98+ W. S. Gilbert Quotes On Education, Friendship And Writing

William Schwenck Gilbert (1836-1911) was an English dramatist, librettist, poet, and illustrator best known for his collaboration with composer Arthur Sullivan on fourteen comic operas. He is noted for his wit and humour, as well as for his critical views on social, political, and moral issues. Gilbert wrote the libretto for some of the most successful musicals of the Victorian era, including H.M.S. Pinafore, The Pirates of Penzance, and The Mikado. Following is our collection on famous quotes by W. S. Gilbert on education, leadership, life.

Top 10 W. S. Gilbert Quotes

1. Love, unrequited, robs me of my rest: Love, hopeless love, my ardent soul encumbers: Love, nightmare-like, lies heavy on my chest, And weaves itself into my midnight slumbers!
2. 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.
3. He did nothing in particular, and did it very well.
4. I'm really very sorry for you all, but it's an unjust world, and virtue is triumphant only in theatrical performances.
5. Deerstalking would be a very fine sport if only the deer had guns.
6. No one can have a higher opinion of him than I have; and I think he's a dirty little beast.
7. Merely corroborative detail, intended to give artistic verisimilitude to an otherwise bald and unconvincing narrative.
8. Life's a pudding full of plums.
9. It's love that makes the world go round.
10. What though I cannot meet my bills? What though I suffer toothache's ills? What though I swallow countless pills?

W. S. Gilbert Short Quotes

• Things are seldom what they seem.
• You have no idea what a poor opinion I have of myself; and how little I deserve it.
• every Jack He must study the knack If he wants to make sure of his Jill!
• It isn't so much what's on the table that matters, as what's on the chairs.
• Wherever valor true is found, true modesty will there abound.
• Darwinian man, though well-behaved, at best is only a monkey shaved.
• There's fish in the sea, no doubt of it, As good as ever came out of it.
• In all the woes that curse our race there is a lady in the case.
• I am the very model of a modern major general
• I always voted at my party's call, and I never thought of thinking for myself at all.

W. S. Gilbert Quotes About Life

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

Life's perhaps the only riddle That we shrink from giving up. — W. S. Gilbert

Isn't your life extremely flat,With nothing to grumble at? — W. S. Gilbert

Oh, don't the days seem lank and long When all goes right and nothing goes wrong, And isn't your life extremely flat With nothing whatever to grumble at! — W. S. Gilbert

Life is a joke that's just begun. — W. S. Gilbert

W. S. Gilbert Quotes About Love

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

Faint heart never won fair lady! Nothing venture, nothing win Blood is thick, but water's thin In for a penny, in for a pound It's Love that makes the world go 'round! — W. S. Gilbert

When the enterprising burglar isn't burgling; When the cut-throat isn't occupied in crime; He loves to hear the little brook a-gurgling; And listen to the merry village chime. — W. S. Gilbert

Spurn not the nobly born with love affected; nor treat with virtuous scorn the well connected. — W. S. Gilbert

So I fell in love with a rich attorney's Elderly ugly daughter. — W. S. Gilbert

W. S. Gilbert Famous Quotes And Sayings

I'm very good at integral and differential calculus, I know the scientific names of beings animalculous; In short, in matters vegetable, animal, and mineral, I am the very model of a modern Major-General. — W. S. Gilbert

I am, in point of fact, a particularly haughty and exclusive person, of pre-Adamite ancestral descent. You will understand this when I tell you that I can trace my ancestry back to a protoplasmal primordial atomic globule. — W. S. Gilbert

Saturday afternoon, although occurring at regular and well-foreseen intervals, always takes this railway by surprise. — W. S. Gilbert

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. — W. S. Gilbert

The Law is the true embodiment of everything that's excellent; it has no kind of fault or flaw and I, my Lords, embody the Law. — W. S. Gilbert

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 — W. S. Gilbert

I've an irritating chuckle, I've a celebrated sneer, I've an entertaining snigger, I've a fascinating leer; To everybody's prejudice I know a thing or two; I can tell a woman's age in half a minute--and I do — W. S. Gilbert

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. — W. S. Gilbert

After many unhappy experiments in the direction of an ideal Republic, it was found that what may be described as a Despotism tempered by Dynamite provides, on the whole, the most satisfactory description of ruler - an autocrat who dares not abuse his autocratic power. — W. S. Gilbert

I am the very model of a modern Major-General, I've information vegetable, animal, and mineral, I know the kings of England, and I quote the fights historical, From Marathon to Waterloo, in order categorical. — W. S. Gilbert

Then a sentimental passion of a vegetable fashion must excite your languid spleen, An attachment a la Plato for a bashful young potato, or a not-too-French French bean! — W. S. Gilbert

When you are lying awake with a dismal headache, and repose is tabooed by anxiety, I conceive you may use any language you choose to indulge in without impropriety. — W. S. Gilbert

If I can wheedle A knife or a needle, Why not a Silver Churn? — W. S. Gilbert

When a felon s not engaged in his employment, Or maturing his felonious little plans, His capacity for innocent enjoyment Is just as great as any honest mans. — W. S. Gilbert

See how the Fates their gifts allot, For A is happy-B is not. Yet B is worthy, I dare say, Of more prosperity than A. — W. S. Gilbert

When every one is somebody, Then no one's anybody! — W. S. Gilbert

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

If the jests that you crack have an orthodox smack, You may get a bland smile from these sages; But should it, by chance, be imported from France, Half-a-crown is stopped out of your wages! — W. S. Gilbert

