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.

I live by good soup, and not on fine language.

Language ought to be the joint creation of poets and manual workers.

Language is the armory of the human mind and at once contains the trophies of its past and the weapons of its future conquests. 

I am always sorry when any language is lost, because languages are the pedigrees of nations.

Methinks the human method of expression by sound of tongue is very elementary and ought to be substituted for some ingenious invention which should be able to give vent to at least six coherent sentences at once.

Under all speech that is good for anything, there lies a silence that is better. Silence is deep as eternity; speech is shallow as time.

The more the pleasures of the body fade away, the greater to me is the pleasure and charm of conversation.

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

I have often repented speaking, but never of holding my tongue.

When action grows unprofitable, gather information; when information grows unprofitable, sleep.

How absurd men are! They never use the liberties they have, they demand those they do not have. They have freedom of thought, they demand freedom of speech.

What a glut of books! Who can read them? As already, we shall have a vast chaos and confusion of books; we are oppressed with them, our eyes ache with reading, our fingers with turning.