Discretion Quotes

“Why must you speak your thoughts? Silence, if fair words stick in your throat, would serve all our ends better.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Children of Húrin

“But nothing will persuade me that the mere fact of being in a place is enough in itself to justify the effort of getting out of bed to become a tourist, or even a traveller. I don't have the slightest wish to be intrepid. I don't want to prove myself to myself or anyone else. I don't care if no one thinks me brave or hardy. I have no concern at all that I did not have whatever it is I should have had to take a dive out of a plane or off a building. None of that matters to me in the least.”
― Jenny Diski, On Trying to Keep Still

“I will never demean myself to speak about my courage," said Julien, coldly, "it would be mean to do so. Let the world judge by the facts.”
― Stendhal, The Red and the Black

“Why can she not influence him more, when she is privileged to draw
so near to him?” I asked myself. “Surely she cannot truly like him, or not
like him with true affection! If she did, she need not coin her smiles so
lavishly, flash her glances so unremittingly, manufacture airs so elaborate,
graces so multitudinous.”
― Charlotte Bronte

“Believe me, you have to have a certain confidence in your powers of descretion to let a dentist loose with a drill in your mouth less than an hour after you've...um...entertained his wife.”
― Jojo Moyes, The Last Letter from Your Lover