Chapter 72: Judging the Audience

Kural 711

Pure men of studied eloquence should study
an audience before speaking deliberate words.

Kural 712

Let good men who know the orator's art knowingly await
the right moment to articulate their good knowledge.

Kural 713

Failing to assess an audience before venturing to speak
is to be unaware of the way of words and remain ineffective.

Kural 714

Be brilliant before brilliant men; but assume
the dullness of pale mortar before dullards.

Kural 715

Of all good things, the best is the polite reserve
that refrains from speaking first when with elders and superiors.

Kural 716

To blunder before perceptive, erudite men
is like slipping and falling from a very high place.

Kural 717

A learned man's learning shines the brightest
among luminaries capable of critiquing his language.

Kural 718

Speaking to an audience of thinking men
is like watering a bed of growing plants.

Kural 719

Those who speak good things to good and learned gatherings
should never repeat them to ignorant groups, even forgetfully.

Kural 720

Expounding to a throng of unfit men
is like pouring sweet nectar into an open gutter.