This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
The language spoken by men in cities does not seem to belong to them any longer. It is a mere part of the general noise, as if the words were no longer formed by human lips but were only a scream and a shriek coming from the mechanism of the city. It is said today that people need only go into the country to reach the "quietness of nature" and silence. But they do not meet the silence there; on the contrary, they carry the noise of the great towns and the noise of their own souls out into the country with them. That is the danger of the "Back to the Land" movement: the noise that is at any rate concentrated in the big towns, locked up as in a prison, is let loose on the countryside. To decentralize the big towns is to decentralize the noise, to distribute it all over the countryside.
Danger | Language | Men | Need | Noise | People | Silence | Words | Danger |
Verbal noise is neither silence nor sound. It permeates silence and sound alike and it causes man to forget both silence and the world. / There has ceased to be any difference between speech and silence, since one single noise of words permeates both the speaker and the non-speaker. The silent listener has simply become a non-speaker. / Verbal noise is a pseudo-language and a pseudo-silence. That is to say, something is spoken and yet it is not real language at all. Something disappears in the noise and yet it is not real silence. When the noise suddenly stops, it is not followed by silence, but merely by a pause in which the noise accumulates in order to expand with even greater force when it is released. / It is as though the noise were afraid that it might disappear, as if it were constantly on the move, because it must always be convincing itself that it really exists. It does not believe in its own existence. / The real word, on the contrary, has no such fear, even when it is not being expressed in sound: its existence is in fact even more palpable in the silence.
Existence | Force | Language | Man | Noise | Order | Silence | Sound | Speech | Words | Afraid |
Meister Eckhart, formally Meister von Hochheim
In silence man can most readily preserve his integrity.
Michelangelo Antonioni, Cavaliere di Gran Croce
What I reject is this refusal to let silence have its place, this need to fill supposed voids.
Miguel de Unamuno, fully Miguel de Unamuno y Jogo
Sometimes, to remain silent is to lie, since silence can be interpreted as assent.
Silence |
It is better to sit alone than in company with the bad, and it is better still to sit with the good than alone. It is better to speak to a seeker of knowledge than to remain silent, but silence is better than idle words.
Mother Teresa, born Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu NULL
Before you speak, it is necessary for you to listen, for God speaks in the silence of the heart.
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, baptismal name Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart
The music is not in the notes, but in the silence between.
Much silence and a good disposition, there are no two things better than these.
Morrie Schwartz, fully Morris "Morrie" S. Schwartz
What is it about silence that makes people uneasy?
Mother Teresa, born Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu NULL
We need to find God, and he cannot be found in noise and restlessness. God is the friend of silence. See how nature - trees, flowers, grass- grows in silence; see the stars, the moon and the sun, how they move in silence... We need silence to be able to touch souls.
Bawa Mahaiyadden, fully Muhammad Raheem Bawa Muhaiyaddeen
My beloved children, who are the pupils of my eye—Truth is silent. If Truth has dawned within you, then there will be no further speech. It is silence, and silence is the greatest Truth, the best question. If there is no Truth, then there will be a lot of talk and questions. One is good and the other is bad. If there is good within you, there will be no further noise within. But if you are full of bad, there will be so much of talk, speeches and questions. Therefore, seek the good. God does not make a noise. If you need anything, then you will have only to knock, and if you are tuned to that point, with the sound of that knock you will get an answer immediately. No noise, you don't have to make a sound. This is the Truth.
God | Good | Need | Noise | Silence | Sound | Truth | Will | God |
N. Scott Momaday, fully Navarre Scott Momaday
There was only the dark infinity in which nothing was. And something happened. At the distance of a star something happened, and everything began. The Word did not come into being, but it was. It did not break upon the silence, but it was older than the silence and the silence was made of it.
N. Scott Momaday, fully Navarre Scott Momaday
I behold there the far, faint motion of leaves. The leaves shine, and they will shiver down to death. Something like a leaf lies here within me; it wavers almost not at all, and there is no light to see it by - that it withers upon a black field. If it could ascend the thousand years into my mouth, I would make a word of it at last, and I would speak it into the silence of the sun.
A mother's silence is the worst form of punishment for it is left to one's imagination to conjure up what is in her mind.
Imagination | Punishment | Silence |
Osho, born Chandra Mohan Jain, also known as Acharya Rajneesh and Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh NULL
The art of life begins with meditation. And by meditation I mean silence of the mind, silence of the heart, reaching to the very center of your being and finding the treasure that is your reality. Once you have known it, you can radiate love, you can radiate life, you can radiate creativity. Your words will become poetic, your gestures will have grace; even your silence will have a song to it. Even if you are sitting unmoving, you will be in a dance. Each breath coming in, going out, will be a joy, each heartbeat so precious because it is the heart beat of the universe itself — you are part of it.
Art | Heart | Life | Life | Meditation | Silence | Universe | Will | Words | Art |
Osho, born Chandra Mohan Jain, also known as Acharya Rajneesh and Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh NULL
God is not a thing, it is an attitude, an attitude of celebration and festivity. Drop sadness. He is so close by; dance! Drop long faces, it is sacrilege — because He is so close by. Forget your childish miseries and worries; He is so close by. Don’t go on brooding about immaterial things; He is so close by. Allow Him to hold your hand. He has been waiting for you for long. As your silence grows; your friendliness, your love grows; your life becomes a moment-to-moment dance, a joy, a celebration.
Ouida, pseudonym of Maria Louise Ramé, preferred to be called Marie Louise de la Ramée NULL
There are many moments in friendship, as in love, when silence is beyond words. The faults of our friend may be clear to us, but it is well to seem to shut our eyes to them. Friendship is usually treated by the majority of mankind as a tough and everlasting thing which will survive all manner of bad treatment. But this is an exceedingly great and foolish error; it may die in an hour of a single unwise word; its conditions of existence are that it should be dealt with delicately and tenderly, being as it is a sensitive plant and not a roadside thistle. We must not expect our friend to be above humanity.
Existence | Friend | Majority | Mankind | Silence | Will | Friendship |