Literally speaking when one’s mouth is big enough to put one’s foot in, be it the left or the right foot, one has a big mouth. Hence, when a person puts his foot in his mouth, he embarrasses himself by saying the wrong thing. One must learn to think twice before speaking lest one might make a mockery of oneself.
A national leader’s words at the critical moment might affect the rise and fall of his country. The Chinese saying of "Words wisely spoken would be powerful enough to cause a nation rise, and words rashly spoken would also be strong enough to make a nation fall" is frequently used to warn leaders not to put their foot in their mouth.
When Shakespeare wants characters to learn the truth about what they really are, he sends them to the woods to do some soul searching. It is in the forest and its natural setting that there is ‘good in everything’. Here is an excerpt from As You Like It –Act II Scene II: “Find tongues in trees, books in running brooks, sermons in stones, and good in everything. I would not change it.”
The foot-in-the-mouth specimens ought to learn to keep their big mouth shut until they know what they are talking about.
20 April 2010
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