-rate country and I don't want to see

that.

Speech at Edinburgh, 26 Nov. 1985, in Scotsman 27 Nov. 1985

Instead of designing an extension to the elegant fa�ade of the National

Gallery which complements it...it looks as if we may be presented with

a kind of vast municipal fire station....I would understand better this

type of high-tech approach if you demolished the whole of Trafalgar Square

and started again...but what is proposed is like a monstrous carbuncle on

the face of a much-loved and elegant friend.

Speech to Royal Institute of British Architects, 30 May 1984, in The Times

31 May 1984. Cf. Countess Spencer

3.49 Apsley Cherry-Garrard =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

1882-1959

See E. L. Atkinson (1.65)

3.50 G. K. Chesterton =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

1874-1936

An adventure is only an inconvenience rightly considered. An inconvenience

is only an adventure wrongly considered.

All Things Considered (1908) "On Running after one's Hat"

No animal ever invented anything so bad as drunkenness--or so good as

drink.

All Things Considered (1908) "Wine When it is Red"

Of those days the tale is told that I once sent a telegram to my wife in

London, which ran: "Am in Market Harborough. Where ought I to be?"

I cannot remember whether this story is true; but it is not unlikely, or,

I think, unreasonable.

Autobiography (1936) ch. 16

They died to save their country and they only saved the world.

Ballad of St Barbara and Other Verses (1922) "English Graves"

Before the gods that made the gods

Had seen their sunrise pass,

The White Horse of the White Horse Vale

Was cut out of the grass.

Ballad of the White Horse (1911) bk. 1, p. 1

I tell you naught for your comfort,

Yea, naught for your desire,

Save that the sky grows darker yet

And the sea rises higher.

Ballad of the White Horse (1911) bk. 1, p. 18

For the great Gaels of Ireland

Are the men that God made mad,

For all their wars are merry,

And all their songs are sad.

Ballad of the White Horse (1911) bk. 2, p. 35

The thing on the blind side of the heart,

On the wrong side of the door,

The green plant groweth, menacing

Almighty lovers in the Spring;

There is always a forgotten thing,

And love is not secure.

Ballad of the White Horse (1911) bk. 3, p. 52

Literature is a luxury; fiction is a necessity.

Defendant (1901) "Defence of Penny Dreadfuls"

All slang is metaphor, and all metaphor is poetry.

Defendant (1901) "Defence of Slang"

"My country, right or wrong," is a thing that no patriot would think of

saying except in a desperate case. It is like saying, "My mother, drunk or

sober."

Defendant (1901) "Defence of Patriotism"

And Noah he often said to his wife when he sat down to dine,

"I don't care where the water goes if it doesn't get into the wine."

Flying Inn (1914) ch. 5 "Wine and Water"

God made the wicked Grocer

For a mystery and a sign,

That men might shun the awful shops

And go to inns to dine.

Flying Inn (1914) ch. 6 "Song against Grocers"

He keeps a lady in a cage

Most cruelly all day,

And makes her count and calls her "Miss"

Until she fades away.

Flying Inn (1914) ch. 6 "Song against Grocers"

The folk that live in Liverpool, their heart is in their boots;

They go to hell like lambs, they do, because the hooter hoots.

Flying Inn (1914) ch. 7 "Me Heart"

They haven't got no noses,

The fallen sons of Eve.

Flying Inn (1914) ch. 15 "Song of Quoodle"

And goodness only knowses

The Noselessness of Man.

Flying Inn (1914) ch. 15 "Song of Quoodle"

The rich are the scum of the earth in every country.

Flying Inn (1914) ch. 15

Tea, although an Oriental,

Is a gentleman at least;

Cocoa is a cad and coward,

Cocoa is a vulgar beast.

Flying Inn (1914) ch. 18 "Song of Right and Wrong"

Before the Roman came to Rye or out to Severn strode,

The rolling English drunkard made the rolling English road.

A reeling road, a rolling road, that rambles round the shire,

And after him the parson ran, the sexton and the squire;

A merry road, a mazy road, and such as we did tread

The night we went to Birmingham by way of Beachy Head.

Flying Inn (1914) ch. 21 "Rolling English Road"

For there is good news yet to hear and fine things to be seen,

Before we go to Paradise by way of Kensal Green.

Flying Inn (1914) ch. 21 "Rolling English Road"

Ten thousand women marched through the streets of London [in support of

women's suffrage] saying: "We will not be dictated to," and then went off

to become stenographers.

