Voltaire understood something subtler than the familiar advice to stay quiet: he saw that exhaustive disclosure itself becomes a form of violence against the listener's imagination. When we withhold judiciously, we grant others the dignity of filling gaps with their own curiosity and interpretation—we become collaborators rather than lecturers. Notice how the most compelling people in your life rarely answer every question completely; they leave you wanting to know more, which paradoxically makes you value them more. The bore isn't simply the quiet person kept silent, but the relentless explainer who mistakes completeness for generosity.