Word Usage Quotes

“Words should not be used merely because they are 'old' or obsolete. The words chosen, however remote they may be from colloquial speech or ephemeral suggestions, must be words that remain in literary use, especially in the use of verse, among educated people. (To such Beowulf was addressed, into whatever hands it may since have fallen.) They must need no gloss. The fact that a word was still used by Chaucer, or by Shakespeare, or even later, gives it no claim, if it has in our time perished from literary use.”
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Monsters and the Critics and Other Essays

“You can tell a paragraph is slipping out of control when there's a runaway use of the word 'hence.”
― Alain de Botton

“Mature'? Good grief! I'm not a cheese. Or a herbaceous border.”
― Clare Pooley, How to Age Disgracefully

“The word 'church' in the Bible is a mistranslation of the Greek word 'ekklesia.' The accurate translation is 'assembly' or 'congregation.' Literally 'ekklesia' means the 'called out ones.' The common usage of this word during the apostles' time was for a called out assembly of people, such as a town square meeting, where citizens were 'called out' to attend.”
― Henry Hon, ONE: Unfolding God's Eternal Purpose from House to House

“Mature? Good grief! I'm not a cheese. Or a herbaceous border.”
― Clare Pooley, How to Age Disgracefully