Pressed into service means pressed out of shape.

I guess every single word I’ve ever said is going to be dissected now.

As soon as I hear a sound, it always suggests a mood to me.

I have to be in tune. All the time. I have to be in tune with my husband, where he is, how he’s feeling. I have to be in tune with where my family is.

Words, words, words! They shut one off from the universe. Three quarters of the time one’s never in contact with things, only with the beastly words that stand for them.

Those who cannot understand how to put their thoughts on ice should not enter into the heat of debate.

One great use of words is to hide our thoughts.

Constant kindness can accomplish much. As the sun makes ice melt, kindness causes misunderstanding, mistrust, and hostility to evaporate.

Every device there is in language is there to be used, if you will. Poets have got to enjoy themselves sometimes, and the twistings and convolutions of words, the inventions and contrivances, are all part of the joy that is part of the painful, voluntary work.

We think when God speaks to us, there’s going to be a boom out of Heaven or we’re going to get some chill bumps, but I really believe God’s talking to us all the time. He’s talking to us right in here. I call it our heart, our conscience, but it’s the Holy Spirit talking to us.

I have made this letter longer than usual, only because I have not had the time to make it shorter.

The best interpreter of the law is custom.

It is hardly an exaggeration to say that oral teachers and sign teachers found it difficult to sit down in the same room without quarreling, and there was intolerance upon both sides. To say ‚oral method‘ to a sign teacher was like waving a red flag in the face of a bull, and to say ‚sign language‘ to an oralist aroused the deepest resentment.

An idea, like a ghost, must be spoken to a little before it will explain itself.

Quarrel? Nonsense; we have not quarreled. If one is not to get into a rage sometimes, what is the good of being friends?

Most of the fundamental ideas of science are essentially simple, and may, as a rule, be expressed in a language comprehensible to everyone.

There, in the chords and melodies, is everything I want to say. The words just jolly it along. It’s always been my way of expressing what, for me, is inexpressible by any other means.

The 14th Amendment was recognized right away to be problematic. The concept of person was both too narrow and too broad, and the courts went to work to overcome both of those flaws.

Hear reason, or she’ll make you feel her.

To know the laws is not to memorize their letter but to grasp their full force and meaning.

Reality is only a Rorschach ink-blot, you know.

I can honestly say, after talking about my mom passing away, I got the biggest weight off of my chest. Comedy is my therapy. That’s how I deal with my problems, my personal battles. I talk about it. I give it to my fans. When they laugh at it, it’s a release, for lack of a better word.

Language is an intrinsic part of who we are and what has, for good or evil, happened to us.

I can unload my opinion on anybody at anytime.

Words mean more than what is set down on paper. It takes the human voice to infuse them with deeper meaning.

Listen to many, speak to a few.

It’s a fact that more people watch television and get their information that way than read books. I find new technology and new ways of communication very exciting and would like to do more in this field.

Talking isn’t doing. It is a kind of good deed to say well; and yet words are not deeds.

If your man is a sports enthusiast, you may have to resign yourself to his spouting off in a monotone on a prize fight, football game or pennant race.

The essence of lying is in deception, not in words.

If you do not wish a man to do a thing, you had better get him to talk about it; for the more men talk, the more likely they are to do nothing else.

I ain’t never called nobody no redskin. I’ve never been mad, like, ‚Get out of this restaurant, you redskin.‘

I’m a great believer that any tool that enhances communication has profound effects in terms of how people can learn from each other, and how they can achieve the kind of freedoms that they’re interested in.

I just think you ought to talk straight with your people.

My first phone was two tin cans tied together with string, and it worked pretty good.

Seek first to understand, then to be understood.

I sent one e-mail in my life. I sent it to Jeff Raikes at Microsoft, and it ended up in court in Minneapolis, so I am one for one.

I don’t know about you, but most of my exchanges with cashiers are not that meaningful.

Is it not important to find out how to listen not only to what is being said but to everything – to the noise in the streets, to the chatter of birds, to the noise of the tramcar, to the restless sea, to the voice of your husband, to your wife, to your friends, to the cry of a baby?

I hold a lot of things in. I’m always making sure everybody is okay. I usually don’t rage; I usually don’t curse. So for me, it’s a great thing to be able to scream and say whatever I want.

When your mother asks, ‚Do you want a piece of advice?‘ it is a mere formality. It doesn’t matter if you answer yes or no. You’re going to get it anyway.

I think it’s brought the world a lot closer together, and will continue to do that. There are downsides to everything; there are unintended consequences to everything. The most corrosive piece of technology that I’ve ever seen is called television – but then, again, television, at its best, is magnificent.

Diplomacy is the art of saying ‚Nice doggie‘ until you can find a rock.

‚Good English‘ is whatever educated people talk; so that what is good in one place or time would not be so in another.

You could imagine a language exactly like English except it doesn’t have connectives like ‚and‘ that allow you to make longer expressions. An infant learning truncated English would have no idea about this: They would just pick it up as they would standard English.

Half the world is composed of people who have something to say and can’t, and the other half who have nothing to say and keep on saying it.

You don’t lead by hitting people over the head – that’s assault, not leadership.

Well, the thing that I learned as a diplomat is that human relations ultimately make a huge difference.

Music fills in for words a lot of the time when people don’t know what to say, and I think music can be more eloquent than words.

The best way to resolve any problem in the human world is for all sides to sit down and talk.

All of the books in the world contain no more information than is broadcast as video in a single large American city in a single year. Not all bits have equal value.

There are always three speeches, for every one you actually gave. The one you practiced, the one you gave, and the one you wish you gave.

Just talk to me as a father – not what the Constitution says. What do you feel?

The American public’s a lot more sophisticated than we all give them credit for. And on complicated issues, I’m going to give them straight answers. And if it takes more than three minutes, I’m going to do it.

War is what happens when language fails.

I had to resign myself, many years ago, that I’m not too articulate when it comes to explaining how I feel about things. But my music does it for me, it really does.

I think perhaps the most important problem is that we are trying to understand the fundamental workings of the universe via a language devised for telling one another when the best fruit is.

Humans cannot avoid trying to influence others. Everything we say or do is examined and interpreted by others for clues as to our intentions.

Sarcasm I now see to be, in general, the language of the devil; for which reason I have long since as good as renounced it.

Journalism largely consists of saying ‚Lord Jones is Dead‘ to people who never knew that Lord Jones was alive.

Let blockheads read what blockheads wrote.