Speech

"Speech is like medicine, a small dose of which cures, but an excess of which kills."

"It is not the speeches which read best which are the greatest speeches. I am not qualified to speak of Demosthenes and Cicero. But, at all events, of the eloquence which has held spellbound the assemblies of which I have been a member, I can truly say posterity cannot possibly judge of their merits by a mere study of the words used. They must see the man, feel the magnetism of his presence, see his gestures, the flash of his eyes. Then, and then only, will they feel what the real essential is between public-speaking on the one hand, and even the most admirable and eloquent writing on the other. I do not say which is best. I personally put the writing far above the speaking. I should tell you the test of a speaker is the audience he addresses. There is no other judge: there is no appeal from that Court."

"Speak boldly, and speak truly, shame the devil."

"We may rest assured that the highest reaches of the art, and without any necessary sacrifice of natural effect, can only be attained by him who well considers, and maturely prepares, and oftentimes sedulously corrects and refines his oration. Such preparation is quite consistent with the introduction of passages prompted by the occasion; nor will the transition from the one to the other be perceptible in the execution of a practised master."

"And what is right speech? Abstaining from lying, from divisive speech, from abusive speech, and from idle chatter: This is called right speech."

"For brevity is very good, Where we are, or are not understood."

"His speech was a fine sample, on the whole, Of rhetoric, which the learn'd call "rigmarole.""

"una palabra es el sabor/que nuestra lengua tiene de lo eterno,/por eso hablo"

"Lo tuo ver dir m'incuora Buona umilta e gran tumor m'appiani."

"Speech is but broken light upon the depth Of the unspoken."

"O that grave speech would cumber our quick souls, Like bells that waste the moments with their loudness."

"A speech comes alive only if it rises from the heart, not if it floats on the lips."

"But this is slavery, not to speak one's thought."

"Though I say't that should not say't."

"I'm alive and still kicking; what you see I can't see and maybe you'll think before you speak."

"He shall strike the earth with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips he shall kill the wicked."

"Eventually it may be possible for humans to speak with another species. I have come to this conclusion after careful consideration of evidence gained through my research experiments with dolphins. If new scientific developments are to be made in this direction, however, certain changes in our basic orientation and philosophy will be necessary."

"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. That the speaking profits me, beyond any other effect."

"For those of us who write, it is necessary to scrutinize not only the truth of what we speak, but the truth of that language by which we speak it. For others, it is to share and spread also those words that are meaningful to us. But primarily for us all, it is necessary to teach by living and speaking those truths which we believe and know beyond understanding. Because in this way alone we can survive, by taking part in a process of life that is creative and continuing, that is growth. [...] We can learn to work and speak when we are afraid in the same way we have learned to work and speak when we are tired. For we have been socialized to respect fear more than our own needs for language and definition, and while we wait in silence for that final luxury of fearlessness, the weight of that silence will choke us. The fact that we are here and that I speak these words is an attempt to break that silence and bridge some of those differences between us, for it is not difference which immobilizes us, but silence. And there are so many silences to be broken."

"As everyone who has studied transcripts of tape-recorded speech knows, we all seem to be extremely reluctant to come right out and say what we mean—thus the bizarre syntax, the hesitations, the circumlocutions, the repetitions, the contradictions, the lacunae in almost every non-sentence we speak."

"Though his tongue Dropp'd manna, and could make the worse appear The better reason, to perplex and dash Maturest counsels."

"When Adam first of men, To first of women Eve, thus moving speech, Turn'd him all ear to hear new utterance flow."

