WORDS QUOTES III

quotations about words

If the word is not dead when it reaches the hearer, he murders it at once by a contradiction, a stipulation, a condition, a digression, an interruption, and all the thousand tricks of conversation.

JOHANN WOLFGANG VON GOETHE

The Maxims and Reflections of Goethe


One mild word ... will quench more heat than a bucket of water.

JOHN THORNTON

Maxims and Directions for Youth

Tags: John Thornton


When we think, our thoughts are in the form of words, so authorities must never be permitted to outlaw or edit our thinking by redefining or outlawing our words.

JONATHAN HOFFMAN

"Words are thoughts; protect them", Arizona Daily Star, March 11, 2017


Desires and words go hand in hand ... they are moved by the same intention to join together, to communicate, to establish bridges between people, whether they are spoken or written.

LAURA ESQUIVEL

Swift as Desire

Tags: Laura Esquivel


It feels like spoken words, this bridge. I want it but fear it. God, I want so desperately to reach the other side -- just like I want the words. I want my words to build bridges strong enough to walk on. I want them to tower over the world so I can stand up on them and walk to the other side.

MARKUS ZUSAK

Getting the Girl

Tags: Markus Zusak


Truly speech has wonderful strength and power, that through a mere word, proceeding out of the mouth of a poor human creature, the devil, that so proud and powerful spirit, should be driven away, shamed and confounded.

MARTIN LUTHER

"Of God's Word", Table Talk

Tags: Martin Luther


My God! The English language is a form of communication! Conversation isn't just crossfire where you shoot and get shot at! Where you've got to duck for your life and aim to kill! Words aren't only bombs and bullets -- no, they're little gifts, containing meanings!

PHILIP ROTH

Portnoy's Complaint

Tags: Philip Roth


Words are powerful. They have the ability to build someone up or tear him down. And that someone includes you too. The words you say to yourself can either motivate you toward your goals, seriously hinder or stall your progress, or prevent you from even starting on your journey.

RACHEL GRICE

"7 Words to Stop Saying Right Now", Yahoo Health, January 24, 2016


What so wild as words are?

ROBERT BROWNING

A Woman's Last Word

Tags: Robert Browning


I believe words have power. Words can build up your self-esteem or words can puff up your pride. Words can deceive you into wrong thinking or words can guide you to safety. Words can move you to compassion. Words can even heal. Your own words can defeat you since our mental self-talk is the software directing our life.

RON WOOD

"Words are weapons", Meridian Star, January 23, 2016


Flaubert's famous search for the "mot juste" was not a search for words that glow alone, but for words so precisely placed that in combination with other words, also precisely placed, they carve out a shape in space and time.

STANLEY FISH

How to Write a Sentence: And How to Read One

Tags: Gustave Flaubert


The beautiful word begets the beautiful deed.

THOMAS MANN

The Magic Mountain

Tags: Thomas Mann


There is no greater impediment to the advancement of knowledge than the ambiguity of words.

THOMAS REID

Essays on the Intellectual Powers of Man

Tags: Thomas Reid


Avoid, which many grave men have not done, words taken from sacred subjects and from elevated poetry: these we have seen vilely prostituted. Avoid too the society of the barbarians who misemploy them.

WALTER SAVAGE LANDOR

"Barrow and Newton", Dialogues of Literary Men

Tags: Walter Savage Landor


I suppose that people, using themselves and each other so much by words, are at least consistent in attributing wisdom to a still tongue.

WILLIAM FAULKNER

The Sound and the Fury

Tags: William Faulkner


There are some things for which three words are three too many, and three thousand words that many words too less.

WILLIAM FAULKNER

Absalom, Absalom!

Tags: William Faulkner


Just pick words and put one of them after the other like a baby learning to walk, like a drunk carefully crossing the street.

WILLIAM GAY

Provinces of Night

Tags: William Gay


Words [are] more beautiful than a found fall leaf.

WILLIAM H. GASS

A Temple of Texts

Tags: William H. Gass


Words are the physicians of a mind diseased.

AESCHYLUS

Prometheus Bound

Tags: Aeschylus


After all is said and done, more is said than done.

AESOP

Aesop's Fables

Tags: Aesop