The long silence

An examination of the concept of silence will show that the word means different things – that silence is different things – depending on whether the context is the silence of nature, the silence of shyness, the silence of the liar or hypocrite, the short silence of the man who cannot hold his tongue, the long silence of the hero or the apostle, or the eternal silence of the Knight of Faith.

Stanley Cavell (MWMWWS, 1969/updated 2002).