When “Small-Talk” is Timely.
One of the first requisites of conversation is to have something worth saying. Lowell once said, “Blessed are they who have nothing to say, and cannot be persuaded to say it;” and another remarked, “There are few wild beasts to be dreaded more than a communicative man with nothing to communicate.” Clearly, this might be aimed at the small-talk habits of some.
Carlyle, in his rugged, vigorous style, expresses himself quite as strongly to the same point: “Thou who wearest that cunning, heaven-made organ, a tongue, think well of this: Speak not, I passionately entreat thee, till thy thought have silently matured itself, till thou have other than mad and mad-making noises to emit; hold thy tongue till some meaning lie behind it to set it wagging. Consider the significance of Silence; it is boundless,—never by meditating to be exhausted; unspeakably profitable to thee! Cease that chaotic hub-bub wherein thy own soul runs to waste, to confused suicidal dislocation and stupor; out of silence comes strength.”
The ground-work of conversation is knowledge of the subject under consideration, and without this words are but useless sounds. Yet there are conditions in which a vigorous flow of “small-talk,” we talk with no particular object or value. Live to enliven and keep in good humor, is most desirable.