LANGUAGE QUOTES V

quotations about language

The true use of speech is not so much to express our wants as to conceal them.

OLIVER GOLDSMITH

Essays

Tags: Oliver Goldsmith


Perhaps the sad and empty language that today's flabby humanity pours forth, will, in all its horror, in all its boundless absurdity, re-echo in the heart of a solitary man who is awake, and then perhaps that man, suddenly realizing that he does not understand, will begin to understand.

ARTHUR ADAMOV

The Confession

Tags: Arthur Adamov


Language, which is the uniting bond and very medium of communion between men, is at the same time by the great variety of tongues, the means of severing and estranging nations more than anything else.

HORACE SMITH

The Tin Trumpet: Or, Heads and Tails, for the Wise and Waggish


Men are apt to overvalue the tongues, and to think they have made considerable progress in learning when they have once overcome these; yet in reality there is no internal worth in them, and men may understand a thousand languages without being the wiser.

E. D. BAKER

attributed, Day's Collacon


It is as though the ancestors who made language and knew from what bestiality its use rescued them are saying to us: Beware of interfering with its purpose! For when language is seriously interfered with, when it is disjoined from truth, be it from mere incompetence or worse, from malice, horrors can descend again on mankind.

CHINUA ACHEBE

Hopes and Impediments: Selected Essays

Tags: Chinua Achebe


If the English language made any sense, a catastrophe would be an apostrophe with fur.

DOUG LARSON

attributed, If Ignorance Is Bliss, Why Aren't There More Happy People?

Tags: Doug Larson


All true language is incomprehensible, Like the chatter of a beggar's teeth.

ANTONIN ARTAUD

Ci-Git

Tags: Antonin Artaud


The limits of my language mean the limits of my world.

LUDWIG WITTGENSTEIN

Tractacus Logico-Philosophicus

Tags: Ludwig Wittgenstein


Speech is a rolling press that always amplifies one's emotions.

GUSTAVE FLAUBERT

Madame Bovary

Tags: Gustave Flaubert


Language is originally and essentially nothing but a system of signs or symbols, which denote real occurrences, or their echo in the human soul.

CARL JUNG

Psychology of the Unconscious

Tags: Carl Jung


In language, the ignorant have prescribed laws to the learned.

RICHARD DUPPA

Maxims


Wouldn't it be wonderful to travel to a foreign country without having to worry about the nuisance of communicating in a different language?... Within a decade or so, we'll be able to communicate with one another via small earpieces with built-in microphones. No more trying to remember your high school French when checking into a hotel in Paris. Your earpiece will automatically translate "Good evening, I have a reservation" to Bon soir, j'ai une réservation -- while immediately translating the receptionist's unintelligible babble to "I am sorry, Sir, but your credit card has been declined."

DAVID ARBESÚ

"Could the language barrier actually fall within the next 10 years?", The Conversation, March 28, 2016


Language was invented for one reason, boys -- to woo women.

N. H. KLEINBAUM

Dead Poets Society


Language is not a wonderful natural asset; it is an artificial device that constantly misleads us and does us great harm; and the modern way of studying language is itself harmful because it enhances the reputation of language and sustains corrupt ways of thought.

AMOREY GETHIN

introduction, Language and Thought: A Rational Enquiry Into Their Nature and Relationship


Evolution teaches us the original purpose of language was to ritualize men's threats and curses, his spells to compel the gods; communication came later.

GENE WOLFE

"The Death of Doctor Island", Universe 3

Tags: Gene Wolfe


A man reacheth not to excellence with one language.

R. ASCHAM

attributed, Day's Collacon


To clothe low-creeping matter with high-flown language is not fine fancy but flat foolery; it rather loads than raises a wren, to fasten the feathers of an ostrich to her wings.

THOMAS FULLER

The Holy State and the Profane State

Tags: Thomas Fuller


There's no such thing as dead languages, only dormant minds.

CARLOS RUIZ ZAFON

The Shadow of the Wind

Tags: Carlos Ruiz Zafon


Since individuals think in the language in which they speak, thought processes are limited to words and concepts within that language. If a word for a concept doesn't exist in that language, it cannot be thought. Because language is the cornerstone of thinking and culture, as the languages around the world die out, ways of thinking become restricted.

JORDAN RYDER

"Native American Student Association to Stage Screening of Language Loss Documentary", Daily Iowan, March 29, 2016


It is a silly conceit, that men without languages are often without understanding; it is apparent in all ages, that some such have been even prodigies for ability; for it is not to be believed that wisdom speaks only to her disciples in Latin, Greek, and Hebrew.

THOMAS FULLER

attributed, Day's Collacon

Tags: Thomas Fuller