In M. Ffinch G. K. Chesterton (1986) ch. 11

The word "orthodoxy" not only no longer means being right; it practically

means being wrong.

Heretics (1905) ch. 1

There is no such thing on earth as an uninteresting subject; the only

thing that can exist is an uninterested person.

Heretics (1905) ch. 3

The artistic temperament is a disease that afflicts amateurs. It is

a disease which arises from men not having sufficient power of expression

to utter and get rid of the element of art in their being.

Heretics (1905) ch. 17

Bigotry may be roughly defined as the anger of men who have no opinions.

Heretics (1905) ch. 20

After the first silence the small man said to the other: "Where does a

wise man hide a pebble?" And the tall man answered in a low voice: "On the

beach." The small man nodded, and after a short silence said: "Where does

a wise man hide a leaf?" And the other answered: "In the forest."

Innocence of Father Brown (1911) "The Sign of the Broken Sword"

Thieves respect property. They merely wish the property to become their

property that they may more perfectly respect it.

Man who was Thursday (1908) ch. 4

The human race, to which so many of my readers belong, has been playing at

children's games from the beginning, and will probably do it till the end,

which is a nuisance for the few people who grow up.

Napoleon of Notting Hill (1904) bk. 1, ch. 1

Why do you rush through the fields in trains,

Guessing so much and so much.

Why do you flash through the flowery meads,

Fat-head poet that nobody reads;

And why do you know such a frightful lot

About people in gloves and such?

New Poems (1933) "The Fat White Woman Speaks" (an answer to Frances

Cornford, see 61:8)

Democracy means government by the uneducated, while aristocracy means

government by the badly educated.

New York Times 1 Feb. 1931, pt. 5, p. 1

The men who really believe in themselves are all in lunatic asylums.

Orthodoxy (1908) ch. 2

Poets do not go mad; but chess-players do. Mathematicians go mad, and

cashiers; but creative artists very seldom. I am not, as will be seen, in

any sense attacking logic: I only say that this danger does lie in logic,

not in imagination.

Orthodoxy (1908) ch. 2

Mr Shaw is (I suspect) the only man on earth who has never written any

poetry.

Orthodoxy (1908) ch. 3

Tradition may be defined as an extension of the franchise. Tradition

means giving votes to the most obscure of all classes, our ancestors. It

is the democracy of the dead. Tradition refuses to submit to the small

and arrogant oligarchy of those who merely happen to be walking about. All

democrats object to men being disqualified by the accident of birth;

tradition objects to their being disqualified by the accident of death.

Democracy tells us not to neglect a good man's opinion, even if he is our

groom; tradition asks us not to neglect a good man's opinion, even if he

is our father.

Orthodoxy (1908) ch. 4

All conservatism is based upon the idea that if you leave things alone you

leave them as they are. But you do not. If you leave a thing alone you

leave it to a torrent of change.

Orthodoxy (1908) ch. 7

Angels can fly because they take themselves lightly.

Orthodoxy (1908) ch. 7

White founts falling in the Courts of the sun,

And the Soldan of Byzantium is smiling as they run.

Poems (1915) "Lepanto"

Strong gongs groaning as the guns boom far,

Don John of Austria is going to the war,

Stiff flags straining in the night-blasts cold

In the gloom black-purple, in the glint old-gold,

Torchlight crimson on the copper kettle-drums,

Then the tuckets, then the trumpets, then the cannon, and he comes.

Poems (1915) "Lepanto"

From all that terror teaches,

From lies of tongue and pen,

From all the easy speeches

That comfort cruel men,

From sale and profanation

Of honour and the sword,

From sleep and from damnation,

Deliver us, good Lord!

Poems (1915) "A Hymn"

Are they clinging to their crosses, F. E. Smith?

Poems (1915) "Antichrist"

Talk about the pews and steeples

And the Cash that goes therewith!

But the souls of Christian peoples...

Chuck it, Smith!

Poems (1915) "Antichrist"

The souls most fed with Shakespeare's flame

Still sat unconquered in a ring,

Remembering him like anything.

Poems (1915) "Shakespeare Memorial"

John Grubby, who was short and stout

And troubled with religious doubt,

Refused about the age of three

To sit upon the curate's knee.

Poems (1915) "New Freethinker"

And I dream of the days when work was scrappy,

And rare in our pockets the mark of the mint,

When we were angry and poor and happy,