Words! Mere words! How terrible they were! How clear, and vivid, and cruel.  One could not escape from them. And yet what a subtle magic there was in them! They seemed to be able to give a plastic form to formless things, and to have a music of their own as sweet as that of viol or of lute.  Mere words! Was there anything so real as words?

"The Picture Of Dorian Gray"  Oscar Wilde