# Quote — Hilary Mantel, Wolf Hall

> He says, this silence of More’s, it was never really silence, was it? It was loud with his treason; it was quibbling as far as quibbles would serve him, it was demurs and cavils, suave ambiguities. It was fear of plain words, or the assertion that plain words pervert themselves; More’s dictionary, against our dictionary. You can have a silence full of words. A lute retains, in its bowl, the notes it has played. The viol, in its strings, holds a concord. A shriveled petal can hold its scent, a prayer can rattle with curses; an empty house, when the owners have gone out, can still be loud with ghosts.

- Author: [Hilary Mantel](https://www.leafyquotes.com/hilary-mantel.md)
- Book: [Wolf Hall](https://www.leafyquotes.com/hilary-mantel/wolf-hall.md)
- Page: 597
- Source: [Wikiquote](https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Hilary_Mantel#Wolf_Hall_(2009)) ([CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/))
- Quote page: https://www.leafyquotes.com/hilary-mantel/wolf-hall/he-says-this

## More from this book

> One tradesman the same as the next? Not in the real world. Any man with a steady hand and a cleaver can call himself a butcher: but without the smith, where does he get that cleaver? Without the man who works in metal, where are your hammers, your scythes, your sickles, scissors and planes? Your arms and armor, your arrowheads, your pikes and your guns? Where are your ships at sea and their anchors? Where are your grappling hooks, your nails, latches, hinges, pokers and tongs? Where are your spits, kettles, trivets, your harness rings, buckles and bits? Where are your knives?

p. 306 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/hilary-mantel/wolf-hall/one-tradesman-the.md)

> What was England, before Wolsey? A little offshore island, poor and cold.

p. 240 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/hilary-mantel/wolf-hall/what-was-england.md)

> The cardinal used to say, the English will forgive a king anything, until he tries to tax them.

p. 332 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/hilary-mantel/wolf-hall/the-cardinal-used.md)