King William IV

Famous quotes containing the words king william, king and/or william:

    When Prince William [later King William IV] was at Cork in 1787, an old officer ... dined with him, and happened to say he had been forty years in the service. The Prince with a sneer asked what he had learnt in those forty years. The old gentleman justly offended, said, “Sir, I have learnt, when I am no longer fit to fight, to make as good a retreat as I can” —and walked out of the room.
    Horace Walpole (1717–1797)

    King Herod shrieking vengeance at the curled
    Up knees of Jesus choking in the air,

    A king of speechless clods and infants. Still
    The world out-Herods Herod;
    Robert Lowell (1917–1977)

    The neo-hippie-dips, the sentimentality-crazed iguana anthropomorphizers, the Chicken Littles, the three-bong-hit William Blakes—thank God these people don’t actually go outdoors much, or the environment would be even worse than it is already.
    —P.J. (Patrick Jake)