"Spoken language’s elaborate rhythms and inflections convey more meaning per word than the printed word. Compare a radio broadcast of a Shakespeare play to reading it. Word for word, listening will be easier. But readers can flip back and look at something whose meaning they might initially have missed; academics call this “regression.” Another advantage to reading is that you can “go off-line and think about what you read,” says James M. Royer, another psychology professor at U. Mass. Amherst. The weighing of relative merits gets pretty elaborate, no doubt partly because of academia’s multicultural sensitivity to non western cultures that exalt the oral tradition. Setting political correctness aside, however, it’s probably true that if you really want to absorb the multiple meanings, and you’re only going to do this once, reading is better. Books on tape also pose a time problem. Carver found that college-level readers optimally take in and understand spoken words at the same word rate that they take in written words—typically about 300 words per minute. The catch is that not even auctioneers can speak at a rate much beyond 250 words per minute. (To produce a 300-words-per-minute sample, Carter had to use a “time-compressed speech” device that compacts words and deletes fractions of dead air between words.) The 250-word count of an auctioneer is much faster than the 175 words per minute the typical book-on-tape actor manages."

"Even then he had those piercing cat's eyes of his and when he had said something, finished up by saying: "If I'm wrong, put me right." And so I began to understand that you didn't speak for the sake of speaking, to say that you had done this or that, what you had eaten or drunk, but to work out an idea, to find out what makes the world go round."

"The whole problem of life, then, is this: how to break out of one's own loneliness, how to communicate with others."

"Il ne rend que monosyllables. Je croy qu'il feroit d'une cerise trois morceaux."

"I had a thing to say, But I will fit it with some better time."

"The tongues of mocking wenches are as keen As is the razor's edge invisible, Cutting a smaller hair than may be seen Above the sense of sense; so sensible Seemeth their conference; their conceits have wings Fleeter than arrows, bullets, wind, thought, swifter things."

"A heavy heart bears not a humble tongue."

"It may be right; but you are i' the wrong To speak before your time."

"Here will be an old abusing of God's patience and the king's English."

"She speaks poniards, and every word stabs."

"Rude am I in my speech, And little blessed with the soft phrase of peace; For since these arms of mine had seven years' pith, Till now some nine moons wasted, they have us'd Their dearest action in the tented field, And little of this great world can I speak, More than pertains to feats of broil and battle, And therefore little shall I grace my cause In speaking for myself."

"Your fair discourse hath been as sugar, Making the hard way sweet and delectable."

"I would be loath to cast away my speech, for besides that it is excellently well penn'd, I have taken great pains to con it."

"The ability to speak does not make you intelligent."

"A heart never created hatred; speech created hatred."

"You speak with me and I speak with you."

"Men will seem to see new destructions in the sky. The flames that fall from it will seem to rise in it and to fly from it with terror. They will hear every kind of animals speak in human language. They will instantaneously run in person in various parts of the world, without motion. They will see the greatest splendour in the midst of darkness. O! marvel of the human race! What madness has led you thus! You will speak with animals of every species and they with you in human speech. You will see yourself fall from great heights without any harm and torrents will accompany you, and will mingle with their rapid course."

"Sometimes, I don't speak right. But yet, I know what I'm talking about."

"To be an intellectual really means to speak a truth that allows suffering to speak."

"Where nature's end of language is declined, And men talk only to conceal the mind."

"I have but nine-pence in ready money, but I can draw for a thousand pounds."

"And let him be sure to leave other men their turns to speak."

"Discretion of speech is more than eloquence; and to speak agreeably to him with whom we deal is more than to speak in good words or in good order."

"Revenons à nos moutons."

"Tout ce qu'on dit de trop est fade et rebutant."

"Let him now speak, or else hereafter for ever hold his peace."

"He who does not make his words rather serve to conceal than discover the sense of his heart deserves to have it pulled out like a traitor's and shown publicly to the rabble."

"Speech that only wise people understand: Illness is destiny, treatment is a Speech. Marriage is destiny, divorce is a decision. Having people in your life is destiny, and keeping them is a decision. If you have no destiny, then you are the one who makes the decision. Physical defects can be covered with two meters of cloth, but mental defects are revealed by the first discussion. Illnesses are not only in the body, but in morals as well.~~ May 4, 2025"