“Let him now speak, or else hereafter for ever hold his peace.”
Épitres (1701) I, 61
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Nicolas Boileau-Despréaux 30
French poet and critic 1636–1711Related quotes
"Germinal" in Vale and Other Poems (1931)
Dr. Pages, Chief Executive Officer Universal Forum of Cultures, Barcelona, Spain. June 14, 2004
About, 2000s
Hecuba, lines 1178-1182 ( tr. Jay Kardan and Laura-Gray Street (2010) http://didaskalia.net/issues/8/32/)
Variant ( tr. E. P. Coleridge (1938) http://data.perseus.org/citations/urn:cts:greekLit:tlg0006.tlg007.perseus-eng1:1145-1186):
[I]f any of the men of former times have spoken ill of women, if any does so now, or shall do so hereafter, I will say all this in one short sentence; for neither land or sea produces such a race, as whoever has had to do with them knows.
“Dango, Pume, Thwither: down with Visbhume’s breeches; let him hold his backside at the ready.”
Source: Lyonesse Trilogy (1983-1989), The Green Pearl (1985), Chapter 9, section 4 (p. 505)
“Let me hold on to this the way it was, before I knew anything else.”
Source: How They Met, and Other Stories
The Golden Legend, Pt. VI, A travelling Scholastic affixing his Theses to the gate of the College.
Context: I think I have proved, by profound researches,
The error of all those doctrines so vicious
Of the old Areopagite Dyonisius,
That are making such terrible work in the churches,
By Michael the Stammerer sent from the East,
And done into Latin by that Scottish beast,
Erigena Johannes, who dares to maintain,
In the face of the truth, the error infernal,
That the universe is and must be eternal;
At first laying down, as a fact fundamental,
That nothing with God can be accidental;
Then asserting that God before the creation
Could not have existed, because it is plain
That, had he existed, he would have created;
Which is begging the question that should be debated,
And moveth me less to anger than laughter.
All nature, he holds, is a respiration
Of the Spirit of God, who, in breathing hereafter
Will inhale it into his bosom again,
So that nothing but God alone will remain.
“If we can only speak to slander our betters, let us hold our tongues.”
Source: The Tenant of Wildfell Hall (1848), Ch. IX : A Snake in the Grass; Gilbert to Eliza
