Music expresses that which cannot be said and on which it is impossible to be silent.

Ce qu’on ne peut dire et ce qu’on ne peut taire, la musique l’exprime.

Victor Hugo

More information about this quote

Topic

Limits of language

Author

Victor Hugo

Source

William Shakespeare

Language

French

Time

1864 1860s 19th century

Occupation

Novelist Poet Writer

From

France Europe

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Hugo, Victor. William Shakespeare. Paris: Lacroix & Verboeckhoven & Cie, 1864, pt. 1, bk. 2, ch. 4.

Illustrated Quote

A quote by Victor Hugo about limits of language: “Music expresses that which cannot be said and on which it is impossible…”
Download
A quote by Victor Hugo about limits of language: “Music expresses that which cannot be said and on which it is impossible…”
Download
A quote by Victor Hugo about limits of language: “Music expresses that which cannot be said and on which it is impossible…”
Download

Related Quotes

Below are one or more quotes that share at least one tag with the quote at the top of the page

Another quote from the 1860s

Listen! you hear the grating roar
Of pebbles which the waves suck back, and fling,
At their return, up the high strand,
Begin, and cease, and then again begin,
With tremulous cadence slow, and bring
The eternal note of sadness in.
Sophocles long ago
Heard it on the Aegean.

Matthew Arnold

Dover Beach

Read Dover Beach at Poetry Foundation
More information about this quote
Topic
The beach Waves Melancholy

Author

Matthew Arnold
Source
Dover Beach
Medium
Poem
Language
English
Time
1867 1860s 19th century
Authentication Score 3
Original Citation

Arnold, Matthew. "Dover Beach." New Poems. London: Macmillan and Co., 1867, I. 9.

Current Citation

Arnold, Matthew. "Dover Beach." Dover Beach and Other Poems. Dover Publications, 2012, I. 9.

Another quote from 1864

Man is everywhere a disturbing agent. Wherever he plants his foot, the harmonies of nature are turned to discords.

George Perkins Marsh

Man and Nature

More information about this quote
Topic
Man and nature Environmental destruction

Author

George Perkins Marsh
Source
Man and Nature
Language
English
Time
1864 1860s 19th century
Authentication Score 3
Original Citation

Marsh, George Perkins. Man and Nature: Or, Physical Geography as Modified by Human Action. New York: Charles Scribner, 1864, ch. 1.

Current Citation

Marsh, George Perkins. Man and Nature: Or, Physical Geography as Modified by Human Action. Dover Publications, 2021, ch. 1.

Another quote originally in French

They have all a lively faith in the perfectibility of man, they judge that the diffusion of knowledge must necessarily be advantageous, and the consequences of ignorance fatal; they all consider society as a body in a state of improvement, humanity as a changing scene, in which nothing is, or ought to be, permanent; and they admit that what appears to them today to be good, may be superseded by something better tomorrow.

Alexis de Tocqueville

Democracy in America

Buy Democracy in America at Amazon Buy Democracy in America at Amazon
Read Democracy in America, vol. 1 at Project Gutenberg
More information about this quote
Topic
American character Americans

Author

Alexis de Tocqueville
Source
Democracy in America
Genre
Political literature
Language
French
Time
1835 1830s 19th century
Authentication Score 2
Original Citation

Tocqueville, Alexis De. De La Democratie en Amerique [Democracy in America]. Vol. 1, London: Saunders and Otley, 1835, ch. 18, pt. 6.

Current Citation

Tocqueville, Alexis De. Democracy in America: The Complete and Unabridged Volumes I and II, translated by Henry Reeve. Bantam Classics, 2000, vol. 1, ch. 18, pt. 6.