“A man thinks that by mouthing hard words he understands hard things.”

— Herman Melville

Last update June 3, 2021. History

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Herman Melville 144

American novelist, short story writer, essayist, and poet 1818–1891

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“For rhetoric, he could not ope
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Samuel Butler (poet) Hudibras

Canto I, line 81
Hudibras, Part I (1663–1664)
Context: For rhetoric, he could not ope
His mouth, but out there flew a trope;
And when he happen'd to break off
I' th' middle of his speech, or cough,
H' had hard words, ready to show why,
And tell what rules he did it by;
Else, when with greatest art he spoke,
You'd think he talk'd like other folk,
For all a rhetorician's rules
Teach nothing but to name his tools.

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Source: Fated to Be Free: A Novel (1875), Ch. 9, p. 113.

“A man thinks that by mouthing hard words he understands hard things.”

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Herman Melville 144

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