A Quote by Thomas Hobbes

True and False are attributes of speech, not of things. And where speech is not, there is neither Truth nor Falsehood.

Thomas Hobbes

Quote Topics

Attributes False Falsehood Neither Nor Speech Things True True And False Truth

Quote Author

Thomas Hobbes
English - Philosopher
April 5, 1588 - December 4, 1679

True and false are attributes of speech not of things. And where speech is not, there is neither truth nor falsehood. Error theremay be, as when we expect that which shall not be; or suspect what has not been: but in neither case can a man be charged with untruth.

Thomas Hobbes

The remedy for speech that is false is speech that is true. This is the ordinary course in a free society. The response to the unreasoned is the rational; to the uninformed, the enlightened; to the straight-out lie, the simple truth.

Anthony Kennedy

Speak only the speech that neither torments self nor does harm to others. That speech is truly well spoken.

Gautama Buddha

Language is neither reactionary nor progressive; it is quite simply fascist; for fascism does not prevent speech, it compels speech.

Roland Barthes

It's always easy to get people to condemn threats to free speech when the speech being threatened is speech that they like. It's much more difficult to induce support for free speech rights when the speech being punished is speech they find repellent.

Glenn Greenwald

Without free speech no search for Truth is possible; without free speech no discovery of Truth is useful; without free speech progress is checked, and the nations no longer march forward towards the nobler life which the future holds for man. Better a thousandfold abuse of free speech than denial of free speech. The abuse dies in a day; but the denial stays the life of the people and entombs the hope of the race.

Charles Bradlaugh

For I have neither wit, nor words, nor worth, Action, nor utterance, nor the power of speech, To stir men's blood: I only speak right on; I tell you that which you yourselves do know.

William Shakespeare

Don't lies eventually lead to the truth? And don't all my stories, true or false, tend toward the same conclusion? Don't they all have the same meaning? So what does it matter whether they are true or false if, in both cases, they are significant of what I have been and what I am? Sometimes it is easier to see clearly into the liar than into the man who tells the truth. Truth, like light, blinds. Falsehood, on the contrary, is a beautiful twilight that enhances every object.

Albert Camus

If a university official's letter accusing a speaker of having a proclivity to commit speech crimes before she's given the speech - which then leads to Facebook postings demanding that Ann Coulter be hurt, a massive riot and a police-ordered cancellation of the speech - is not hate speech, then there is no such thing as hate speech.

Ann Coulter

Refraining from false speech: speech from the heart. Undertake for one week not to gossip (positively or negatively) or speak about anyone you know who is not present with you (any third party).

Jack Kornfield

Giving a true speech, a true, passionate speech, is old-school football.

Richard Sherman

There are questions so indiscreet, that they deserve neither truth nor falsehood in reply.

Sophie Swetchine

Just at the age 'twixt boy and youth, When thought is speech, and speech is truth.

Walter Scott

I prefer a little free speech to no free speech at all; but how many have free speech or the chance or the mind for it; and is not free speech here as elsewhere clamped down on in ratio of its freedom and danger?