The pen is mightier than the sword

"The pen is mightier than the sword" is a metonymic adage coined by Edward Bulwer-Lytton in 1839 for his play "Richelieu; Or the Conspiracy".cite book
title=Richelieu; Or the Conspiracy: A Play in Five Acts.
publisher=Saunders and Otley, Conduit St.
location=London
year=1839
edition=second] cite book
title=Good English
publisher=W.J. Widdleton
first=Edward Sherman
last=Gould
year=1870
location=New York
pages=63] The play was about Cardinal Richelieu, though in the author's words "license with dates and details... has been, though not unsparingly, indulged." The Cardinal's line in Act II, scene II, was more fully:cite book
title=The Dramatic Works of Edward Bulwer Lytton
author=Lord Lytton
volume=IX
location=New York
publisher=Peter Fenelon Collier
year=1892
pages=136] quote
True, This! —
Beneath the rule of men entirely great,
The pen is mightier than the sword. Behold
The arch-enchanters wand! — itself a nothing! —
But taking sorcery from the master-hand
To paralyse the Cæsars, and to strike
The loud earth breathless! — Take away the sword —
States can be saved without it!

The play opened at London's Covent Garden Theatre on 7 March 1839 with William Charles Macready in the lead role.cite book
title=Macready's Reminiscences, and Selections from His Diaries and Letters
last=Macready
first=William Charles
editor=Sir Frederick Pollock
year=1875
location=New York
publisher=MacMillan and Co.
pages=471] Macready believed its opening night success was "unequivocal"; Queen Victoria attended a performance on 14 March.

In 1870, literary critic Edward Sherman Gould wrote that Bulwer "had the good fortune to do, what few men can hope to do: he wrote a line that is likely to live for ages." By 1888 another author, Charles Sharp, feared that repeating the phrase "might sound trite and commonplace". [cite book
title=The Sovereignty of Art
publisher=T. Fisher Unwin
first=Charles
last=Sharp
year=1888
location=London
pages=67] The Thomas Jefferson Building of the Library of Congress, which opened in 1897, has the adage decorating an interior wall. [cite book
title=Library of Congress and the Interior Decorations: A Practical Guide for Visitors
publisher=Foster & Reynolds
first=Charles B
last=Reynolds
year=1897
location=New York, Washington, St. Augustine
pages=15] [Specifically, the west wall of the entrance pavilion's second floor south corridor] Though Bulwer's phrasing was novel, the idea of communication surpassing violence in efficacy had numerous predecessors.

As motto and slogan

*The phrase appeared as the motto of gold pen manufacturer Levi Willcutt during a Railroad Jubilee in Boston, Massachusetts which ran during the week beginning September 17 1852. [cite book
title=The Railroad Jubilee. An Account of the Celebration Commemorative of the Opening of Railroad Communcation Between Boston and Canada
publisher=J. E. Eastburn, city printer
author= Boston (Mass.). City Council
year=1852
pages=139]
*Woodrow Wilson's 1916 U.S. presidential re-election campaign used the slogan "He proved the pen mightier than the sword".
*It is the motto of the Alpha Xi Delta sorority.
*In its Latinized form, Calamvs Gladio Fortior, it is the motto of Keio University in Tokyo, Japan.

Predecessors

According to the website Trivia-Library.com,cite web
url=http://www.trivia-library.com/b/origins-of-sayings-the-pen-is-mightier-than-the-sword.htm
title=About the history and origins behind the famous saying the pen is mightier than the sword.
publisher=Trivia-Library.com citing Wallechinsky, David, Irving Wallace (1981). "The People's Almanac".] the book "The People's Almanac" by Irving Wallace and David Wallechinsky lists several supposed predecessors to Bulwer's phrasing.

Their first example comes from the Greek playwright Euripides, who died circa 406 BC. He is supposed to have written: "The tongue is mightier than the blade." If the "People's Almanac" is correct, it should be possible to source this to an extant work by Euripides; however, the quote does appear in the 1935 fictional work "Claudius the God and his Wife Messalina" by Robert Graves, [cite book
title=Claudius, the God and His Wife Messalina.
publisher=H. Smith and R. Haas
first=Robert
last=Graves
year=1935
pages=122] and is thus possibly an anachronism.