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. — W. S. Gilbert

Who knows but we may count among our intellectual chickens Like them an Earl of Thackeray and p'raps a Duke of Dickens — W. S. Gilbert

And that singular anomaly, the lady novelist-- I don't think she'd be missed--I'm sure she'd not be missed! — W. S. Gilbert

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

I accept refreshment at any hands, however lowly. — W. S. Gilbert

Oh! a private buffoon is a light-hearted loon, If you listen to popular rumour; From morning to night he's so joyous and bright, And he bubbles with wit and good humour! — W. S. Gilbert

Matrimonial devotion doesn't seem to suit her notion. — W. S. Gilbert

I know everybody's income and what everybody earns, And I carefully compare it with the income-tax returns — W. S. Gilbert

I often think it's comical How Nature always does contrive That every boy and every gal That's born into the world alive Is either a little Liberal Or else a little Conservative! — W. S. Gilbert

Ah, pray no mistake, We are not shy; We're very wide awake The Moon and I. — W. S. Gilbert

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

I shall carry to the Catacombs of Age, Photographically lined On the tablet of my mind — W. S. Gilbert

All bayonets are bad. — W. S. Gilbert

Let the punishment fit the crime. — W. S. Gilbert

Oh, wouldn't the world seem dull and flat with nothing whatever to grumble at? — W. S. Gilbert

Though I'm anything but clever, I could talk like that forever. — W. S. Gilbert

Utopia's quite another land; In her enterprising movements, She is England--with improvements — W. S. Gilbert

Bow, bow, ye lower middle classes! Bow, bow, ye tradesmen, bow, ye masses! — W. S. Gilbert

Bless your heart, they don't mind--they're exceedingly kind-- They don't blame you--as long as you're funny! — W. S. Gilbert

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 — W. S. Gilbert

There's a fascination frantic in a ruin that's romantic. — W. S. Gilbert

No good play is a success; fine writing and high morals are useless on the stage. I have been scribbling twaddle for thirty-five years to suit the public taste, and I should know. — W. S. Gilbert

Oh, I am a cook and a captain bold, And the mate of the Nancybrig, And a bos'sun tight, and a midshipmite, And the crew of the captain's gig! — W. S. Gilbert

The happiest hour a sailor sees Is when he's down At an inland town, With his Nancy on his knees, yo ho! And his arm around her waist! — W. S. Gilbert

Bind up their wounds - but look the other way. — W. S. Gilbert

I am the Captain of the Pinafore ; And a right good captain too! . . . . 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 more, For the hardy Captain of the Pinafore! — W. S. Gilbert

On my face extended flat I was walloped with a cat For listening at the key-hole of the door. — W. S. Gilbert

If your master is surly, from getting up early (And tempers are short in the morning), An inopportune joke is enough to provoke Him to give you, at once, a month's warning. — W. S. Gilbert

poverty is obsolete and hunger is abolished — W. S. Gilbert

In enterprise of martial kind, when there was any fighting, he led his regiment from behind -- he found it less exciting. — W. S. Gilbert

When in that House MPs divide/If they've a brain and cerebellum, too/They've got to leave that brain outside/And vote just as their leaders tell 'em to. — W. S. Gilbert

For duty, duty must be done; The rule applies to everyone. — W. S. Gilbert

I see no objection to stoutness, in moderation. — W. S. Gilbert

When every blessed thing you have is made of silver, or of gold, you long for simple pewter. — W. S. Gilbert

I am a child of Nature, and take after my mother. — W. S. Gilbert

In short, whoever you may be, To this conclusion you'll agree, When every one is somebodee, Then no one's anybody! — W. S. Gilbert

It is a glorious thing To be a Pirate King. — W. S. Gilbert

Roll on, thou ball, roll on! Through pathless realms of Space, Roll on! — W. S. Gilbert

A popular speaker, however unpopular and insignificant, has only to wind up his speech with half-a-dozen lines of Shakespeare (and to make it clearly understood that they are Shakespeare's) and he will sit down amid thunders of applause. — W. S. Gilbert

A policeman's lot is not a happy one — W. S. Gilbert

Society has quite forsaken all her wicked courses, Which empties our police courts, and abolishes divorces. — W. S. Gilbert

The privilege and pleasure That we treasure beyond measure Is to run on little errands for the Ministers of State. — W. S. Gilbert

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. — W. S. Gilbert

A man is but an ass Who fights in a cuirass — W. S. Gilbert

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

I am a courtier grave and serious Who is about to kiss your hand: Try to combine a pose imperious With a demeanour nobly bland. — W. S. Gilbert

Posterity will know as little of me as I know of posterity. — W. S. Gilbert

Man is nature's sole mistake. — W. S. Gilbert

Down went the owners -- greedy men whom hope of gain allured: oh, dry the starting tear, for they were heavily insured. — W. S. Gilbert

Posterity shall know of me even less than I shall know of posterity. — W. S. Gilbert

Life Lessons by W. S. Gilbert

1. W. S. Gilbert's works often explore the idea that we should strive to be our best selves, no matter the obstacles we face.
2. He also emphasizes the importance of using humor to cope with difficult situations, and to find joy in the small moments of life.
3. Lastly, Gilbert's works often highlight the power of resilience and determination in overcoming adversity.