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. . .the greatest thing by far is to be a
master of metaphor. It is the one thing that cannot be learned from others;
and it is also a sign of genius, since a good metaphor implies an intuitive
perception of the similarity in dissimilars.
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-Aristotle
Poetics
22, 1459a 5-7
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The ill and unfit choice of words wonderfully
obstructs the understanding.
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-Francis Bacon
New Organon
I, Aphorism 42
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Careful and correct use of language is a
powerful aid to straight thinking, for putting into words precisely what we
mean necessitates getting our own minds quite clear on what we mean.
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-William Ian Beardmore Beveridge
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*There are any number of
different languages in the world; nowhere is without language.
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-I Corinthians, 14:10
Oxford Study Bible, 1992
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~BELLADONNA, n. In Italian
a beautiful lady; in English a deadly poison. A striking example of the
essential identity of the two tongues.
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-Ambrose Bierce
The Devil's Dictionary, 1906
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Never make fun of people who speak broken
English. It means they know another language.
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-H. Jackson Brown, Jr.
Life's Little Instruction Book
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The word 'good' has many meanings. For
example, if a man were to shoot his grandmother at a range of five hundred
yards, I should call him a good shot, but not necessarily a good man.
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-G.K. Chesterton
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*Bonjour! Or, for all of
you who don't speak French, 'Hello, you inferior American scum!'
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-Dustin Fisher
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Usage won out -- the supreme authority in all
things, and especially in language.
(Consuetudo vicit: quae cum omnium domina rerum, tum maxime verborum est.)
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-Aulus Gellius
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Because everyone uses language to talk,
everyone thinks he can talk about language.
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-Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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He who knows no foreign language knows nothing
of his own.
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-Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
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This sentence has cabbage six words.
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-Douglas Hofstadter
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A word is not a crystal, transparent and
unchanged; it is the skin of a living thought, and may vary greatly in color
and content according to the circumstances and the time in which it is used.
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-Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.
Opinion, Towne v. Eisner, January 7, 1918
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German, to me, looks like what worms do under
rocks.
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-P.J. O'Rourke
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The metaphor is perhaps one of man's most
fruitful potentialities. Its efficacy verges on magic, and it seems a tool
for creation which God forgot inside one of His creatures when He made him.
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-Jose Ortega y Gasset
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But if thought corrupts language, language
can also corrupt thought.
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-George Orwell
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If lawyers are disbarred and clergymen
defrocked, doesn't it follow that electricians can be delighted; musicians
denoted; cowboys deranged; models deposed; tree surgeons debarked and dry
cleaners depressed?
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-Virginia Ostman
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Because language is misleading, as well as
because it is diffuse and inexact when applied to logic (for which it was
never intended), logical symbolism is absolutely necessary to any exact or
thorough treatment of our subject.
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-Bertrand Russell
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*"[W]hy do
people say 'make the same mistake again'? What does 'again' add to the
sentence? And am I right that 'burn up' and 'burn down' mean the same
thing? 'Slow up' and 'slow down' mean the same thing? So if 'screw up' is
acceptable, why not 'screw down'?". . . ."And take this phrase 'head over
heels in love.' " he continued. "This is a common expression, yes? But it's
exactly backward. Or, rather, upside down. You are ordinarily head
over heels. When you are in love you should be heels over head. Am
I right?"
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-Vasily Gregorovich Lunarcharsky (Vaygay), a
character in Carl Sagan's
Contact, 1985
Part I : The Message, Chapter 9, "The Numinous"
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If the French were really intelligent, they'd
speak English.
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-Wilfred Sheed
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I am the Roman king, and I am above grammar.
(Ego sum rex Romanus, et supra grammaticam.)
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-Sigismund, Holy Roman Emperor
At the Council of Constance, 1414
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. . of all the creations of man language is
the most astonishing.
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-Lytton Strachey
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American is a very difficult language
mixed with English.
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-Unknown
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You'll go to Heck if you don't believe in Gosh.
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-Unknown
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Humor is the first of gifts to perish in a
foreign tongue.
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-Virginia Woolfe
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A great many people think that polysyllables
are a sign of intelligence.
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-Barbara Walters
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If there were a verb meaning 'to believe
falsely,' it would not have any significant first person, present
indicative.
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-Ludwig Wittgenstein
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How come the alphabet is in that order? Is
it cause of that song
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-Steven Wright
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