“To maintain immaculate speech, often times silence is required.”
Yahia Lababidi (1973)
"Where Epics Fail: Aphorisms on Art, Morality & Spirit" (2018)
“I have often regretted my speech, never my silence.”
Maxim 1070
Sentences, The Moral Sayings of Publius Syrus, a Roman Slave
Help us to complete the source, original and additional information
Do you have more details about the quote "I have often regretted my speech, never my silence." by Publilio Siro?
Publilio Siro112
Latin writerRelated quotes
“One of my only regrets is that I was never able to fall in love.”
Dylann Roof (1994) American mass murderer
Journal found in his car
“My only regret is that I have not drunk more champagne in my life.”
John Maynard Keynes (1883–1946) British economist
At a King's College college feast, as quoted in 1949, John Maynard Keynes, 1883-1946, Fellow and Bursar, (A memoir prepared by direction of the Council of King’s College, Cambridge University, England), Cambridge University Press, 1949, page 37. This in turn quoted in Quote Investigator, " My Only Regret Is That I Have Not Drunk More Champagne In My Life https://quoteinvestigator.com/2013/07/11/more-champagne/", 2013-07-11 <br class="br">Attributed
Thomas Carlyle book Sartor Resartus
As the Swiss inscription says: Sprechen ist silbern, Schweigen ist golden
Bk. III, ch. 3.
1830s, Sartor Resartus (1833–1834)
Rita Levi-Montalcini (1909–2012) Italian neurologist
Of the fact that she never married; quoted in Associated Press obituary.
“I shall never deny what you deserve, my queen,
never regret my memories of Dido, not while I
can recall myself and draw the breath of life.”
Numquam, regina, negabo
Promeritam, nec me meminisse pigebit Elissae
Dum memor ipse mei, dum spiritus hos regit artus.
Source: Aeneid (29–19 BC), Book IV, Lines 334–336 (tr. Fagles); Aeneas to Dido.
“It has never been my nature, I regret to admit to the House, to turn the other cheek.”
Denis Healey (1917–2015) British Labour Party politician and Life peer
Speech http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/commons/1974/dec/18/the-economy in the House of Commons (18 December 1974) <br class="br">1970s
“I have a voice, too, and for good or evil mine is the speech that cannot be silenced”
Joseph Conrad book Heart of Darkness
Source: Heart of Darkness
“I only regret that I have but one life to lose for my country.”
Nathan Hale (1755–1776) soldier for the Continental Army during the American Revolutionary War
Last words before being hanged by the British as a spy, (September 22, 1776), according to the account by William Hull based on reports by British Captain John Montresor who was present and who spoke to Hull under a flag of truce the next day:
‘On the morning of his execution,’ continued the officer, ‘my station was near the fatal spot, and I requested the Provost Marshal to permit the prisoner to sit in my marquee, while he was making the necessary preparations. Captain Hale entered: he was calm, and bore himself with gentle dignity, in the consciousness of rectitude and high intentions. He asked for writing materials, which I furnished him: he wrote two letters, one to his mother and one to a brother officer.’ He was shortly after summoned to the gallows. But a few persons were around him, yet his characteristic dying words were remembered. He said, ‘I only regret, that I have but one life to lose for my country.’
Some speculation exists that Hale might have been repeating or paraphrasing lines from Joseph Addison's play Cato, Act IV, Scene IV:
How beautiful is death when earned by virtue.
Who would not be that youth? What pity is it
that we can die but once to serve our country.
See George Dudley Seymour, Captain Nathan Hale, Major John Palsgrave Wyllys, A Digressive History, (1933), p. 39.
Another early variant of his last words exists, as reported in the Independent Chronicle and the Universal Advertiser (17 May 1781):
I am so satisfied with the cause in which I have engaged, that my only regret is, that I have not more lives than one to offer in its service.