“Use a sweet tongue, courtesy, and gentleness, and thou mayst manage to guide an elephant with a hair.”

— Saadi , book Gulistan of Sa'di

Chapter 3, story 28 http://books.google.com/books?id=LDpbAAAAQAAJ&q=%22use+a+sweet+tongue+courtesy+and+gentleness+and+thou+mayst+manage+to+guide+an+elephant+with+a+hair%22&pg=PA292#v=onepage
Gulistan (1258)

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update Jan. 15, 2023. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "Use a sweet tongue, courtesy, and gentleness, and thou mayst manage to guide an elephant with a hair." by Saadi?

Saadi 5

Persian poet 1210–1291

Related quotes

“Sweet Stay-at-Home, sweet Well-content,
Thou knowest of no strange continent;
Thou hast not felt thy bosom keep
A gentle motion with the deep;
Thou hast not sailed in Indian seas,
Where scent comes forth in every breeze.”

William Henry Davies (1871–1940) British poet

Sweet Stay-at-Home.

“If you can't manage courtesy, try silence.”

Jim Butcher book White Night

Source: White Night

“Labor is sweet, for Thou hast toiled,
And care is light, for Thou hast cared;
Let not our works with self be soiled,
Nor in unsimple ways ensnared.
Through life's long day and death's dark night,
O gentle Jesus! be our light.”

Frederick William Faber (1814–1863) British hymn writer and theologian

Source: Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), P. 369.

“Hail, ye small, sweet courtesies of life! for smooth do ye make the road of it.”

Laurence Sterne book A Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy

The Pulse, Paris.
A Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy (1768)

“No longer would we imprison thee though thou art all gentleness and would chat and jest with us by the hour.”

Samuel Laman Blanchard (1804–1845) British author and journalist

"A Quarrel with some Old Acquaintances".
Sketches from Life (1846)

“Guide the people by law, subdue them by punishment; they may shun crime, but will be void of shame. Guide them by example, subdue them by courtesy; they will learn shame, and come to be good.”

Confucius (-551–-479 BC) Chinese teacher, editor, politician, and philosopher

Source: The Analects, Other chapters

“Come, then, with what voice Thou wilt come, Thou power- clad Messenger of my Redeemer! Come with thunder on Thy tongue, or with a sweet "harp of ten strings;" come to us simple as a little child, or wise as a scribe instructed of God; but, O! let us only feel that fire in Thy message which lies not in sentences nor in tones, but in a heart itself inflamed from above, and pouring fire into our hearts.”

William Arthur (minister) (1819–1901) Wesleyan Methodist minister and author

Source: Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), P. 323.

“He rolls it under his tongue as a sweet morsel.”

Matthew Henry (1662–1714) Theologician from Wales

Psalm 36.
Commentaries

“The voice was gentle, like a scalpel petting the short hairs of your throat.”

Vernor Vinge A Fire Upon the Deep (1st edition)

Source: A Fire Upon the Deep (1992), Chapter 5 (p. 51).

“On the tongue of such an one they shed a honeyed dew, and from his lips drop gentle words.”

Hesiod Greek poet

Source: The Theogony (c. 700 BC), line 82.

Related topics