“Speech is silvern, Silence is golden; or, as I might rather express it: speech is of time, silence is of eternity.”

1830s, Sir Walter Scott (1838)

"Where Epics Fail: Aphorisms on Art, Morality & Spirit" (2018)

Source: The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie

Of Discretion.
Proverbial Philosophy (1838-1849)

Source: The Ordeal of Richard Feverel http://www.gutenberg.org/files/4412/4412.txt (1859), Ch. 34.

"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.

Abide as the Self