It ain't those parts of the Bible that I can't understand that bother me, it is the parts that I do understand.
The magic of words is that they have power to do more than convey meaning; not only do they have the power to make things clear, they make things happen.
I thought it necessary to study history, even to study it deeply, in order to obtain a clear meaning of our immediate time.
Always try to use the language so as to make quite clear what you mean and make sure your sentence couldn't mean anything else.
I believe that the Bible is to be understood and received in the plain and obvious meaning of its passages; for I cannot persuade myself that a book intended for the instruction and conversion of the whole world should cover its true meaning in any such mystery and doubt that none but critics and philosophers can discover it.
In any language it is a struggle to make a sentence say exactly what you mean.
The reason to stand up for punctuation is that without it there is no reliable way of communicating meaning.
The single most important lesson of effective communication is this: Focus on clarity. Concentrate on precisions. Don’t worry about constructing beautiful sentences. Beauty comes from meaning, not language. Accuracy is the most effective style of all.
You say what you have to say. But you have to learn to say it in such a way that the reader can see what you mean.
The dream is a series of images, which are apparently contradictory and nonsensical, but arise in reality from psychologic material which yields a clear meaning.
Aphorisms may equivocate, but they must not wobble.
The goal of Bible translation is be transparent to the original text - to see as clearly as possible what the biblical authors actually wrote.
A precision of composition and figuration is what I'm working toward. I've always felt viewers should have an experience without having to ask what the hell is was about.
When an instrument admits two constructions, the one safe, the other dangerous, the one precise, the other indefinite, I prefer that which is safe and precise.
It's a rather rude gesture, but at least it's clear what you mean.
