Quotes by Prince Philip

I had been playing polo, and I decided to give up at the age of 50.

When a man opens the car door for his wife, it's either a new car or a new wife.

The art of being a good guest is to know when to leave.

I didn't want to be president of the World Wildlife Fund. I was asked to do it. I'd much rather have stayed in the navy, frankly.

You can't just decide you want to do this or that. You have to be invited.

Everyone has to have a sense of duty. A duty to society, to their family. I mean, you name it.

There was no precedent. If I asked somebody, 'What do you expect me to do?' they all looked blank. They had no idea; nobody had much idea.

I am the only man in the country not allowed to give his name to his children.

My favourite subject at school was avoiding unnecessary work.

If it doesn't fart or eat hay, she isn't interested.

Everything that wasn't invented by God is invented by an engineer.

Ah, you're the one who wrote the letter. So you can write then.

There is nothing like it for morale to be reminded that the years are passing -- ever more quickly -- and that bits are dropping off the ancient frame. But it is nice to be remembered at all.

They're a damn nuisance -- I've got one in my bathroom and every time I run my bath the steam sets it off.

Cannibalism is a radical but realistic solution to the problem of overpopulation.

Aren't most of you descended from pirates?

I must confess that I am interested in leisure in the same way that a poor man is interested in money.

In the days when the nation depended on agriculture for its wealth it made the Lord Chancellor sit on a woolsack to remind him where the wealth came from. I would like to suggest we remove that now and make him sit on a crate of machine tools.

Are you running away from something?

I have very little experience of self-government. In fact, I am one of the most governed people in the world.

Young people are the same as they always were. They are just as ignorant.

British women can't cook.

I don't care what kind it is, just get me a beer.

All money nowadays seems to be produced with a natural homing instinct for the Treasury.

Your country is one of the most notorious centres of trading in endangered species.

In the first years of the Queen's reign, the level of adulation -- you wouldn't believe it. You really wouldn't.

During the Blitz, a lot of shops had their windows blown in and put up notices saying, 'More open than usual'. I now declare this place more open than usual.

If we could just stop the tourism, we could stop the congestion.

It would have been very easy to play to the gallery, but I took a conscious decision not to do that. Safer not to be too popular. You can't fall too far.

All these other creatures have an equal right to exist here. We have no prior rights to the Earth than anybody else, and if they're here, let's give them a chance to survive.

Oh no, I might catch some ghastly disease.

Deaf? If you're near there, no wonder you are deaf.

If you stay here much longer you'll all be slitty-eyed.

If you travel as much as we do, you appreciate the improvements in aircraft design of less noise and more comfort -- provided you don't travel in something called economy class, which sounds ghastly.

Do you know they have eating dogs for the anorexic now?

Can you tell the difference between them?

You look like you're ready for bed!

If a cricketer suddenly decided to go into a school and batter a lot of people to death with a cricket bat, are you going to ban cricket bats?

You can't have been here long, you haven't got a pot belly.

How do you keep the natives off the booze long enough to pass the test?

Oh, it's you that owns that ghastly car, is it?

You managed not to get eaten then?

People think there's a rigid class system here, but dukes have been known to marry chorus girls. Some have even married Americans.

I never see any home cooking -- all I get is fancy stuff.

That's a nice tie... Do you have any knickers in that material?

And if we could get the local leaders to appreciate their responsibility for the environment then they would be able to explain that responsibility to the people of their faith.

You have mosquitoes. I have the Press.

There's a lot of your family in tonight.

Books are certainly old fashioned, but only people with a very limited perception are silly enough to condemn ideas because of their age. It is, of course, equally silly to condemn the new fangled simply because it is strange.

If anyone has a new idea in this country, there are twice as many people who keep putting a man with a red flag in front of it.

You were playing your instruments? Or do you have tape recorders under your seats?

We didn't have counsellors rushing around every time somebody let off a gun. You just got on with it!

Who is going to be the first to face up to the need for self-restraint in the number of children brought into the world?

Only a Scotsman can really survive a Scottish education.

There's a cord sticking out of the back. Might you tell me where it goes?

You're just a silly little Whitehall twit: you don't trust me and I don't trust you.

It's a vast waste of space.

It seems to me that it's the best way of wasting money that I know of. I don't think investments on the moon pay a very high dividend.

