Source: The Wise Man's Fear
“There are no secrets better kept than the secrets everybody guesses.”
Crofts, Act III
Variant: There are no secrets except the secrets that keep themselves.
Source: 1890s, Mrs. Warren's Profession (1893)
“A handful of soldiers is always better than a mouthful of arguments.”
E 19
Aphorisms (1765-1799), Notebook E (1775 - 1776)
Time Magazine, Who Needs Breasts, Anyway? http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1001832-1,00.html, Feb. 18, 2002. Retrieved February 1, 2007.
“the poisonous world flows into my mouth like water into that of a drowning man”
Source: Diaries of Franz Kafka
“Better be poisoned in one's own blood then to be poisoned in one's principle.”
As quoted by Governor Barnett's Declaration to the Profile of Mississippi Broadcast via TV and Radio. Sep. 13, 1962 http://microsites.jfklibrary.org/olemiss/controversy/doc2.html without citation and in An unknown legend of India: A bharat ratna By Gaurav Pundeer https://books.google.com/books?isbn=3736889569
Famous speeches
“The heart of a fool is in his mouth, but the mouth of a wise man is in his heart.”
“It is better to keep your mouth shut and appear stupid than to open it and remove all doubt.”
Cited as an example of "What Mark Twain Didn't Say" in Mark Twain by Geoffrey C. Ward, et al.
Misattributed
Variant: It is better to keep your mouth closed and let people think you are a fool than to open it and remove all doubt.
“903. Better have an old Man to humour, than a young Rake to break your Heart.”
Introductio ad prudentiam: Part II (1727), Gnomologia (1732)
