What is this the sound and rumor? What is this that all men hear, Like the wind in hollow valleys read more

What is this the sound and rumor? What is this that all men hear, Like the wind in hollow valleys when the storm is drawing near, Like the rolling of the ocean in the eventide of fear? 'Tis the people marching on

There is nothing which cannot be perverted by being told badly.

There is nothing which cannot be perverted by being told badly.

What some invent the rest enlarge.

What some invent the rest enlarge.

Enemies carry a report in form different from the original.
[Lat., Nam inimici famam non ita ut nata est read more

Enemies carry a report in form different from the original.
[Lat., Nam inimici famam non ita ut nata est ferunt.]

Trying to squash a rumor is like trying to unring a bell.

Trying to squash a rumor is like trying to unring a bell.

Nature abhors a vacuum but why do most people hasten to fill in the blanks with garbage?

Nature abhors a vacuum but why do most people hasten to fill in the blanks with garbage?

It (rumour) has a hundred tongues, a hundred mouths, a voice of
iron.
[Lat., Linguae centum sunt, oraque read more

It (rumour) has a hundred tongues, a hundred mouths, a voice of
iron.
[Lat., Linguae centum sunt, oraque centum
Ferrea vox.]

Rumor is not always wrong

Rumor is not always wrong

Straightway throughout the Libyan cities flies rumor;--the report
of evil things than which nothing is swifter; it flourishes by read more

Straightway throughout the Libyan cities flies rumor;--the report
of evil things than which nothing is swifter; it flourishes by
its very activity and gains new strength by its movements; small
at first through fear, it soon raises itself aloft and sweeps
onward along the earth. Yet its head reaches the clouds. . . . A
huge and horrid monster covered with many feathers: and for
every plume a sharp eye, for every pinion a biting tongue.
Everywhere its voices sound, to everything its ears are open.
[Lat., Extemplo Libyae magnas it Fama per urbes:
Fama malum quo non velocius ullum;
Mobilitate viget, viresque acquirit eundo;
Parva metu primo; mox sese attollit in auras,
Ingrediturque solo, et caput inter nubilia condit.
. . . .
Monstrum, horrendum ingens; cui quot sunt corpore plumae
Tot vigiles oculi subter, mirabile dictu,
Tot linquae, totidem ora sonant, tot subrigit aures.]