Quotations by Theme
Communication - Language
"We have too many high sounding words, and too few actions that correspond with them."
Abigail Adams, 1744-1818
"But behaviour in the human being is sometimes a defense, a way of concealing motives and thoughts, as language can be a way of hiding your thoughts and preventing communication."
Abraham Maslow, 1908-1970
"Words calculated to catch everyone may catch no one."
Adlai E. Stevenson Jr., 1900-1965
"Until we can understand the assumptions in which we are drenched we cannot know ourselves"
Adrienne Rich, 1929-
"Lying is done with words and also with silence."
Adrienne Rich, 1929-
"Don't you know this, that words are doctors to a diseased temperament?"
Aeschylus, 525-456 BCE
"I passionately believe that's it's not just what you say that counts, it's also how you say it - that the success of your argument critically depends on your manner of presenting it."
Alain de Botton, 1969-
"Language comes first. It's not that language grows out of consciousness, if you haven't got language, you can't be conscious."
Alan Moore,
"Text-messaging or The Sun, these are perfect Orwellian ways of limiting the vocabulary and thus limiting the consciousness."
Alan Moore, 1953-
"Charm is a way of getting the answer yet without asking a clear question."
Albert Camus, 1913-1960
"To know oneself, one should assert oneself."
Albert Camus, 1913-1960
"I enjoyed my own nature to the fullest, and we all know that there lies happiness, although, to soothe one another mutually, we occasionally pretend to condemn such joys as selfishness."
Albert Camus, 1913-1960
"Peace cannot be kept by force; it can only be achieved by understanding."
Albert Einstein, 1879-1955
"If you wish to preserve your secret, wrap it up in frankness."
Alexander Smith, 1830-1867
"Genuine forgiveness does not deny anger but faces it head-on."
Alice Duer Miller, 1874-1942
"Whoever controls the media, the images, controls the culture."
Allen Ginsberg, 1926-1997
"Bore: A person who talks when you wish him to listen."
Ambrose Bierce, 1842-1914
"Speak when you are angry and you will make the best speech you will ever regret."
Ambrose Bierce, 1842-1914
"Words make love with one another."
Andre Breton, 1896-1966
"We were always intoxicated with color, with words that speak of color, and with the sun that makes colors live."
Andre Derain,
"Smile, for everyone lacks self-confidence and more than any other one thing a smile reassures them."
Andre Maurois, 1885-1967
"Conversation may be compared to a lyre with seven chords - philosophy, art, poetry, love, scandal, and the weather."
Anna Jameson,
"Accuracy of language is one of the bulwarks of truth."
Anna Jameson,
"All my experience of the world teaches me that in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred, the safe and just side of a question is the generous and merciful side."
Anna Jameson,
"Language is the source of misunderstandings."
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, 1900-1944
"What words say does not last. The words last. Because words are always the same, and what they say is never the same."
Antonio Porchia, 1886-1968
"High thoughts must have high language."
Aristophanes, 446-388 BCE
"Anyone can become angry, that is easy. But to be angry with the right person, to the right degree, at the right time, for the right purpose, and in the right way, that is not easy."
Aristotle, 384-322 BCE
"The job is to ask questions-it always was-and to ask them as inexorably as I can. And to face the absence of precise answers with a certain humility."
Arthur Miller, 1915-2005
"I think now that the great thing is not so much the formulation of an answer for myself, for the theater, or the play-but rather the most accurate possible statement of the problem."
Arthur Miller,
"When we speak we are afraid our words will not be heard or welcomed. But when we are silent, we are still afraid. So it is better to speak."
Audre Lorde, 19341992
"I have come to believe over and over again that what is most important to me must be spoken, made verbal and shared, even at the risk of having it bruised or misunderstood."
Audre Lorde,
"The Argument from Intimidation is a confession of intellectual impotence."
Ayn Rand, 1905-1982
"The keys to effective communication are knowing who you are, being yourself and sharing your message in a responsive way."
Barbara Borowitz Garland,
"I really don't know where my sense of language came from. Neither of my parents was very verbal, but my mother has a nice sense of humor."
Barbara Kruger,
"I think I developed language skills to deal with threat. It's the girl thing to do-you know, instead of pulling out a gun."
Barbara Kruger, 1945-
"The highest activity a human being can attain is learning for understanding, because to understand is to be free."
Baruch Spinoza,
"Men govern nothing with more difficulty than their tongues, and can moderate their desires more than their words."
Baruch Spinoza,
"Do not weep; do not wax indignant. Understand."
