Motivational Quotes

Speech

Discretion in speech is more than eloquence.

- Sir Francis Bacon

Best Quotes about Speech

1.

Free speech carries with it some freedom to listen.

Bob Marley

2.

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

Publilius Syrus

3.

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

4.

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.

5.

Tears at times have all the weight of speech.

Ovid

6.

A long tongue shortens life.

7.

Speech is an arrangement of notes that will never be played again.

8.

Bigotry and intolerance, silenced by argument, endeavors to silence by persecution, in old days by fire and sword, in modern days by the tongue.

Simmons, Charles

9.

The world does not speak. Only we do. The world can, once we have programmed ourselves with a language, cause us to hold beliefs. But it cannot propose a language for us to speak. Only other human beings can do that.

Rorty, Richard

10.

It's a damn shame we have this immediate ticking off in the mind about how people sound. On the other hand, how many people really want to be operated upon by a surgeon who talks broad cockney?

Aitkins, Eileen

11.

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

Tiberius

12.

I do not speak to thee in drink but in tears, not in pleasure but in passion, not in words only, but in woes also.

William Shakespeare

13.

Speeches that are measured by the hour will die with the hour.

Jefferson, Thomas

14.

Let your speech be always with grace, seasoned with salt, that ye may know how ye ought to answer every man. [Colossians 4:6]

Bible

15.

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

William Shakespeare

16.

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

Whitehead, Alfred North

17.

Wherever the relevance of speech is at stake, matters become political by definition, for speech is what makes man a political being.

Arendt, Hannah

18.

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

Cato The Elder

19.

Where the speech is corrupted, the mind is also.

Seneca

20.

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

Mark Twain

21.

Let us speak, though we show all our faults and weaknesses, --for it is a sign of strength to be weak, to know it, and out with it -- not in a set way and ostentatiously, though, but incidentally and without premeditation.

Melville, Herman

22.

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

Chuang-tzu

23.

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

24.

The mind is a wonderful thing. It starts working the minute you're born and never stops working until you get up to speak in public.

Ball, Patricia Ann

25.

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

26.

I've decided to discontinue my long talks. It's because of my throat. Someone threatened to cut it.

27.

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

Demosthenes

28.

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

29.

I do know of these that... only are reputed wise for saying nothing.

William Shakespeare

30.

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

Sir William Osler

31.

When you have spoken the word, it reigns over you. When it is unspoken you reign over it.

Proverb, Arabian

32.

Speech is the mirror of the mind. (Imago Animi Sermo Est)

Seneca

33.

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

W. Somerset Maugham

34.

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

35.

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

Moralia

36.

Readiness of speech is often inability to hold the tongue.

Jean Baptiste Rousseau

37.

Speeches are not magic and there is no great speech without great policy.

Noonan, Peggy

38.

Better pointed bullets than pointed speeches.

Bismarck, Otto Von

39.

The basic rule of human nature is that powerful people speak slowly and subservient people quickly --because if they don't speak fast nobody will listen to them.

Caine, Michael

40.

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

William Shakespeare

41.

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

42.

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

43.

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

Hansell B. Duckett

44.

Speech is civilization itself. The word... preserves contact -- it is silence which isolates.

Mann, Thomas

45.

Be check'd for silence, but never tax'd for speech.

William Shakespeare

46.

Be it art or hap, he hath spoken true.