Several possible precursors do appear in the Old and New Testaments, [see also cite web
url=http://www.usccb.org/nab/bible/revelation/revelation1.htm#foot15
title=New American Bible, Revelation Chapter 1:16 (footnote)
publisher=Confraternity of Christian Doctrine, Inc.
location=Washington, DC
date=2002
accessdate=13 November
accessyear=2006 Notes similar imagery also used in Revelation verses 1:16, 2:16, and 19:15; Ephesians 6:17; as well as in the Old Testament: Wisdom 18:15; and Isaiah 11:4; 49:2.] for example, in the Epistle to the Hebrews, whose authorship is uncertain, reads: "Indeed, the word of God is living and effective, sharper than any two-edged sword, penetrating even between soul and spirit, joints and marrow, and able to discern reflections and thoughts of the heart." [cite web
url=http://www.usccb.org/nab/bible/hebrews/hebrews4.htm#v12
title=New American Bible, Hebrews 4:12
publisher=Confraternity of Christian Doctrine, Inc.
location=Washington, DC
date=2002
accessdate=13 November
accessyear=2006]

The Islamic prophet Muhammad is quoted as saying "The ink of the scholar is holier than the blood of the martyr". [http://www.storyofpakistan.com/contribute.asp?artid=C059] [http://www.islamset.com/heritage/philos/Conclusion.html]

In 1529, Antonio de Guevara, in "Reloj de príncipes", compared a pen to a lance, books to arms, and a life of studying to a life of war. [In Spanish: "¡Cuánta diferencia vaya de mojar la péñola de la tinta a teñir la lanza en la sangre, y estar rodeados de libros o estar cargados de armas, de estudiar cómo cada uno ha de vivir o andar a saltear en la guerra para a su prójimo matar!"] cite web
url=http://www.h-net.org/~cervantes/csa/articf89/disalvo.htm
title=Spanish Guides to Princes and the Political Theories in Don Quijote
first=Angelo J.
last=Di Salvo
year=1989
publisher=The Cervantes Society of America
accessdate=12 November
accessyear=2006] Thomas North, in 1557, translated "Reloj de príncipes" into English as "Diall of Princes." The analogy would appear in again in 1582, in George Whetstone's "An Heptameron of Civil Discourses": "The dashe of a Pen, is more than the counterbuse of a Launce." [cite book
title=An heptameron of ciuill discourses
first=George
last=Whetstone
edition=2nd
id=STC (2nd ed.) / 25337
chapter=thyrd Daies Exercise
publisher=Richard Iones, at the signe of the Rose and the Crowne, neare Holburne Bridge
date=1582-02-03] [It appears as a marginal note to the passage: "The Doctor, that had giuen as many déepe woundes with his Pen, as euer he had doone with his Launce, shronke no more at these threates, then an Oke at the Helue of an Are, but coldely wylled him, to vse his pleasure, he was ready to defend (or to die, in) his oppinion."]

Abu'l-Fazl ibn Mubarak, who died in 1602 and was personal scribe and vizier to Jalaluddin Muhammad Akbar (Akbar the Great), wrote of a gentleman put in charge of a fiefdom having "been pro­moted from the pen to the sword and taken his place among those who join the sword to the pen, and are masters both of peace and war." [cite web
url=http://persian.packhum.org/persian/pf?file=00701022&ct=73
title=The Akbarnama Of Abu-l-Fazl
last=Beveridge
first=H.
chapter=XLVI
volume=2
year=1902
accessdate=15 November
accessyear=2006] [A source has Abu'l-Fazl ibn Mubarak in "Āīn-e Akbari" (the third volume of the "Akbarnama"), quoting his master as saying to his calligraphers "Go on doing with your pen what in other times was done with the sword" but this is spurious. Source is: cite web
url=http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/mp/2002/04/01/stories/2002040101200400.htm
title=Writing their own epitaph...
first=Firoz Bakht
last=Ahmed
publisher=The Hindu
date=2002-04-01
accessdate=13 November
accessyear=2006] Syad Muhammad Latif, in his 1896 history of Agra, quoted King Abdullah of Bokhara (Abdullah-Khan II), who died in 1598, as saying that "He was more afraid of Abu'l-Fazl's pen than of Akbar's sword." [cite book
pages=264
title=Agra Historical & Descriptive with an Account of Akbar and His Court and of the Modern City of Agra, 1896
isbn=81-206-1709-6
publisher=Asian Educational Services
first=Syad Muhammad
last=Latif
year=2003]