Baruch Spinoza,
"Weigh the meaning and look not at the words."
Ben Jonson, 1572-1637
"Language most shews a man: Speak, that I may see thee."
Ben Jonson,
"Talking is the disease of age."
Ben Jonson,
"Words differently arranged have a different meaning, and meanings differently arranged have different effects."
Blaise Pascal, 1623-1662
"Kind words do not cost much. Yet they accomplish much."
Blaise Pascal,
"If we are to succeed we must communicate."
Bob Johnson,
"One of the most sincere forms of respect is actually listening to what another has to say."
Bryant H. McGill, 1969-
"Where wise actions are the fruit of life, wise discourse is the pollination."
Bryant H. McGill, 1969-
"The talent of a true writer and poet is in the ear."
Bryant H. McGill, 1969-
"We cannot change anything until we accept it. Condemnation does not liberate, it oppresses."
Carl Gustav Jung, 1875-1961
"Grasp the subject. The words will follow"
Cato the Elder,
"We do not write in order to be understood; we write in order to understand."
Cecil Day Lewis, 1904-1972
"Men are born with two eyes, but only one tongue, in order that they should see twice as much as they say."
Charles Caleb Colton, 1780-1832
"The less men think, the more they talk."
Charles de Montesquieu, 1689-1755
"He who will not economise will have to agonise"
Confucius, 551-479 BCE
"When we see men (or children) of a contrary character, we should turn inwards and examine ourselves."
Confucius, 551-479 BCE
"He who learns but does not think, is lost! He who thinks but does not learn is in great danger."
Confucius, 551-479 BCE
"Anger is a very appropriate and necessary response to an injustice. But stand back now; the truth, clearly spoken, is always your best weapon. Calmly spoken, it can burn a hole through the hardest heart."
Confucius, 551-479 BCE
"The cautious seldom err."
Confucius, 551-479 BCE
"It is impossible to communicate to people who have not experiencedt the undefinable menace of total rationalism."
Czeslaw Milosz,
"Any fool can criticize, condemn, and complain but it takes character and self control to be understanding and forgiving."
Dale Carnegie, 1888-1955
"When dealing with people, remember you are not dealing with creatures of logic, but creatures of emotion."
Dale Carnegie, 1888-1955
"Fear not those who argue but those who dodge."
Dale Carnegie, 1888-1955
"For most women, the language of conversation is primarily a language of rapport: a way of establishing connections and negotiating relationships."
Deborah Tannen, 1945-
"Each person's life is lived as a series of conversations."
Deborah Tannen, 1945-
"The biggest mistake is believing there is one right way to listen, to talk, to have a conversation - or a relationship."
Deborah Tannen, 1945-
"We tend to look through language and not realize how much power language has."
Deborah Tannen, 1945-
"Communication is a continual balancing act, juggling the conflicting needs for intimacy and independence. To survive in the world, we have to act in concert with others, but to survive as ourselves, rather than simply as cogs in a wheel, we have to act alone."
Deborah Tannen, 1945-
"When awareness is completely balanced, communicating with the outside world is instantaneous and automatic. It happens with the touch of thought."
Deepak Chopra,
"It is greed to do all the talking but not to want to listen at all."
Democritus,
"The English language is nobody's special property. It is the property of the imagination: it is the property of the language itself."
Derek Walcott, 1930-
"A poem records emotions and moods that lie beyond normal language, that can only be patched together and hinted at metaphorically."
Diane Ackerman, 1948-
"We have two ears and one tongue so that we would listen more and talk less."
Diogenes, 412 BC-323BC
"The real art of conversation is not only to say the right thing at the right place but to leave unsaid the wrong thing at the tempting moment."
Dorothy Nevill,
"Words have no power to impress the mind without the exquisite horror of their reality."
Edgar Allan Poe, 1809-1849
"If you never change your mind, why have one?"
Edward de Bono, 1933-
"There is no failure except in no longer trying."
Elbert Hubbard, 1856-1915
"The ineffable joy of forgiving and being forgiven forms an ecstasy that might well arouse the envy of the gods."
Elbert Hubbard, 1856-1915
"The recipe for perpetual ignorance is: be satisfied with your opinions and content with your knowledge."
Elbert Hubbard, 1856-1915
"Positive anything is better than negative thinking."
Elbert Hubbard, 1856-1915
"Too much agreement kills a chat."
Eldridge Cleaver,
"Forming characters! Whose? Our own or others? Both. And in that momentous fact lies the peril and responsibility of our existence."
