Read books online
at our other site:
The Literature Page

Quotations by Subject

Quotations by Subject: Language
(Related Subjects: English, Writing, Books, Poetry, Quotations)
Showing quotations 1 to 30 of 31 quotations in our collections

We have too many high sounding words, and too few actions that correspond with them.: Abigail Adams (1744 - 1818), letter to John Adams, 1774
He can compress the most words into the smallest ideas of any man I ever met.: Abraham Lincoln (1809 - 1865)
Words calculated to catch everyone may catch no one.: Adlai E. Stevenson Jr. (1900 - 1965), speech to Democratic National Convention, Chicago, Illinois, July 21, 1952
Words are the physicians of the mind diseased.: Aeschylus (525 BC - 456 BC), Prometheus Bound
Language is the source of misunderstandings.: Antoine de Saint-Exupery (1900 - 1944)
Let thy speech be short, comprehending much in a few words.: Aprocrypha
High thoughts must have high language.: Aristophanes (450 BC - 388 BC), Frogs, 405 B.C.
Grasp the subject, the words will follow.: Cato the Elder (234 BC - 149 BC)
Use soft words and hard arguments.: English Proverb
Great literature is simply charged with meaning to the utmost possible degree.: Ezra Pound (1885 - 1972)
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 (1903 - 1950), "Politics and the English Language", 1946
A man thinks that by mouthing hard words he understands hard things.: Herman Melville (1819 - 1891)
For me, words are a form of action, capable of influencing change.: Ingrid Bengis
When ideas fail, words come in very handy.: Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749 - 1832)
Deeds, not words shall speak me.: John Fletcher (1579 - 1625)
Words ought to be a little wild for they are the assaults of thought on the unthinking.: John Maynard Keynes (1883 - 1946)
The great thing about human language is that it prevents us from sticking to the matter at hand.: Lewis Thomas (1913 - 1993)
Man invented language to satisfy his deep need to complain.: Lily Tomlin (1939 - )
We have really everything in common with America nowadays except, of course, language.: Oscar Wilde (1854 - 1900), The Canterville Ghost, 1882
Words have a longer life than deeds.: Pindar (522 BC - 443 BC), Nemean Odes
Language exerts hidden power, like a moon on the tides.: Rita Mae Brown, Starting From Scratch, 1988
Drawing on my fine command of the English language, I said nothing.: Robert Benchley (1889 - 1945)
No one has a finer command of language than the person who keeps his mouth shut.: Sam Rayburn (1882 - 1961)
Do not accustom yourself to use big words for little matters.: Samuel Johnson (1709 - 1784)
Works of imagination should be written in very plain language; the more purely imaginative they are the more necessary it is to be plain.: Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772 - 1834)
Broadly speaking, the short words are the best, and the old words best of all.: Sir Winston Churchill (1874 - 1965)
Think like a wise man but communicate in the language of the people.: William Butler Yeats (1865 - 1939)
Speak properly, and in as few words as you can, but always plainly; for the end of speech is not ostentation, but to be understood.: William Penn (1644 - 1718)
I understand a fury in your words, But not the words.: William Shakespeare (1564 - 1616), "Othello", Act 4 scene 2
My words fly up, my thoughts remain below: Words without thoughts never to heaven go.: William Shakespeare (1564 - 1616), "Hamlet", Act 3 scene 3

	Next Page
Showing quotations 1 to 30 of 31 quotations in our collections
Previous Subject: Knowledge	Next Subject: Laughter
Return to Subject List