Tongue Quotes, Quotations, and Sayings

22 Tongue Quotes
[1-22] 
“The stroke of the tongue breaketh the bones. Many have fallen by the edge of the sword; but not so many as have fallen by the tongue.”
Bible Quotes
Source: Ecclesiasticus (ch. XXVIII, v. 17)
“For every kind of beasts, and of birds, and of serpents, and of things in the sea, is tamed, and hath been tamed of mankind: But the tongue can no man tame; it is an unruly evil, full of deadly poison.”
Bible Quotes
Source: James (ch. III, v. 7-8)
“Though wickedness be sweet in his mouth, though he hide it under his tongue; Though he spare it, and forsake it not; but keep it still within his mouth: Yet his meat in his bowels is turned, it is the gall of asps within him.”
Bible Quotes
Source: Job (ch. XX, v. 12-14)
“She openeth her mouth with wisdom; and in her tongue is the law of kindness.”
Bible Quotes
Source: Proverbs (ch. XXXI, v. 26)
“My heart is inditing a good matter: I speak of the things which I have made touching the king: my tongue is the pen of a ready writer.”
Bible Quotes
Source: Psalms (ch. XLV, v. 1)
“Thou shalt hide them in the secret of thy presence from the pride of man: thou shalt keep them secretly in a pavilion from the strife of tongues.”
Bible Quotes
Source: Psalms (ch. XXXI, v. 20)
“Keep thy tongue from evil, and thy lips from speaking guile.”
Bible Quotes
Source: Psalms (ch. XXXIV, v. 13)
“The first vertue, sone, if thou wilt lerne, Is to restreyne and kepen wel thy tonge.”
Geoffrey Chaucer Quotes
Source: The Canterbury Tales (l. 18,213), The Manciple's Tale
“He rolls it under his tongue as a sweet morsel.”
Matthew (Mathew) Henry Quotes
Source: Commentaries (Psalm XXXI)
“Better the feet slip then the tongue. [Better the feet slip than the tongue.]”
George Herbert Quotes
Source: Jacula Prudentum
“The windy satisfaction of the tongue.”
Homer ("Smyrns of Chios") Quotes
Source: The Odyssey (bk. IV, l. 1,092), (Pope's translation)
“Since word is thrall, and thought is free, Keep well thy tongue, I counsel thee.”
James I of Scotland Quotes
Source: Ballad of good Counsel, quoted by Scott in "Fair Maid of Perth", ch. XXV
“The tongue is the vile slave's vilest part. [Lat., Lingua mali pars pessima servi.]”
Juvenal (Decimus Junius Juvenal) Quotes
Source: Satires (IX, 120)
“I should think your tongue has broken its chain.”
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow Quotes
Source: Christus--The Golden Legend (pt. IV)
“Marry, you are the wiser man; for many a man's tongue shakes out his master's undoing.”
William Shakespeare Quotes
Source: All's Well That Ends Well (Lavatch at II, iv)
“Tongues I'll hang on every tree That shall civil sayings show. . . .”
William Shakespeare Quotes
Source: As You Like It (Celia at III, ii)
“I cannot, nor I will not hold me still; My tongue, though not my heart, shall have his will.”
William Shakespeare Quotes
Source: The Comedy of Errors (Adriana at IV, ii)
“You play the spaniel, And think with wagging of your tongue to win me.”
William Shakespeare Quotes
Source: The Life of King Henry the Eighth (King Henry at V, iii)
“So on the tip of his subduing tongue All kinds of arguments and question deep, All replication prompt and reason strong, For his advantage still did wake and sleep. To make the weeper laugh, the laugher weep, He had the dialect and different skill, Catching all passions in his craft of will; . . .”
William Shakespeare Quotes
Source: A Lover's Complaint (l. 120)
“The language I have learnt these forty years, My native English, now I must forgo; And now my tongue's use is to me no more Than an unstringed viol or a harp, Or like a cunning instrument cased up Or, being open, put into his hands That knows no touch to tune the harmony.”
William Shakespeare Quotes
Source: The Tragedy of King Richard the Second (Mowbray at I, iii)
“All swol'n with chafing, down Adonis sits, Banning his boist'rous and unruly beast; And now the happy season once more fits That lovesick Love by pleading may be blest; For lovers say the heart hath treble wrong When it is barred the aidance of the tongue.”
William Shakespeare Quotes
Source: Venus and Adonis (l. 325)
“Is there a tongue like Delia's o'er her cup, That runs for ages without winding up?”
Edward Young Quotes
Source: Love of Fame (satire I, l. 281)