Elihu Burritt,
"One does not inhabit a country; one inhabits a language. That is our country, our fatherland - and no other."
Emile Cioran, 1911-1995
"Word - that invisible dagger."
Emile Cioran, 1911-1995
"To devastate by language, to blow up the word and with it the world."
Emile Cioran, 1911-1995
"There are no chaste minds. Minds copulate wherever they meet."
Eric Hoffer,
"It is remarkable by how much a pinch of malice enhances the penetrating power of an idea or an opinion. Our ears, it seems, are wonderfully attuned to sneers and evil reports about our fellow men."
Eric Hoffer,
"Euclid taught me that without assumptions there is no proof. Therefore, in any argument, examine the assumptions."
Eric Temple Bell, 1883-1960
"Both dreams and myths are important communications from ourselves to ourselves. If we do not understand the language in which they are written, we miss a great deal of what we know and tell ourselves in those hours when we are not busy manipulating the outside world."
Erich Fromm, 1900-1980
"Question everything. Every stripe, every star, every word spoken. Everything."
Ernest Gaines, 1933-
"Our opinions become fixed at the point where we stop thinking."
Ernest Renan, 1823-1892
"Nature is a dictionary; one draws words from it."
Eugene Delacroix, 1798-1863
"The simplicities of natural laws arise through the complexities of the language we use for their expression."
Eugene Wigner, 1902-1995
"You can stroke people with words."
F. Scott Fitzgerald, 1896-1940
"Mediocre minds usually dismiss anything which reaches beyond their own understanding."
Francois de La Rochefoucauld, 1613-1680
"Most of our faults are more pardonable than the means we use to conceal them."
Francois de La Rochefoucauld, 1613-1680
"I know perfectly well that at this moment the whole universe is listening to us," Jean Giraudoux wrote in The Madwoman of Chaillot, "and that every word we say echoes to the remotest star."
Frank Drake,
"Out of damp and gloomy days, out of solitude, out of loveless words directed at us, conclusions grow up in us like fungus: one morning they are there, we know not how, and they gaze upon us, morose and gray. Woe to the thinker who is not the gardener but only the soil of the plants that grow in him."
Friedrich Nietzsche, 1844-1900
"Those who cannot understand how to put their thoughts on ice should not enter into the heat of debate."
Friedrich Nietzsche, 1844-1900
"We often refuse to accept an idea merely because the tone of voice in which it has been expressed is unsympathetic to us."
Friedrich Nietzsche, 1844-1900
"When marrying, ask yourself this question: Do you believe that you will be able to converse well with this person into your old age? Everything else in marriage is transitory."
Friedrich Nietzsche, 1844-1900
"A special kind of beauty exists which is born in language, of language, and for language."
Gaston Bachelard,
"Poetry is one of the destinies of speech... One would say that the poetic image, in its newness, opens a future to language."
Gaston Bachelard,
"The words of the world want to make sentences."
Gaston Bachelard,
"Better than a thousand hollow words is one word that brings peace."
Gautama Buddha, 563-483 BCE
"Words have the power to both destroy and heal. When words are both true and kind, they can change our world."
Gautama Buddha, 563-483 BCE
"We accumulate our opinions at an age when our understanding is at its weakest."
Georg Christoph Lichtenberg, 1742-1799
"We talk too much, love too seldom, and hate too often."
George Carlin,
"I like not only to be loved, but to be told that I am loved; the realm of silence is large enough beyond the grave."
George Eliot (Mary Ann Evans), 1819-1880
"But words are things, and a small drop of ink, Falling like dew, upon a thought, produces That which makes thousands, perhaps millions, think."
George Gordon Byron, 1788-1824
"In conversation, humor is worth more than wit and easiness more than knowledge."
George Herbert, 1593-1633
"Good words are worth much, and cost little."
George Herbert, 1593-1633
"The great enemy of clear language is insincerity. When there is a gap between one's real and one's declared aims, one turns as it were instinctively to long words and exhausted idioms, like a cuttlefish spurting out ink."
George Orwell (Eric Arthur Blair), 1903-1950
"The muffled syllables that nature speaks, fill us with deeper longing for her word."
George Santayana, 1863-1952
"The word experience is like a shrapnel shell, and bursts into a thousand meanings."
George Santayana, 1863-1952
"The primary use of conversation is to satisfy the impulse to talk."
George Santayana,
"Truth exists; only lies are invented."
Georges Braque, 1882-1963
"Loneliness is never more cruel than when it is felt in close propinquity with someone who has ceased to communicate."
