Robert South Quotes

Eloquence is a painting of the thoughts.

My fans have always loved my metaphors.

Metaphors are fine if they aid understanding, but sometimes they get in the way.

Rhetoric is nothing but reason well dressed and argument put in order.

Rhetoric may be defined as the faculty of observing in any given case the available means of persuasion. This is not a function of any other art.

Neither irony or sarcasm is argument.

A witty saying proves nothing.

Eloquence is the poetry of prose.

The art of the parenthesis is one of the greatest secrets of eloquence in Society.

In argument similes are like songs in love; they describe much, but prove nothing.

I haven't much opinion of words. They're apt to set fire to a dry tongue, that's what I say.

The rhetoric is the key to the character. It's the verbal music of the piece.

The point—the power to hurt—of all figures [of speech] consist in the truthfulness of their application.

We love eloquence for its own sake, and not for any truth which it may utter, or any heroism it may inspire

I must say I'm not very fond of oratory that's so full of energy it hasn't any room for facts.

Neither irony nor sarcasm is argument.

Analogies prove nothing, that is quite true, but they can make one feel more at home.

… sledgehammer eloquence...

Political speeches are a particularly low form of rhetoric.

Analogies, in particular, can illuminate, but they can also obscure and confuse. They need to be handled carefully, like rhetorical high explosives.

We use metaphors to express our own truths.

I'm not good at throwing around rhetoric.

If you look at the copies of Churchill's speeches that have survived, they are heavily marked up. He was scrupulous about the impact of each word. He preferred short words and the repetition of short words. He knew everything about the techniques of rhetoric.

Let argument bear no unmusical sound.

Eloquence is the power to translate a truth into language perfectly intelligible to the person to whom you speak.