, or
expedient, or pleasant, and he adopts it. The considerations presented
to his mind decide his action. But those considerations are in the form
of arguments, and those arguments exist in words. The true original
power, indeed, is in the thought. It is the thinker who generates the
steam. But thought unexpressed accomplishes nothing. The writer and the
speaker engineer it into action.

Thought, indeed, even in the mind of its originator, exists in words.
For we really think only in words. Much more, then, must the thought
have some verbal expression, written or spoken, before it can influence
the opinions or the actions of others. A man may have all the wisdom of
Solomon, yet will he exercise no influence upon human affairs unless he
gives his wisdom utterance. Profound thinkers sometimes, indeed, utter
very little. But they must utter something. They originate and give
forth a few thoughts or discoveries, which minds of a different order,
writers and talkers, pick up, reproduce, multiply, and disseminate all
over the surface of society. When a man unites these two functions,
being both an original thinker and a skilful and industrious writer, the
influence which he may exert upon his race is prodigious. If any one,
for instance, would take the pains to trace the influences which have
sprung from such a man as Plato, he would have an illustration of what
is meant. Plato, while living, had no wealth, rank, or position of any
kind, to add force to what he said or did. Whatever he has done in the
world, he has done simply by his power as a thinker and a writer. There
were many Grecians quite as subtle and acute in reasoning as he. But
their thoughts died with them. Plato, on the other hand, was an
indefatigable writer, as well as an acute and profound thinker. He gave
utterance to his ideas in words which, even in a dead language, have to
this day a living power. When Plato was dead, there remained his written
words. They remain still. They have entered successively into the
philosophies, the creeds, and the practical codes, of the Grecian world,
the Roman, the Saracen, and the Christian. At this very hour hundreds of
millions of human beings unconsciously hold opinions which the words of
that wise old Greek have helped to mould. The mere brute force of a
military conqueror may make arbitrary changes in the current of human
affairs. But no permanent change is ever made except by the force of
opinion. The words of Plato