William Shakespeare in 1600, in his play "Hamlet" , wrote: "... many wearing rapiers are afraid of goosequills." [cite web
url=http://www.opensourceshakespeare.org/views/plays/play_view.php?WorkID=hamlet&Scope=entire&pleasewait=1&msg=pl
title=The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark
last=Shakespeare
first=William
publisher=opensourceshakespeare.org
accessdate=15 November
accessyear=2006]

Robert Burton, in 1621, in "The Anatomy of Melancholy", stated: "It is an old saying, "A blow with a word strikes deeper than a blow with a sword": and many men are as much galled with a calumny, a scurrilous and bitter jest, a libel, a pasquil, satire, apologue, epigram, stage-play or the like, as with any misfortune whatsoever."cite web
url=http://onlinebooks.library.upenn.edu/webbin/gutbook/lookup?num=10800
title=The Anatomy of Melancholy: What it is, with all the kinds, causes, symptoms, prognostics, and several cures of it
author=Buton, Robert (as Democritus Junior)
editor=Karl Hagen
chapter=Part i, Sect. 2, Memb. 4, Subsect. 4
publisher=Project Gutenberg] After listing several historical examples he concludes: "Hinc quam sit calamus saevior ense patet", which translates as "From this it is clear how much more cruel the pen may be than the sword."

Thomas Jefferson, on June 19 1792, ended a letter to Thomas Paine with: "Go on then in doing with your pen what in other times was done with the sword: shew that reformation is more practicable by operating on the mind than on the body of man, and be assured that it has not a more sincere votary nor you a more ardent well-wisher than Y [ou] rs. &c. "Thomas Jefferson" [cite web
url=http://odur.let.rug.nl/~usa/P/tj3/writings/brf/jefl99.htm
title=To Thomas Paine Philadelphia, June 19, 1792
last=Jefferson
first=Thomas
date=1792-06-19
publisher=From Revolution to Reconstruction
accessdate=13 November
accessyear=2006]

The French emperor Napoleon Bonaparte (1769-1821), known to history for his military conquests, also left this oft-quoted remark: “Four hostile newspapers are more to be feared than a thousand bayonets.”

Netizens have suggested that a 1571 edition of Erasmus' "Institution of a Christian Prince" contains the words "There is no sworde to bee feared more than the Learned pen" [http://www.phrases.org.uk/bulletin_board/7/messages/471.html Re: Pen vs. sword] which cites cite book
title=Random House Dictionary of Popular Proverbs and Sayings
year=1996
first=Gregory Y.
last=Titelman
publisher=Random House
location=New York] cite web
url=http://forum.quoteland.com/1/OpenTopic?a=tpc&s=586192041&f=099191541&m=2691916426&r=5601956426
title=the pen is mightier.....
month=March
year=2003
publisher=Quoteland.com
accessdate=15 November
accessyear=2006] but this is not evident from modern translations [cite web
url=http://www.stoics.com/erasmus_s_education_of_a_chris.html
title=Erasmus's Education of a Christian Prince (1516)
last=Born
first=Lester K.
location=New York
publisher=Octagon Books
year=1963
accessdate=15 November
accessyear=2006] and this could be merely a spurious quotation.

References in culture

The adage has been used in various forms by many writers. For example, Terry Pratchett in "The Light Fantastic" (1986) wrote: [cite book
title=The Light Fantastic
isbn=0-06-102070-2
publisher=HarperCollins
first=Terry
last=Pratchett
format=paperback
date=2000-03-01
pages=11]

"Quimby was eventually killed by a disgruntled poet during an experiment conducted in the palace grounds to prove the disputed accuracy of the proverb "The pen is mightier than the sword," and in his memory it was amended to include the phrase, "only if the sword is very short, and the pen is very sharp."

Mike Love used the phrase on the Beach Boys album "Surf's Up" in "Student Demonstration Time", with the addition of "but no match for a gun."

In the 1989 movie Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, the character Marcus Brody exclaims the line after defeating a Nazi tank through a series of events set off by squirting one Nazi in the face with a fountain pen.

Douglas MacArthur sardonically commented on the reality of war, "Whoever thinks the pen is mightier than the sword clearly has never encountered automatic weapons."

Comic Carlos Mencia made fun of the quote, challenging anyone who agreed with the quote to fight him; he with a sword and the challenger with a pen.

ee also

*It was a dark and stormy night
*Almighty dollar

References

External Links

*wikisource inline
*wikibooks