Gilbert & Sullivan A More Humane Mikado
[MIKADO]
A more humane Mikado never
Did in Japan exist
To nobody second
I'm certainly reckoned
A true philanthropist
It is my very humane endeavour
To make, to some extent
Each evil liver
A running river
Of harmless merriment
My object all sublime
I shall achieve in time —
To let the punishment fit the crime —
The punishment fit the crime;
And make each prisoner pent
Unwillingly represent
A source of innocent merriment!
Of innocent merriment!
All prosy dull society sinners
Who chatter and bleat and bore
Are sent to hear sermons
From mystical Germans
Who preach from ten till four
The amateur tenor, whose vocal villainies
All desire to shirk
Shall, during off-hours
Exhibit his powers
To Madame Tussaud's waxwork
The lady who dyes a chemical yellow
Or stains her grey hair puce
Or pinches her figure
Is backed like a nigga
With permanent walnut juice
The idiot who, in railway carriages
Scribbles on window-panes
We only suffer
To ride on a buffer
In Parliamentary trains
My object all sublime
I shall achieve in time —
To let the punishment fit the crime —
The punishment fit the crime;
And make each prisoner pent
Unwillingly represent
A source of innocent merriment!
Of innocent merriment!
[Chorus]
His object all sublime
He will achieve in time —
To let the punishment fit the crime —
The punishment fit the crime;
And make each prisoner pent
Unwillingly represent
A source of innocent merriment!
Of innocent merriment!
[MIKADO]
The advertising quack who wearies
With tales of countless cures
His teeth, I've enacted
Shall all be extracted
By terrified amateurs
The music-hall singer attends a series
Of masses and fugues and "ops"
By Bach, interwoven
With Spohr and Beethoven
At classical Monday Pops
The billiard sharp who any one catches
His doom's extremely hard —
He's made to dwell —
In a dungeon cell
On a spot that's always barred
And there he plays extravagant matches
In fitless finger-stalls
On a cloth untrue
With a twisted cue
And elliptical billiard balls!
My object all sublime
I shall achieve in time —
To let the punishment fit the crime —
The punishment fit the crime;
And make each prisoner pent
Unwillingly represent
A source of innocent merriment!
Of innocent merriment!
[Chorus]
His object all sublime
He will achieve in time —
To let the punishment fit the crime —
The punishment fit the crime;
And make each prisoner pent
Unwillingly represent
A source of innocent merriment!
Of innocent merriment!