It is idle to think that by means of words any real communication can ever pass from one man to another. The lips or the tongue may represent the soul, even as a cipher or a number may represent a picture of Hans Memling, but from the moment that we have something to say to each other, we are compelled to hold our peace. And if at such times we do not listen to the urgent commands of silence, invisible though they be, we shall have suffered an eternal loss that all the treasures of human wisdom cannot make good, for we shall have let slip the opportunity of listening to another soul, and of giving existence, be it only for an instant, to our own—and many lives there are in which such opportunities do not present themselves twice.

It is only when life is sluggish within us that we speak, only at moments when reality lies far away, and we do not wish to be conscious of our brethren. And no sooner do we speak than something warns us that the divine gates are closing. Thus it comes about that we hug silence to us and are very misers of it, and even the most reckless will not squander it on the first comer. There is an instinct of the superhuman truths within us which warns us that it is dangerous to be silent with one whom we do not wish to know, or do not love; for words may pass between men, but let silence have had its instant of activity, and it will never efface itself—and indeed the true life, the only life that leaves a trace behind, is made up of silence alone.