Remember not only to say the right thing in the right place, but far more difficult still, to leave unsaid the wrong thing at the tempting moment.

Misfortune, and recited misfortune especially, may be prolonged to that point where it ceases to excite pity and arouses only irritation.

Listen with ears of tolerance, see through the eyes of compassion, speak with language of love.

The most important single ingredient in the formula of success is knowing how to get along with people.

Teach your child to hold his tongue; he'll learn fast enough to speak.

The thing I hate about an argument is that it always interrupts a discussion.

Understanding a question is half an answer.

I was in darkness, but I took three steps and found myself in paradise. The first step was a good thought, the second, a good word; and the third, a good deed.

Meaningful silence is better than meaningless words.

We know how to speak many falsehoods which resemble real things, but we know, when we will, how to speak true things.

Fear of serious injury cannot alone justify suppression of free speech and assembly. Men feared witches and burned women. It is the function of speech to free men from the bondage of irrational fears.

The world would be happier if men had the same capacity to be silent that they have to speak.

If one but tell a thing well, it moves on with undying voice, and over the fruitful earth and across the sea goes the bright gleam of noble deeds ever unquenchable.

It is by the goodness of God that in our country we have those three unspeakably gracious things: freedom of speech, freedom of conscience, and the prudence never to practice either of them.

Surely human affairs would be far happier if the power in men to be silent were the same as that to speak. But experience more than sufficiently teaches that men govern nothing with more difficulty than their tongues.