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Words quotes

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“Words without thoughts never to heaven go.” William Shakespeare, “Hamlet” - 1623

“People to whom sin is just a matter of words, to them salvation is just words too.” William Faulkner, “As I Lay Dying” - 1930

“Tragic phrases comfort the heart.... Without them, sorrow would be too heavy for men to bear.” Fyodor Dostoyevsky, “The Brothers Karamazov” - 1880

“QUOTATION, n. The act of repeating erroneously the words of another. The words erroneously repeated.” Ambrose Bierce, “The Devil's Dictionary” - 1911

“Culture is perishing in overproduction, in an avalanche of words, in the madness of quantity.” Milan Kundera, “The Unbearable Lightness of Being” - 1984

“He had a word, too. Love, he called it. But I had been used to words for a long time. I knew that that word was like the others: just a shape to fill a lack; that when the right time came, you wouldn’t need a word for that anymore than for...” William Faulkner, “As I Lay Dying” - 1930

“You cram these words into mine ears against the stomach of my sense.” William Shakespeare, “The Tempest” - 1623

“Let's fight with gentle words till time lend friends, and friends their helpful swords.” William Shakespeare, “Richard II” - 1595

“He wanted to cry quietly but not for himself: for the words, so beautiful and sad, like music.” James Joyce, “A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man” - 1916

“To be slow in words is a woman's only virtue.” William Shakespeare, “The Two Gentlemen of Verona” - 1623

“Ill deeds is doubled with an evil word.” William Shakespeare, “The Comedy of Errors” - 1623

“A lord must learn that sometimes words can accomplish what swords cannot.” George R. R. Martin, “A Game of Thrones” - 1996

“Words mean more than what is written on paper. They need the human voice to give them deeper meaning.” Maya Angelou, “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings” - 1969

“There's a light in a woman's eyes that speaks louder than words.” Arthur Conan Doyle, “The Hound of the Baskervilles” - 1902

“Words can be like X-rays, if you use them properly—they'll go through anything. You read and you're pierced.” Aldous Huxley, “Brave New World” - 1932

“He who speaks without modesty will find it difficult to make his words good.” Confucius, “Analects”

“His silence is more eloquent than words.” Thomas Carlyle, “On Heroes, Hero-Worship, and The Heroic in History” - 1841

“Therefore it has always been said that music is the language of feeling and of passion, as words are the language of reason.” Arthur Schopenhauer, “The World as Will and Representation” - 1819

“A flow of words is a sure sign of duplicity.” Honoré de Balzac, “Letters of Two Brides” - 1841

“A definition is the enclosing a wilderness of idea within a wall of words.” Samuel Butler, “The Note-Books of Samuel Butler” - 1912

“He that uses his words loosely and unsteadily will either be not minded or not understood.” John Locke, “An Essay Concerning Human Understanding” - 1689

“I drank in my words like a thirsty man. I even began to believe them.” Charles Bukowski, “Ham on Rye” - 1982

“There are times when the world is rearranging itself, and at times like that, the right words can change the world.” Orson Scott Card, “Ender's Game” - 1985

“A poet’s mission is to make words do more work than they normally do, to make them work on more than one level.” Jay-Z, “Decoded” - 2010

“It's a beautiful thing, the destruction of words. Of course the great wastage is in the verbs and adjectives, but there are hundreds of nouns that can be got rid of as well.” George Orwell, “1984” - 1949

“In the end we shall make thoughtcrime literally impossible, because there will be no words in which to express it.” George Orwell, “1984” - 1949

“Was there anything so real as words?” Oscar Wilde, “The Picture of Dorian Gray” - 1890

“I understand a fury in your words, but not the words.” William Shakespeare, “Othello” - 1623

“O, that's a brave man! He writes brave verses, speaks brave words, swears brave oaths, and breaks them bravely, quite traverse, athwart the heart of his lover;” William Shakespeare, “As You Like It” - 1623

“I think the best grace of wit will shortly turn into silence, and discourse grow commendable in none only but parrots.” William Shakespeare, “The Merchant of Venice” - 1600

“They breathe truth that breathe their words in pain.” William Shakespeare, “Richard II” - 1595

“The words of Mercury are harsh after the songs of Apollo.” William Shakespeare, “Love's Labour's Lost” - 1598