Germaine Greer,
"The universal principle of etymology in all languages: words are carried over from bodies and from the properties of bodies to express the things of the mind and spirit. The order of ideas must follow the order of things."
Giambattista Vico, 1668-1744
"Language is a living thing. We can feel it changing. Parts of it become old: they drop off and are forgotten. New pieces bud out, spread into leaves, and become big branches, proliferating."
Gilbert Highet,
"In talking, shyness and timidity distort the very meaning of my words. I don't pretend to know anybody well. People are like shadows to me and I am like a shadow."
Gwen John, 1876-1939
"Very early in life I became fascinated with the wonders language can achieve. And I began playing with words."
Gwendolyn Brooks, 1917-2000
"We are getting into semantics again. If we use words, there is a very grave danger they will be misinterpreted."
H. R. Haldeman,
"When the impulses which stir us to profound emotion are integrated with the medium of expression, every interview of the soul may become art. This is contingent upon mastery of the medium."
Hans Hofmann, 1880-1966
"The more language is a living operation, the less we are aware of it. Thus it follows from the self-forgetfulness of language that its real being consists in what is said in it."
Hans-Georg Gadamer, 1900-2002
"Nothing exists except through language."
Hans-Georg Gadamer,
"I was always influenced by language."
Helen Dunmore,
"I do not want the peace that passeth understanding. I want the understanding which bringeth peace."
Helen Keller, 1880-1968
"It takes two to speak the truth one to speak, and another to hear."
Henry David Thoreau, 1817-1862
"The language of friendship is not words, but meanings. It is an intelligence about language."
Henry David Thoreau, 1817-1862
"Thaw with her gentle persuasion is more powerful than Thor with his hammer. The one melts, the other breaks into pieces."
Henry David Thoreau, 1817-1862
"When somebody says that all statements are false, the obvious problem is that as an assertion it's self-defeating."
Henry Flynt,
"What we call 'morals' is simply blind obedience to words of command."
Henry Havelock Ellis,
"There are moments in life, when the heart is so full of emotion That if by chance it be shaken, or into its depths like a pebble drops some careless word, it overflows, and its secret, spilt on the ground like water, can never be gathered together."
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow,
"The human voice is the organ of the soul."
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow,
"Assumptions are the termites of relationships."
Henry Winkler,
"Words signify man's refusal to accept the world as it is."
Herbert Kaufman, 18781947
"Opinion is ultimately determined by the feelings, and not by the intellect."
Herbert Spencer,
"How often misused words generate misleading thoughts."
Herbert Spencer,
"We know how to speak many falsehoods that resemble real things, but we know, when we will, how to speak true things."
Hesiod, 800 BC-720BC
"Words empty as the wind are best left unsaid."
Homer,
"Hateful to me as the gates of Hades is that man who hides one thing in his heart and speaks another."
Homer,
"A companion's words of persuasion are effective."
Homer,
"I detest that man who hides one thing in the depths of his heart, and speaks for another."
Homer,
"My language is what I use, and if I lost that, I wouldn't be able to say anything."
Howard Hodgkin, 1932-
"For me, words are a form of action, capable of influencing change."
Ingrid Bengis,
"To every action there is always opposed an equal reaction."
Isaac Newton,
"Tact is the art of making a point without making an enemy."
Isaac Newton,
"A man may imagine things that are false, but he can only understand things that are true, for if the things be false, the apprehension of them is not understanding."
Isaac Newton,
"We build too many walls and not enough bridges."
Isaac Newton,
"For women the best aphrodisiacs are words."
Isabel Allende,
"In other words, the man who is born into existence deals first with language; this is a given. He is even caught in it before his birth."
Jacques Lacan,
"Every legend, moreover, contains its residuum of truth, and the root function of language is to control the universe by describing it."
James A. Baldwin,
"The word power has such a generally negative implication in our society. What are people talking about? Are they talking about muscles, or control?"
James Hillman,
"Strange about parents. We have such easy access to them and such daunting problems of communication."
James Merrill, 1926-1995
"We don't all speak a common language, even when we seem to use the same words."
Jami Bernard,
"Change happens by listening and then starting a dialogue with the people who are doing something you don't believe is right."
Jane Goodall,
"If you say, I love you, then you have already fallen in love with language, which is already a form of break up and infidelity."
Jean Baudrillard, 1929-
"Never resist a sentence you like, in which language takes its own pleasure and in which, after having abused it for so long, you are stupefied by its innocence."
