Melville Quotes

That great America on the other side of the sphere, Australia. — Herman Melville

My means are sane, my motives and my object mad. — Herman Melville

There is no greater solitude than that of the samurai unless it is that of the tiger in the jungle ... Perhaps ... — Jean-Pierre Melville

A beautiful woman is born Queen of men and women both, as Mary Stuart was born Queen of Scots, whether men or women. — Herman Melville

A whale ship was my Yale College and my Harvard. — Herman Melville

These Spaniards are all an odd set; the very word Spaniard has a curious, conspirator, Guy-Fawkish twang to it. — Herman Melville

Youth is immortal; Tis the elderly only grow old! — Herman Melville

I'll try a pagan friend, thought I, since Christian kindness has proved but hollow courtesy. — Herman Melville

Their hands met; their eyes fastened; Starbuck's tears the glue. — Herman Melville

To be a born American citizen seems a guarantee against pauperism; and this, perhaps, springs from the virtue of a vote. — Herman Melville

I've part changed my flesh since that time, why not my mind? — Herman Melville

Beware the People weeping When they bare the iron hand. — Herman Melville

However, a good laugh is a mighty good thing, and rather too scarce a good thing; the more's the pity. — Herman Melville

I tell you, the sperm will stand no nonsense. — Herman Melville

art is the objectification of feeling — Herman Melville

A noble craft, but somehow a most melancholy! All noble things are touched with that. — Herman Melville

Courage is the most common and vulgar of the virtues. — Herman Melville

One of the coolest and wisest hours a man has, is just after he awakes in the morning. — Herman Melville

Time itself now held long breaths with keen suspense. — Herman Melville

For few men's courage is proof against protracted meditation unrelieved by action — Herman Melville

Strange as it may seem, there is nothing in which a young and beautiful female appears to more advantage than in the art of smoking. — Herman Melville

Born in throes, 't is fit that man should live in pains and die in pangs! So be it, then! — Herman Melville

If you are poor, avoid wine as a costly luxury; if you are rich, shun it as a fatal indulgence. Stick to plain water. — Herman Melville

We talk of the Turks, and abhor the cannibals; but may not some of them, go to heaven, before some of us? — Herman Melville

At length I fell asleep, with the volume in my hand; and never slept so sound before — Herman Melville

In New Bedford, fathers, they say, give whales for dowers to their daughters, and portion off their nieces with a few porpoises a-piece. — Herman Melville

Starbuck; let me look into a human eye; it is better than to gaze into sea or sky; better than to gaze upon God. — Herman Melville

Do not presume, well-housed, well-warmed, and well-fed, to criticize the poor — Herman Melville

Morning to ye! Morning to ye! — Herman Melville

For all his tattooings he was on the whole a clean, comely looking cannibal ... — Herman Melville

Delight,
top-gallant delight is to him, who acknowledges no law or lord, but the Lord his God, and is only a patriot to heaven. — Herman Melville

Faith, like a jackal, feeds among the tombs, and even from these dead doubts she gathers her most vital hope. — Herman Melville

There is a touch of divinity even in brutes, and a special halo about a horse, that should forever exempt him from indignities. — Herman Melville

Adverse winds are holding mad Christmas in him, boys. — Herman Melville

Ignorance is the father of all fear. — Herman Melville

For though consciences are as unlike as foreheads, every intelligence, not including the Scriptural devils who "believe and tremble" has one. — Herman Melville

Think not, is my eleventh commandment; and sleep when you can, is my twelfth. — Herman Melville

Leviathan is not the biggest fish; - I have heard of Krakens. — Herman Melville

Bachelors alone can travel freely, and without any twinges of their consciences touching desertion of the fire-side. — Herman Melville

Ego non baptiso te in nomine ... but make out the rest yourself. — Herman Melville

Until we understand that our grief outweighs a thousand joys, we will never understand what Christianity is all about. — Herman Melville

Stay true to the dreams of thy youth. — Herman Melville

Yet, after all, insensible as he is to a thousand wants, and removed from harassing cares, my not the savage be the happier man..? — Herman Melville

Queequeq, my fine friend, does this sort of thing often happen? — Herman Melville

It is not down on any map; true places never are. — Herman Melville

There are two places in the world where men can most effectively disappear - the city of London and the South Seas. — Herman Melville

Holloa! Starbuck's astir," said the rigger. "He's a lively chief mate that; good man, and a pious; but — Herman Melville

There is a savor of life and immortality in substantial fare. Like balloons, we are nothing till filled. — Herman Melville

