The words or the language, as they are written or spoken do not seem to play any role in my mechanism of thought.
languagequotes
To express oneself badly is not only faulty as far as the language goes, but does some harm to the soul.
The misuse of language induces evil in the soul.
The language and the “people” of the unconscious are symbols, and the means of communications dreams. Thus an examination of Man and his Symbols is in effect an examination of man’s relation to his own unconscious. And since in Jung’s view the unconscious is the great guide, friend, and adviser of the conscious, this book is related in the most direct terms to the study of human beings and their spiritual problems.
Jung’s search for the soul, then, stands at one with the search for appropriately dialogical and differentiated language.
I was made to learn Latin and Greek, but I resented it, being of opinion that it was silly to learn a language that was no longer spoken. I believe that all the little good I got from years of classical studies I could have got in adult life in a month.
Therefore it has always been said that music is the language of feeling and of passion, as words are the language of reason.
The great enemy of clear language is insincerity. When there is a gap between one’s real and one’s declared aims, one turns as it were instinctively to long words and exhausted idioms, like a cuttlefish squirting out ink.
It is often asserted that discussion is only possible between people who have a common language and accept common basic assumptions. I think that this is a mistake. All that is needed is a readiness to learn from one’s partner in the discussion, which includes a genuine wish to understand what he intends to say. If this readiness is there, the discussion will be the more fruitful the more the partner’s backgrounds differ.
But if thought corrupts language, language can also corrupt thought.
