All Heaven and Earth are still, though not in sleep,
But breathless, as we grow when feeling most.
There was silence deep as death;
And the boldest held his breath,
For a time.
Campbell—Battle of the Baltic.
Speech is great; but silence is greater.
Carlyle—Essays. Characteristics of Shakespeare. </poem>
Under all speech that is good for anything
there lies a silence that is better. Silence is deep
as Eternity; speech is shallow as Time.
Carlyle—Essays. Memoir of the Life of Scott.
Silence is more eloquent than words.
Carlyle—Heroes and Hero Worship. Lecture
II.
Silence is the element in which great things
fashion themselves together; that at length they
may emerge, full-formed and majestic, into the
daylight of Life, which they are thenceforth to
rule.
Carlyle—Sartor Resartus. Bk. ELI. Ch. III.
There are haunters of the silence, ghosts that
hold the heart and brain.
Madison Cawein—Haunters of the Silence.
Cum tacent clamant.
When they hold their tongues they cry out.
Cicero—In Catilinam. 1. 8.
And they three passed over the white sands,
between the rocks, silent as the shadows.
Coleridge—The Wanderings of Cain.
Striving to tell his woes, words would not come;
For light cares speak, when mighty griefs are
dumb.
Samuel Daniel—Complaint of Rosamond.
St. 114.
II ne voit que la nuit, n'entend que le silence.
He sees only night, and hears only silence.
Det.tt.t.k—Imagination. IV.
Silence is the mother of Truth.
Benj. Disraeli- -Tancred. Bk. IV. Ch. IV.
A horrid stillness first invades the ear,
And in that silence we the tempest fear.
Dryden—Astraa Redux. L. 7.
Stillborn silence! thou that art
Flood-gate of the deeper heart!
Richard Fijsckno—Silence.
Take heed of still waters, they quick pass away.
| author = Herbert
| work = Jacuta Prudentitm.
| seealso = (See also Lyly)
| topic = Silence
| page = 708
}}
{{Hoyt quote
| num =
| text = <poem>Small griefs find tongues: full casques are ever
found
To give, if any, yet but little sound.
Deep waters noyselesse are; and this we know,
That chiding streams betray small depth below.
| author = Herrick
| work = Hesperides. To His Mistresse Objecting to Him Neither Toying or Talking.
| seealso = (See also Jewell)
| topic = Silence
| page = 708
}}
{{Hoyt quote
| num =
| text = <poem>And silence, like a poultice, comes
To heal the blows of sound.
Holmes—The Music Grinder.
There is a silence where hath been no sound,
There is a silence where no sound may be,
In the cold grave—under the deep, deep sea,
Or in wide desert where no life is found,
Which hath been mute, and still must sleep profound.
Hood—Sonnets. Silence.
Est et fideli tuta silentio merees.
There is likewise a reward for faithful silence.
Horace—Carmina. III. 2. 25.
Not much talk—a great, sweet silence.
Henry James, Jr.—A Bundle of Letters. Letter IV.
Vessels never give so great a sound as when
they are empty.
Bishop John Jewell—Defense of the Apology
for the Church of England.
Rarus sermo illis et magna libido tacendi.
Their conversation was brief, and their desire was to be silent.
Juvenal—Satires. II. 14.
Thou foster-child of Silence and slow Time.
Keats—Ode on a Grecian Urn.
Les gens sans bruit sont dangereux;
II n'en est pas ainsi des autres.
Silent people are dangerous; others are not so.
La Fontaine—Fables. VLH. 23.
Some sipping punch, some sipping tea,
But as you by their faces see
All silent and all damned.
Lamb—Lines made up from a stanza in Wordsworth's Peter Bell.
All was silent as before—
All silent save the dripping rain.
| author = Longfellow
| work = A Rainy Day.
What shall I say to you? What can I say
Better than silence is?
| author = Longfellow
| work = Morituri Salutamus. L. 128.
Three Silences there are : the first of speech,
The second of desire, the third of thought.
| author = Longfellow
| work = The Three Silences of Molinos.
{{Hoyt quote
| num = | text = <poem>Where the streame runneth smoothest, the water
is deepest.
| author = Lyly
| work = Euphues and His England. P. 287.
| seealso = (See also Herbert, Rutxts, Henry IV, Southey)