Faith and philosophy are air, but events are brass. — Herman Melville

The American, who up to the present day, has evinced, in Literature, the largest brain with the largest heart, that man is Nathaniel Hawthorne. — Herman Melville

The reason the mass of men fear God, and at bottom dislike Him, is because they rather distrust His heart, and fancy Him all brain like a watch. — Herman Melville

Being in love with someone is like daytime. You know there are other stars our there someplace, but you can only see the sun. — Henry Melville

immortality is but ubiquity in time); that — Herman Melville

The terrors of truth and dart of death To faith alike are vain. — Herman Melville

You cannot hide the soul. — Herman Melville

Queequeg was George Washington cannibalistically developed. — Herman Melville

To treat of human actions is to deal wholly with second causes. — Herman Melville

It is not for man to follow the trail of truth too far, since by so doing he entirely loses the directing compass of his mind. — Herman Melville

Frighted Jonah trembles, and summoning all his boldness to his face, only looks so much the more a coward. — Herman Melville

When the passage "All men are born free and equal," when that passage was being written were not some of the signers legalised owners of slaves? — Herman Melville

Can it be, that the Greek grammarians invented their dual number for the particular benefit of twins? — Herman Melville

Melville's Moby-Dick - — John Irving

The characters tell their story - I am merely the tool used to record it — Marti Melville

The march of conquest through wild provinces, may be the march of Mind; but not the march of Love. — Herman Melville

True places are not found on maps. — Herman Melville

Are not half our lives spent in reproaches for foregone actions, of the true nature and consequences of which we were wholly ignorant at the time? — Herman Melville

An uncommon prudence is habtual with the subtler depravity, for it has everything to hide. — Herman Melville

Surely a gentle sister is the second best gift to a man; and it is first in point of occurrence; for the wife comes after. — Herman Melville

If you can get nothing better out of the world, get a good dinner out of it, at least. — Herman Melville

Slowly it floats more and more away, — Herman Melville

See how elastic our prejudices grow when once love comes to bend them. — Herman Melville

Let America first praise mediocrity even, in her children, before she praises ... the best excellence in the children of any other land. — Herman Melville

Thinking is, or ought to be, a coolness and a calmness; and our poor hearts throb, and our poor brains beat too much for that. — Herman Melville

Never joke at funerals, or during business transactions. — Herman Melville

A pretty pickle, truly, thought I; abed here in a strange house in the broad day, with a cannibal and a tomahawk. — Herman Melville

In this world, shipmates, sin that pays its way can travel freely and without a passport; whereas Virtue, if a pauper, is stopped at all frontiers. — Herman Melville

But thus it often is, that the constant friction of illiberal minds wears out at last the best resolves of the more generous. — Herman Melville

There's magic in the water that draws all men away form the land, that leads them over hills, down creeks and streams and rivers to the sea. — Herman Melville

Not so much thy skill, then, O hunter, as the great necessities that strike the victory to thee! — Herman Melville

an eight day clock. — Herman Melville

Methinks that what they call my shadow here on earth is my true substance. — Herman Melville

The shadows of things are greater than themselves; and the more exaggerated the shadow, the more unlike the substance. — Herman Melville

The whale has no famous author, and whaling no famous chronicler, you will say. — Herman Melville

It is better to sail with a moody good captain than a laughing bad one. — Herman Melville

I would prefer not to. — Herman Melville

The only real owner of anything is its commander; — Herman Melville

Flight from tyranny does not of itself insure a safe asylum, far less a happy home. — Herman Melville

go on a whaling voyage; this — Herman Melville

God is liberal of color; so should man be. — Herman Melville

Aye, aye, it must be so. I've oversailed him. How, got the start? Aye, he's chasing ME now; not I, HIM
that's bad — Herman Melville

Friendship at first sight, like love at first sight, is said to be the only truth. — Herman Melville

What he ate did not so much relieve his hunger, as keep it immortal in him. — Herman Melville

Though tyrants threat, though Lyons rage and rore
Defy them all, and feare not to win out. — Elizabeth Melville

In the choice of a horse and a wife a man must please himself ignoring the opinion and advice of friends. — George Whyte-Melville

To a sensitive being, pity is not seldom pain. — Herman Melville

In certain moods, no man can weigh this world without throwing in something, somehow like Original Sin, to strike the uneven balance. — Herman Melville

in coat, heart, body, and brain; — Herman Melville

There she blows!-there she blows! A hump like a snow-hill! It is Moby Dick! — Herman Melville

Our institutions have a potent digestion, and may in time convert and assimilate to good all elements thrown in, however originally alien. — Herman Melville

War should be carried on like a monsoon; one changeless determination of every particle towards the one unalterable aim. — Herman Melville