A. P. Herbert Quotes

33 Sourced Quotes

A highbrow is the kind of person who looks at a sausage and thinks of Picasso.

A. P. Herbert
The critical period in matrimony is breakfast-time.

A. P. Herbert
Nobody's wrong but England – and England's always wrong,
Too late – or else too early – too soft – or else too strong.
And when for once the wide world begins to praise her name
Her own sons crowd and hurry to shout her back to shame.

A. P. Herbert
People must not do things for fun. We are not here for fun. There is no reference to fun in any Act of Parliament.

A. P. Herbert
It is like the thirteenth stroke of a crazy clock, which not only is itself discredited but casts a shade of doubt over all previous assertions.

A. P. Herbert
Don't let's go to the dogs tonight,
For mother will be there.

A. P. Herbert
Modern dictionaries are pusillanimous works, preferring to record what has been done than to say what ought to be done.

A. P. Herbert
Vladimir, Vladimir, Vladimir Kuts
Nature's attempt at an engine in boots.
On the Russian runner Vladimir Kuts

A. P. Herbert
Nothing is wasted, nothing is in vain:
The seas roll over but the rocks remain.

A. P. Herbert
There's alcohol in plant and tree.
It must be Nature's plan
That there should be in fair degree
Some alcohol in Man.

A. P. Herbert
An Act of God was defined as something which no reasonable man could have expected.

A. P. Herbert
My ball is in a bunch of fern, A jolly place to be; An angry man is close astern- He waves his club at me. Well, let him wave-the sky is blue; Go on, old ball, we are but two-We may be down in three, Or nine-or ten-or twenty-five-It matters not; to be alive, Is good enough for me.

A. P. Herbert
The Common Law of England has been laboriously built about a mythical figure—the figure of 'The Reasonable Man'.

A. P. Herbert
It is clear that the game of golf may well be included in that category of intolerable provocations which may legally excuse or mitigate behavior not otherwise excusable.

A. P. Herbert
Men who would face torture without a word become blasphemous at the short fourteenth. It is clear that the game of golf may well be included in that category of intolerable provocations which may legally excuse or mitigate behaviour not otherwise excusable.

A. P. Herbert
It cannot be too clearly understood that this is not a free country, and it will be an evil day for the legal profession when it is.

A. P. Herbert
Greenfly, it's difficult to see Why God, who made the rose, made thee.

A. P. Herbert
The whole Constitution has been erected upon the assumption that the King not only is capable of doing wrong but is more likely to do wrong than other men if he is given the chance.

A. P. Herbert
The Englishman never enjoys himself except for a noble purpose. He does not play cricket because it is a good game, but because it creates good citizens. He does not love motor-races for their own sake, but for the advantages they bring to the engineering firms of his country. And it is common knowledge that the devoted persons who conduct and regularly attend horse-races do not do so because they like it, but for the benefit of the breed of the English horse.

A. P. Herbert
While the Commons must bray like an ass every day
To appease their electoral hordes,
We don't say a thing till we've something to say—
There's a lot to be said for the Lords.

A. P. Herbert
A man who has made up his mind on a given subject twenty-five years ago and continues to hold his political opinions after he has been proved to be wrong is a man of principle; while he who from time to time adapts his opinions to the changing circumstances of life is an opportunist.

A. P. Herbert
As my poor father used to say
In 1863,
Once people start on all this Art
Goodbye, moralitee!

A. P. Herbert
On trying to write a cheque on a cow:
'Was the cow crossed?'
'No, your worship, it was an open cow.'

A. P. Herbert
Let's find out what everyone is doing,
And then stop everyone from doing it.

A. P. Herbert
Other people's babies—
That's my life!
Mother to dozens,
And nobody's wife.
Of a nanny

A. P. Herbert
The Farmer will never be happy again;
He carries his heart in his boots;
For either the rain is destroying his grain
Or the drought is destroying his roots.

A. P. Herbert
Let's stop somebody from doing something!
Everybody does too much.

A. P. Herbert
Citizens who take it upon themselves to do unusual actions which attract the attention of the police should be careful to bring these actions into one of the recognized categories of crimes and offences, for it is intolerable that the police should be put to the pains of inventing reasons for finding them undesirable.

A. P. Herbert
This high official, all allow,
Is grossly overpaid;
There wasn't any Board, and now
There isn't any Trade.

A. P. Herbert
The concept of two people living together for 25 years without having a cross word suggests a lack of spirit only to be admired in sheep.

A. P. Herbert