The world population 60 years ago was just over 2 billion and it's now more than 6 billion. This huge increase -- an explosion really -- has probably done more harm to the environment than anything else.

It's difficult to see how it's possible to become immensely valuable by singing what are the most hideous songs.

A few years ago, everybody was saying we must have more leisure, everyone's working too much. Now everybody's got more leisure time they're complaining they're unemployed. People don't seem to make up their minds what they want.

Wildlife of the world is disappearing, not because of a malicious and deliberate policy of slaughter and extermination, but simply because of a general and widespread ignorance and neglect.

The conservation of nature, the proper care for the human environment and a general concern for the long-term future of the whole of our planet are absolutely vital if future generations are to have a chance to enjoy their existence on this earth.

You don't really want nonagenarians as heads of organisations which are trying to do something useful.

You're not wearing mink knickers,are you?

I have frequently been misrepresented. I don't hate the press; I find a lot of it is very unpalatable.

We go into the red next year... I shall have to give up polo.

Human population growth is probably the single most serious long-term threat to survival. We're in for a major disaster if it isn't curbed...We have no option. If it isn't controlled voluntarily, it will be controlled involuntarily by an increase in disease, starvation and war.

It is frequently more rewarding merely to ask pertinent questions. It may get someone to go and look for an answer.

The biggest waste of water in the country by far. You spend half a pint and flush two gallons.

People can't get their heads round the idea of a species surviving; you know, they're more concerned about how you treat a donkey in Sicily or something.

I reckon I've done my bit. I want to enjoy myself a bit now, with less responsibility, less frantic rushing about, less preparation, less trying to think of something to say.

We are suffering a national defeat comparable to any lost military campaign, and what is more, it is self- inflicted? It is about time that we pulled our fingers out? The rest of the world most certainly does not owe us a living.

If anything, I've thought of myself as Scandinavian. Particularly, Danish. We spoke English at home.

Do you still throw spears at each other?

I am full of admiration for the technologists who have developed all sorts of gadgets for the purpose of improving communications. However, I believe that all these fascinating machines are complementary to, and not substitutes for, books and the printed word.

It is an old cliche to say that the future is in the hands of the young. This is no longer true. The quality of life to be enjoyed or the existence to be survived by our children and future generations is in our hands now.

It's no use saying do this, do that, don't do that ... it's very easy when children want something to say no immediately. I think it's quite important not to give an unequivocal answer at once. Much better to think it over. Then, if you eventually say no, I think they really accept it.

If I were reincarnated I would wish to be returned to Earth as a killer virus to lower human population levels.

People say after a fire it's water damage that's the worst. We're still drying out Windsor Castle.

In the event that I am reincarnated, I would like to return as a deadly virus, in order to contribute something to solve overpopulation.

I don't claim to have any special interest in natural history, but as a boy I was made aware of the annual fluctuations in the number of game animals and the need to adjust the cull to the size of the surplus population.

I therefore suggested that WWF should invite leaders from the major religions to meet together to discuss what -- if any -- responsibility they felt they had for the natural environment as a sacred entity.

I would like to go to Russia very much -- although the bastards murdered half my family.

A horse which stops dead just before a jump and thus propels its rider into a graceful arc provides a splendid excuse for general merriment.

Occasionally I get fed up, going to visit a factory, when I am being shown around by the chairman, who clearly hasn't got a clue, and I try to get hold of the factory manager, but I can't because the chairman wants to make sure he's the one in all the photographs.

We live in what virtually amounts to a museum -- which does not happen to a lot of people.

I don't know how they're going to integrate in places like Glasgow and Sheffield.

The bastards murdered half my family.

For conservation to be successful it is necessary to take into consideration that it is a characteristic of man that he can only be relied upon to do anything consistently which is in his own interest.

Change does not change tradition, it strengthens it. Change is a challenge and anopportunity, not a threat.

The man who invented the red carpet needed his head examined.

I don't think a prostitute is more moral than a wife, but they are doing the same thing.

We don't come to Canada for our health. We can think of other ways of enjoying ourselves.

Everybody was saying we must have more leisure. Now they are complaining they are unemployed.

When a man opens a car door for his wife, it's either a new car or a new wife.

A gun is no more dangerous than a cricket bat in the hands of a madman.