Conversation

The word conversation is the verbalization of concepts involving abstractions and concrete objects which make up the world we live in. Also, a conversation is communication by two or more people, or by ones self. It can be very involved or just simple small talk.

Sourced

• But conversation, choose what theme we may,
  And chiefly when religion leads the way,
  Should flow, like waters after summer show'rs,
  Not as if raised by mere mechanic powers.
  • William Cowper, Conversation (1782), line 703.

• Conversation is a game of circles.
  • Ralph Waldo Emerson, Essays (1841), Circles.

• I never, with important air,
  In conversation overbear.
  * * * *
  My tongue within my lips I rein;
  For who talks much must talk in vain.
  • John Gay, Fables (1727), Part I. Introduction, line 53.

• They would talk of nothing but high life and high-lived company, with other fashionable topics, such as pictures, taste, Shakespeare, and the musical glasses.
  • Oliver Goldsmith, The Vicar of Wakefield (1766), Chapter IX.

• Tom Birch is as brisk as a bee in conversation; but no sooner does he take a pen in his hand, than it becomes a torpedo to him, and benumbs all his faculties.
  • Samuel Johnson, reported in James Boswell, Life of Johnson (1743).

• Questioning is not the mode of conversation among gentlemen.
  • Samuel Johnson, reported in James Boswell, Life of Johnson (1776).

• A single conversation across the table with a wise man is better than ten years' study of books.
  • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Hyperion (1839), Chapter VII. Quoted from the Chinese.

• With thee conversing I forget all time:
  All seasons and their change, all please alike.
  • John Milton, Paradise Lost (1667; 1674), Book IV, line 639.

• Form'd by thy converse, happily to steer
  From grave to gay, from lively to severe.
  • Alexander Pope, An Essay on Man (1733-34), Epistle IV, line 379.

• A dearth of words a woman need not fear;
  But 'tis a task indeed to learn to hear:
  In that the skill of conversation lies;
  That shows or makes you both polite and wise.
  • Edward Young, Love of Fame (1725-28), Satire V, line 57.

Hoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations

Quotes reported in Hoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations (1922), p. 137.

• Method is not less requisite in ordinary conversation than in writing, provided a man would talk to make himself understood.
  • Joseph Addison, The Spectator, No. 476.

• With good and gentle-humored hearts
  I choose to chat where'er I come
  Whate'er the subject be that starts.
  But if I get among the glum
  I hold my tongue to tell the truth
  And keep my Breath to cool my broth.
  • John Byrom, Careless Content.

• In conversation avoid the extremes of forwardness and reserve.
  • Cato.

• Conversation is the laboratory and workshop of the student.
  • Ralph Waldo Emerson, Society and Solitude, Clubs.

• With thee conversing I forget the way.
  • John Gay, Trivia, Book II, line 480.

• And when you stick on conversation's burs,
  Don't strew your pathway with those dreadful urs.
  • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr., A Rhymed Lesson, Urania.

• Discourse, the sweeter banquet of the mind.
  • Homer, The Odyssey, Book 15, line 433. Pope's translation.

• His conversation does not show the minute hand; but he strikes the hour very correctly.
  • Samuel Johnson, Johnsoniana, Kearsley, line 604.

• Men of great conversational powers almost universally practise a sort of lively sophistry and exaggeration which deceives for the moment both themselves and their auditors.
  • Thomas Babington Macaulay, 1st Baron Macaulay, Essay, On the Athenian Orators.

• Inject a few raisins of conversation into the tasteless dough of existence.
  • O. Henry, The Complete Life of John Hopkins.

• We took sweet counsel together.
  • Psalms. LV. 14.

• Ita fabulantur ut qui sciant Dominum audire.
  • They converse as those who know that God hears.
  • Tertullian, Apologeticus, p. 36. (Ed. Rigalt).