
“To persevere in one's duty, and be silent is the best answer to calumny”
Stanzas from the Grande Chartreuse (1855)
Context: But — if you cannot give us ease —
Last of the race of them who grieve
Here leave us to die out with these
Last of the people who believe!
Silent, while years engrave the brow;
Silent — the best are silent now. Achilles ponders in his tent,
The kings of modern thought are dumb,
Silent they are though not content,
And wait to see the future come.
They have the grief men had of yore,
But they contend and cry no more.
“To persevere in one's duty, and be silent is the best answer to calumny”
Stanzas from the Grande Chartreuse (1855)
“God is silent. Now if only man would shut up.”
“She knew she could help him best by being silent and by being near.”
Source: The Pearl
“Of every noble work the silent part is best,
Of all expression that which can not be expressed.”
The Unexpressed.
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919)
“Slowly, silently, now the moon
Walks the night in her silver shoon.”
Silver.
“A silent man is a thinking man. A silent woman is an angry one …”
Source: Styxx
οὔ τοι ἅπασα κερδίων
φαίνοισα πρόσωπον ἀλάθει᾽ ἀτρεκής·
καὶ τὸ σιγᾶν πολλάκις ἐστὶ σοφώτατον ἀνθρώπῳ νοῆσαι.
Nemean 5, line 16-8; page 222. (483 BC?)