Bernstein: Candide / Act I - 8. Dear Boy - Adolph Green, London Symphony Orchestra, Leonard Bernstein

Dear boy, you will not hear me speak

With sorrow or with rancor

Of what has paled my rosy cheek

And blasted it with canker

'Twas love, great love that did the deed

Through Nature’s gentle laws

And how should ill effects proceed

From so divine a cause?

Dear boy

Sweet honey comes from bees that sting

As you are well aware

To one adept in reasoning

Whatever pains disease may bring

Are but the tangy seasoning

Of love’s delicious fare

Columbus and his men, they say

Conveyed the virus hither

Whereby my features rot away

And vital powers wither

Yet they had they not traversed the seas

And come infected back

Why, think of all the luxuries

That modern life would lack!

Dear boy

All bitter things conduce to sweet

As this example shows

Without the little spirochete

We’d have no chocolate to eat

Nor would tobacco’s fragrance greet

The European nose

Each nation guards its native land

With cannon and with sentry

Inspectors look for contraband

At every point of entry

Yet nothing can prevent the spread

Of love’s divine disease

It rounds the world from bed to bed

As pretty as you please

Dear boy

Men worship Venus everywhere

As can be plainly seen

The decorations which I bear

Are nobler than the Croix de Guerre

And gained in service of our fair

And universal queen