Jean Baudrillard,
"The great gift of conversation lies less in displaying it ourselves than in drawing it out of others. He who leaves your company pleased with himself and his own cleverness is perfectly well pleased with you."
Jean de la Bruyere,
"Logic is the technique by which we add conviction to truth."
Jean de la Bruyere,
"Logic and mathematics are nothing but specialised linguistic structures."
Jean Piaget, 1896 - 1980
"I distrust the incommunicable, it is the source of all violence."
Jean-Paul Sartre,
"Words are loaded pistols."
Jean-Paul Sartre, 1905-1980
"So when you are listening to somebody, completely, attentively, then you are listening not only to the words, but also to the feeling of what is being conveyed, to the whole of it, not part of it."
Jiddu Krishnamurti,
"When we talk about understanding, surely it takes place only when the mind listens completely - the mind being your heart, your nerves, your ears- when you give your whole attention to it."
Jiddu Krishnamurti,
"One of the greatest gifts you can give to anyone is the gift of attention."
Jim Rohn,
"Grammar is a piano I play by ear. All I know about grammar is its power."
Joan Didion, 1934-
"Every spoken word arouses our self-will."
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe,
"Be generous with kindly words, especially about those who are absent."
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe,
"Every day we should hear at least one little song, read one good poem, see one exquisite picture, and, if possible, speak a few sensible words."
Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe,
"If you wish to know the mind of a man, (or child) listen to his words."
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe,
"A person hears only what they understand."
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe,
"No one would talk much in society if they knew how often they misunderstood others."
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe,
"When ideas fail, words come in very handy."
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe,
"A correct answer is like an affectionate kiss."
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe,
"Words are but pictures of our thoughts."
John Dryden, 1631-1700
"Deeds, not words shall speak me."
John Fletcher, 1579-1625
"There is no difference between living and learning . . . it is impossible and misleading and harmful to think of them as being separate. Teaching is human communication and like all communication, elusive and difficult...we must be wary of the feeling that we know what we are doing in class. When we are most sure of what we are doing, we may be closest to being a bore."
John Holt,
"Where more is meant than meets the ear."
John Milton,
"Give me the liberty to know, to utter, and to argue freely according to conscience, above all liberties."
John Milton,
"The genius of communication is the ability to be both totally honest and totally kind at the same time."
John Powell,
"A lie does not consist in the indirect position of words, but in the desire and intention, by false speaking, to deceive and injure your neighbour."
Jonathan Swift,
"A man should never be ashamed to own that he has been in the wrong, which is but saying... that he is wiser today than yesterday."
Jonathan Swift,
"Books, the children of the brain."
Jonathan Swift,
"Words were not given to man in order to conceal his thoughts."
Jose Saramago, 1922-
"Perhaps it is the language that chooses the writers it needs, making use of them so that each might express a tiny part of what it is."
Jose Saramago,
"Human vocabulary is still not capable, and probably never will be, of knowing, recognizing, and communicating everything that can be humanly experienced and felt."
Jose Saramago,
"A true critic ought to dwell upon excellencies rather than imperfections, to discover the concealed beauties of a writer, and communicate to the world such things as are worth their observation."
Joseph Addison,
"Every writing career starts as a personal quest for sainthood, for self-betterment. Sooner or later, and as a rule quite soon, a man discovers that his pen accomplishes a lot more than his soul."
Joseph Brodsky,
"A language is a more ancient and inevitable thing than any state."
Joseph Brodsky,
"For a writer only one form of patriotism exists: his attitude toward language."
Joseph Brodsky,
"If you go in for argument, take care of your temper. Your logic, if you have any, will take care of itself."
Joseph Farrell,
"The aim of argument, or of discussion, should not be victory, but progress."
Joseph Joubert,
"Words, like glass, obscure when they do not aid vision."
Joseph Joubert, 1754-1824
"Words should be employed as the means, not the end; language is the instrument, conviction is the work."
Joshua Reynolds, 1723-1792
"I don't give advice. I can't tell anybody what to do. Instead I say this is what we know about this problem at this time. And here are the consequences of these actions."
Joyce Brothers,
"Listening, not imitation, may be the sincerest form of flattery."
Joyce Brothers,
"Feelings or emotions are the universal language and are to be honored. They are the authentic expression of who you are at your deepest place."
Judith Wright,
"The music of language became extremely important to me, and obvious to me. By the time I was seven I was writing myself. I was a poet."
June Jordan,
"This literature was completely incomprehensible to me, but I became immersed in the sounds of the language of these great writers."
June Jordan,
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