Where there are many hands the lentils get burnt.
(Wise saying from the orient!)
John Lentell
6th January, 1971
Saturday’s Piece
Nothing is easier than fault-finding; no talent, no self-denial, no brains, no character are required to set up in the grumbling business.
(Robert West)
John Lentell
5th January 1971
Friday’s Piece
The thing that numbs the heart if this:
That men cannot devise
Some scheme of life to banish fear
That lurks in most men’s eyes.
(James Norman Hall, 1887 – 1951)
John Lentell
4th January, 1971
Thursday’s Piece
Here lies my wife: here let her lie!
Now she’s at rest, and so am I.
(Epitaph intended for John Dryden‘s wife)
John Lentell
3rd January, 1971
John Dryden by John Michael Wright, 1668 (detail)
National Portrait Gallery, London
Wednesday’s Piece
Peace, commerce and honest friendship with all nations – entangling alliances with none.
(Thomas Jefferson, 1743 – 1826)
John Lentell
1st January, 1971
Tuesday’s Piece
They say a reasonable amount o’fleas is good fer a dog – keeps him from broodin’ over bein’ a dog, mebbe.
(Edward Noyes Westcott, 1846 – 1898)
John Lentell
30th December, 1970
Monday’s Piece
John Donne, Anne Donne, Un-done.
(Letter from John Donne to his wife)
John Lentell
29th December, 1970
Thursday’s Piece
Force, and fraud, are in war the two cardinal virtues.
(Thomas Hobbes, 1588 – 1679)
John Lentell
28th December, 1970
Wednesday’s Piece
If you your lips would keep from slips
Five things observe with care;
To whom you speak, of whom you speak,
And how, and when, and where.
(William Edward Norris, 1847 – 1925)
John Lentell
27th December, 1970
Tuesday’s Piece
Most all the time, the whole year round, there ain’t no flies on me,
But jest ‘fore Christmas I’m as good a I kin be!
(Eugene Field, 1850 – 1895)
John Lentell
Christmas Day
25th December, 1970
Monday’s Piece
All violent feelings….produce in us a falseness in all our impressions of external things, which I would generally characterise as the ‘Pathetic Fallacy’.
(John Ruskin, 1819 – 1900)
John Lentell
24th December, 1970
Sunday’s Piece
At a banquet of firemen the chief proposed this toast:
“The Ladies! Their eyes kindle the only flame which we cannot extinguish, and against which there is no insurance.”
(Anonymous Toast quote)
John Lentell
23rd December, 1970
Saturday’s Piece
Here’s a health to all those that we love,
Here’s a health to all those that love us
Here’s a health to all those that love them – that love those – that love them – that love those – that love us.
(Anonymous Toast quote)
John Lentell
22nd December, 1970
Friday’s Piece
Running into her former suitor at a party, a girl decided to snub him.
“So sorry,” she murmured when the hostess introduced him, “but I didn’t get the name.”
“I know you didn’t,” said the unabashed ex suitor, “but you certainly tried hard enough.”
John Lentell
21st December, 1970
Thursday’s Piece
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle used to tell how he sent a telegram to each of twelve friends, all men of great virtue and reputation and of considerable position in society. The message was worded, “Fly at once, all is discovered.”
Within twenty-four hours, the story goes, all twelve had left the country.
John Lentell
19th December, 1970
Wednesday’s Piece
Humour is odd, grotesque, and wild,
Only by affectation spoil’d;
‘Tis never by invention got,
Men have it when they know it or not.
(Jonathan Swift, 1667 – 1745)
John Lentell
18th December, 1970
Tuesday’s Piece
There was a young lady of Riga,
Who rode with a smile on a tiger;
They returned from the ride
With the Lady inside,
And the smile on the face of the tiger.
(Anon)
John Lentell
17th December, 1970
Monday’s Piece
I am…..a mushroom
On whom the dew of heaven drops now and then.
(John Ford, 1586 – 1639)
John Lentell
16th December, 1970
Sunday’s Piece
To the rapturous, wild and ineffable pleasure
Of drinking at somebody else’s expense.
(Henry Sambrooke Leigh, 1837 – 1883)
John Lentell
15th December, 1970
Saturday’s Piece
Never explain – your friends do not need it, and your enemies will not believe it anyway..
(Elbert Hubbard, 1856 – 1915)
John Lentell
14th December, 1970
Lentell Soup 