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About this quote

What does it mean?
True worth is quiet, while boastfulness often masks smallness.
In plain terms
Shy people often have substance; loud people do not.
What can you take from it?
Humility often signals real value.

Where it applies

  • social interactions
  • workplace dynamics
  • friendship

Putting it to work

  • hiring
  • team building
  • self assessment

Questions to consider

  • What traits signal real worth?
  • How do you judge character?

Another view

Quiet people can also lack confidence rather than value.

More from William Cullen Bryant

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  2. No trumpet-blast profound the hour in which the Prince of Peace was born; No bloody streamlet stained Earth's silver rivers on the sacred morn.

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  3. Eloquence is the poetry of prose.

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