“Conversation. — Because they have many of those ideas that, to be shown, have need of eyes, gestures, voice, a whole multitude of signs that the written word does not accompany. One sees the soul in operation.”
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Joseph Joubert 253
French moralist and essayist 1754–1824Related quotes

Cariola, Mujer, Matrona, Dirigente Social y Política: Abrir el Congreso Nacional a la Ciudadanía, DiarioDigital, 2013-08-25 http://www.diarioreddigital.cl/index.php/politica/36-politica/443-karol-cariola-mujer-matrona-dirigente-social-y-politica-abrir-el-congreso-nacional-a-la-ciudadania-,
Original: "Las instituciones en general han perdido credibilidad, no porque no funcionen sino porque funcionan a puertas cerradas, porque no se han abierto a que el pueblo chileno pueda entrar a ellas. El congreso nacional ha sido un espacio cerrado durante muchos años, el binominal lo ha mantenido contenido en dos fuerzas políticas y no representa otras ideas que son de transformación y que han estado presentes durante muchos años en nuestro país".

“Letters are signs of things, symbols of words, whose power is so great that without a voice they speak to us the words of the absent; for they introduce words by the eye, not by the ear.”
Litterae autem sunt indices rerum, signa verborum, quibus tanta vis est, ut nobis dicta absentium sine voce loquantur. Verba enim per oculos non per aures introducunt.
Bk. 1, ch. 3, sect. 1; p. 96.
Etymologiae

Source: Everybody’s Autobiography (1937), Ch. 2

The Signs of the Times (9 December 1903], paragraph 10

Diary entry for June 27, 1988, p. 177.
Writing Home (1994)

“Of course, however, the living voice and the intimacy of a common life will help you more than the written word. You must go to the scene of action, first, because men put more faith in their eyes than in their ears, and second, because the way is long if one follows precepts, but short and helpful, if one follows patterns.”
Plus tamen tibi et viva vox et convictus quam oratio proderit; in rem praesentem venias oportet, primum quia homines amplius oculis quam auribus credunt, deinde quia longum iter est per praecepta, breve et efficax per exempla.
Alternate translation: Teaching by precept is a long road, but short and beneficial is the way by example.
Source: Epistulae Morales ad Lucilium (Moral Letters to Lucilius), Letter VI: On precepts and exemplars, Line 5.