“Words, words, mere words, no matter from the heart; th' effect doth operate another way.” William Shakespeare, “Troilus and Cressida” - 1609

“A thousand moral paintings I can show that shall demonstrate these quick blows of Fortune's more pregnantly than words.” William Shakespeare, “Timon of Athens” - 1623

“The heart hath treble wrong When it is barr'd the aidance of the tongue.” William Shakespeare, “Venus and Adonis” - 1593

“There was a lot more to magic, as Harry quickly found out, than waving your wand and saying a few funny words.” J. K. Rowling, “Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone” - 1997

“Some old wounds never truly heal, and bleed again at the slightest word.” George R. R. Martin, “A Game of Thrones” - 1996

“I don't know the meaning of half those long words, and, what's more, I don't believe you do either!” Lewis Carroll, “Alice's Adventures in Wonderland” - 1865

“It is one of my faults, that though my tongue is sometimes prompt enough at an answer, there are times when it sadly fails me in framing an excuse; and always the lapse occurs at some crisis, when a facile word or plausible pretext is specially...” Charlotte Brontë, “Jane Eyre” - 16 October 1847

“It seemed as if my tongue pronounced words without my will consenting to their utterance: something spoke out of me over which I had no control.” Charlotte Brontë, “Jane Eyre” - 16 October 1847

“The captain has said too much or he has said too little, and I'm bound to say that I require an explanation of his words.” Robert Louis Stevenson, “Treasure Island” - 1883

“You may imagine how I felt when I heard this abominable old rogue addressing another in the very same words of flattery as he had used to myself. I think, if I had been able, that I would have killed him through the barrel.” Robert Louis Stevenson, “Treasure Island” - 1883

“Immodest words admit of no defense, for want of modesty is want of sense.” Benjamin Franklin, “The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin” - 1791

“If names be not correct, language is not in accordance with the truth of things. If language be not in accordance with the truth of things, affairs cannot be carried on to success.” Confucius, “Analects”

“Without knowing the force of words, it is impossible to know men.” Confucius, “Analects”

“Even Samson, the world's strongest man, was destroyed by the woman who slept in his arms. She was the one whose words hurt him.” Malcolm X, “The Autobiography of Malcolm X” - 1965

“They had behind them, to my mind, the terrific suggestiveness of words heard in dreams, of phrases spoken in nightmares.” Joseph Conrad, “Heart of Darkness” - 1899

“This, I think, I may at least say, that we should have a great many fewer disputes in the world, if words were taken for what they are, the signs of our ideas only; and not for things themselves.” John Locke, “An Essay Concerning Human Understanding” - 1689

“Words, in their immediate Signification, are the sensible Signs of his Ideas who uses them.” John Locke, “An Essay Concerning Human Understanding” - 1689

“Words differently arranged have a different meaning, and meanings differently arranged have different effects.” Blaise Pascal, “Pensées” - 1670

Related topics

meaning speech language ideas music truth modesty understanding tragedy heart woman swords silence writing action hurt love passion strength men

Related authors

William Shakespeare (13)
Confucius (3)
John Locke (3)
Oscar Wilde (2)
William Faulkner (2)
George R. R. Martin (2)
Charlotte Brontë (2)
George Orwell (2)
Robert Louis Stevenson (2)
James Joyce (1)
J. K. Rowling (1)
Lewis Carroll (1)
Maya Angelou (1)
Arthur Conan Doyle (1)
Aldous Huxley (1)
Benjamin Franklin (1)
Malcolm X (1)
Joseph Conrad (1)
Fyodor Dostoyevsky (1)
Thomas Carlyle (1)

Related sources

Analects (3)
An Essay Concerning Human Understanding (3)
As I Lay Dying (2)
Richard II (2)
A Game of Thrones (2)
Jane Eyre (2)
1984 (2)
Treasure Island (2)
Hamlet (1)
The Two Gentlemen of Verona (1)
The Merchant of Venice (1)
As You Like It (1)
Othello (1)
The Tempest (1)
The Picture of Dorian Gray (1)
Lady Windermere's Fan (1)
A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man (1)
Love's Labour's Lost (1)
Troilus and Cressida (1)
Timon of Athens (1)