Daily Inspiration Quote by William Shakespeare

"Give every man thy ear, but few thy voice" is Shakespeare at his most weaponized: a line that sounds like manners and behaves like strategy. Spoken by Polonius in Hamlet, it arrives dressed as fatherly wisdom but carries the anxious DNA of a court where talk is currency and a loose tongue is a hanging offense. The phrasing turns listening into a public virtue and speaking into a scarce resource, rationed like trust.

The intent is practical: move through society with maximum information and minimum exposure. "Give" makes the ear sound generous, almost democratic, while "few" snaps shut like a gate. That imbalance is the subtext. Listening is framed as harmless - even flattering - because it costs you nothing visible. Speaking, by contrast, is treated as self-incrimination. In Elsinore, every opinion is a potential allegiance, every candid remark a quote waiting to be weaponized. Polonius, the play's bureaucratic busybody, knows this world intimately; his advice reads like a survival guide written by a man who has spent years translating human messiness into reportable facts.

Shakespeare also plants a quiet irony. Polonius preaches restraint, yet he is famously incapable of it: he meddles, spies, and talks himself into a fatal position behind the arras. The line works because it exposes a core social truth - that attention can be offered without commitment - while letting the character undermine it. It's not just about discretion; it's about power. The person who listens collects leverage. The person who speaks supplies it.