"Words of comfort, skillfully administered, are the oldest therapy known to man"
About this Quote
The subtext is slightly provocative in how it blurs care and craft. “Therapy” can sound soft, private, clinical; Nizer yokes it to words, the most public tool we have. He implies that before pills, before psychoanalysis, before the wellness-industrial complex, people survived by talking each other back from the ledge. It’s a generous view of human history, but also a lawyerly one: if speech can heal, then speech in court can be framed as social medicine rather than mere combat.
Context matters. Nizer worked amid rising faith in scientific authority and professional expertise, when “therapy” was becoming a cultural keyword. By calling comfort “the oldest therapy,” he nods to modern psychology while claiming primacy for a more ancient practice: the consoling story, the reassuring explanation, the expertly shaped narrative that makes pain legible. The line lands because it’s both true and self-interested: a reminder that what we say can steady people, and that “skill” is the difference between empathy and mere noise.
Quote Details
| Topic | Kindness |
|---|---|
| Source | Help us find the source |
| Cite |
Citation Formats
APA Style (7th ed.)
Nizer, Louis. (2026, January 14). Words of comfort, skillfully administered, are the oldest therapy known to man. FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/words-of-comfort-skillfully-administered-are-the-87916/
Chicago Style
Nizer, Louis. "Words of comfort, skillfully administered, are the oldest therapy known to man." FixQuotes. January 14, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/words-of-comfort-skillfully-administered-are-the-87916/.
MLA Style (9th ed.)
"Words of comfort, skillfully administered, are the oldest therapy known to man." FixQuotes, 14 Jan. 2026, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/words-of-comfort-skillfully-administered-are-the-87916/. Accessed 18 Feb. 2026.











