Motivational Quotes

Speech

They that are loudest in their threats are the weakest in the execution of them. It is probable that he who is killed by lightning hears no noise; but the thunder-clap which follows, and which most alarms the ignorant, is the surest proof of their safety.

- Colton, Charles Caleb

Best Quotes about Speech

Talk is over-rated as a means of settling disputes.

Cruise, Tom

How absolute the knave is! we must speak by the card, or equivocation will undo us.

William Shakespeare

The only happy talkers are dandies who extract pleasure from the very perishability of their material and who would not be able to tolerate the isolation of all other forms of composition; for most good talkers, when they have run down, are miserable; they know that they have betrayed themselves, that they have taken material which should have a life of its own, to dispense it in noises upon the air.

Connolly, Cyril

All speech is vain and empty unless it be accompanied by action.

Demosthenes

Language is legislation, speech is its code. We do not see the power which is in speech because we forget that all speech is a classification, and that all classifications are oppressive.

Barthes, Roland

Men of few words are the best men.

William Shakespeare

Tears at times have all the weight of speech.

Ovid

Readiness of speech is often inability to hold the tongue.

Jean Baptiste Rousseau

What has influenced my life more than any other single thing has been my stammer. Had I not stammered I would probably... have gone to Cambridge as my brothers did, perhaps have become a don and every now and then published a dreary book about French literature.

Maugham, W. Somerset

10.

Speech has been given to man to disguise his thoughts.

Talleyrand, Charles Maurice De

11.

Look wise, say nothing, and grunt. Speech was given to conceal thought.

Sir William Osler

12.

Bore: one who has the power of speech but not the capacity for conversation.

Benjamin Disraeli

13.

Speech is power: speech is to persuade, to convert, to compel. It is to bring another out of his bad sense into your good sense.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

14.

Thought is the fountain of speech.

Chrysippus

15.

Speech is the mirror of the soul; as a man speaks, so he is.

Syrus, Publilius

16.

Be a craftsman in speech that thou mayest be strong, for the strength of one is the tongue, and speech is mightier than all fighting.

Maxims of Ptahhotep

17.

Man does not speak because he thinks; he thinks because he speaks. Or rather, speaking is no different than thinking: to speak is to think.

Paz, Octavio

18.

Speech is always bolder than action.

Schiller, Johann Friedrich Von

19.

The habit of common and continuous speech is a symptom of mental deficiency.

Walter Bagehot

20.

Weighest thy words before thou givest them breath.

William Shakespeare

21.

Speech is human nature itself, with none of the artificiality of written language.

Whitehead, Alfred North

22.

If you don't want to read it, see it or hear it, don't say it.

23.

It's better to keep your mouth shut and give the impression that you're stupid than to open it and remove all doubt.

Belson, Rami

24.

Where the speech is corrupted, the mind is also.

Seneca

25.

All speech, written or spoken, is a dead language, until it finds a willing and prepared hearer.

Stevenson, Robert Louis

26.

Speech and silence. We feel safer with a madman who talks than with one who cannot open his mouth.

Cioran, E. M.

27.

If nobody spoke unless he had something to say, the human race would very soon lose the use of speech.

W. Somerset Maugham

28.

There are remarks that sow and remarks that reap.

Wittgenstein, Ludwig

29.

Great wisdom is generous; petty wisdom is contentious. Great speech is impassioned, small speech cantankerous.

Chuang-tzu

30.

Sweet Benjamin, since thou art young, and hast not yet the use of tongue, make it thy slave, while thou art free; Imprison it, lest it do thee.

Hoskins, John

31.

From my earliest days I have enjoyed an attractive impediment in my speech. I have never permitted the use of the word stammer. I can't say it myself.

Campbell, Patrick

32.

Colton, Charles Caleb

33.

A long tongue shortens life.

34.

We have as many planes of speech as does a painting planes of perspective which create perspective in a phrase. The most important word stands out most vividly defined in the very foreground of the sound plane. Less important words create a series of deeper planes.

Stanislavisky, Konstantin

35.

Speech of yourself ought to be seldom and well chosen.

Bacon, Francis

36.

It usually takes more than three weeks to prepare a good impromptu speech.

Mark Twain

37.

Speech is the gift of all, but the thought of few.

Cato The Elder

38.

In a free state there should be freedom of speech and thought.

Tiberius

39.

Speech is a mirror of the soul: as a man speaks, so is he.

Publilius Syrus

40.

Listening to someone talk isn't at all like listening to their words played over on a machine. What you hear when you have a face before you is never what you hear when you have before you a winding tape.

Fallaci, Oriana

41.

Things are often spoke and seldom meant.

William Shakespeare

42.

What this country needs is more free speech worth listening to.

Hansell B. Duckett

43.

Today's public figures can no longer write their own speeches or books, and there is some evidence that they can't read them either.

Gore Vidal

44.

Free speech carries with it some freedom to listen.

Bob Marley

45.

Never try to impress people with the profundity of your thought by the obscurity of your language. Whatever has been thoroughly thought through can be stated simply.

46.

Do not fight verbosity with words: speech is given to all, intelligence to few.

Moralia

47.

Many great writers have been extraordinarily awkward in daily exchange, but the greatest give the impression that their style was nursed by the closest attention to colloquial speech.

Wilder, Thornton

48.

Though thou speak'st truth, methink thou speak'st not well.

William Shakespeare

49.

Much speech is one thing, well-timed speech is another.

Sophocles

50.

A talk is like a woman's dress. Long enough to cover the subject, but short enough to be interesting.