“Silence is the speech of love,
The music of the spheres above.”
Speech of Love.
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919)
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Richard Henry Stoddard 9
American poet 1825–1903Related quotes
Source: On the Fetish Character in Music and the Regression of Listening (1938), p. 271
As the Swiss inscription says: Sprechen ist silbern, Schweigen ist golden
Bk. III, ch. 3.
1830s, Sartor Resartus (1833–1834)
“True silence is the speech of lovers. For only love knows its beauty, completeness and utter joy.”
Source: Poustinia (1975), Ch. 1
1830s, Sir Walter Scott (1838)
“Speech is the small change of Silence.”
Source: The Ordeal of Richard Feverel http://www.gutenberg.org/files/4412/4412.txt (1859), Ch. 34.
“Silence
is an ocean. Speech is a river.”
"The Three Fish" Ch. 18 : The Three Fish, p. 196
Variant translations or adaptations:
Silence is the language of God, all else is poor translation.
As quoted in Teachers of Wisdom (2010) by Igor Kononenko, p. 134
Silence is an ocean. Speech is a river. Silence is the language of God, all else is poor translation.
As quoted in "Rumi’s wisdom" (2 October 2015) http://paulocoelhoblog.com/2015/10/02/character-of-the-week-rumi/, by Paulo Coelho
The Essential Rumi (1995)
Context: Silence
is an ocean. Speech is a river.When the ocean is searching for you, don't walk
into the language-river. Listen to the ocean,
and bring your talky business to an end Traditional words are just babbling
in that presence, and babbling is a substitute
for sight.
“Silence is most powerful. Speech is always less powerful than silence.”
Abide as the Self