Famous Quotes by Herman Melville
- Books, gentlemen, are a species of men, and introduced to them you circulate in the “very best... More
- It is not the purpose of literature to purvey news. For news consult the Almanac de Gotha. More
- Our souls belong to our bodies, not our bodies to our souls. More
- “He’s asleep, ain’t he?” “With kings and counsellors,” murmured I. More
- Ah Bartleby! Ah humanity! More
- I can see that figure now—pallidly neat, pitiably respectable, incurably forlorn! It was Bartleby. More
- I was not unemployed in my profession by the late John Jacob Astor; a name which, I admit, I love... More
- Imagine my surprise, nay, my consternation, when without moving from his privacy, Bartleby in a... More
- One of the coolest and wisest hours a man has, is just after he awakes in the morning. More
- Benevolent desires, after passing a certain point, can not undertake their own fulfillment... More
- Our institutions have a potent digestion, and may in time convert and assimilate to good all... More
- There seems no reason why patriotism and narrowness should go together, or why intellectual... More
- Those of us who always abhorred slavery as an atheistical iniquity, gladly we join in the... More
- Let us pray that the great historic tragedy of our time may not have been enacted without... More
- I seem, in most of these verses, to have but placed a harp in a window, and noted the contrasted... More
- the negro Babo took by succession each Spaniard forward, and asked him whose skeleton that was,... More
- “what has cast such a shadow upon you” “The negro.” More
- “you were with me all day; stood with me, sat with me, talked with me, looked at me, ate with... More
- Through the port comes the moon-shine astray!
It tips the guard’s cutlass and silvers this... More
- I am sleepy, and the oozy weeds about me twist. More
- Fathoms down, fathoms down, how I’ll dream fast asleep. More
- A true military officer is in one particular like a true monk. Not with more self-abnegation will... More
- To an immature nature essentially honest and humane, forewarning intimations of subtler danger... More
- To anybody who can hold the Present at its worth without being inappreciative of the Past, it may... More
- Truth uncompromisingly told will always have its ragged edges. More
- Are sailors, frequenters of fiddlers’ greens, without vices? No; but less often than with... More
- If a well-constituted individual refrains from blazoning aught amiss or calamitous in his family,... More
- The retaliation is apt to be in monstrous disproportion to the supposed offense; for when in... More
- Coke and Blackstone hardly shed so much light into obscure spiritual places as the Hebrew prophets. More
- The sailor is frankness, the landsman is finesse. Life is not a game with the sailor, demanding... More
- Forty years after a battle it is easy for a noncombatant to reason about how it ought to have... More
- There is nothing namable but that some men will, or undertake to, do it for pay. More
- His duty he always faithfully did; but duty is sometimes a dry obligation, and he was for... More
- A chaplain is the minister of the Prince of Peace serving the host of the God of War—Mars. As... More
- Personal prudence, even when dictated by quite other than selfish considerations, surely is no... More
- When I think of this life I have led; the desolation of solitude it has been; the masoned,... More
- Let me look into a human eye; it is better than to gaze into sea or sky; better than to gaze upon... More
- The lightning flashes through my skull; mine eyeballs ache and ache; my whole beaten brain seems... More
- Ha, ha, my ship! thou mightiest well be taken now for the sea- chariot of the sun. Ho, ho! all ye... More
- Oh! thou clear spirit of clear fire, whom on these seas I as Persian once did worship, till in... More
- There is something wrong about the man who wants help. There is somewhere a deep defect, a want,... More
- In social halls a favored guest
In years that follow victory won,
How sweet to feel your... More
- But seldom the laurel wreath is seen
Unmixed with pensive pansies dark;
There’s a light... More
- I don’t know but a book in a man’s brain is better off than a book bound in calf—at any... More
- This country is at present engaged in furnishing material for future authors; not in encouraging... More
- Life is a long Dardenelles, My Dear Madam, the shores whereof are bright with flowers, which we... More
- There is the grand truth about Nathaniel Hawthorne. He says NO! in thunder; but the Devil himself... More
- I have written a wicked book, and feel spotless as the lamb. Ineffable socialities are in me. I... More
- So far as I am individually concerned, & independent of my pocket, it is my earnest desire to... More
- Old Abe is much better looking than I expected & younger looking. He shook hands like a good... More
- For my part I love sleepy fellows, and the more ignorant the better. Damn your wide-awake and... More
- At sea a fellow comes out. Salt water is like wine, in that respect. More
- Praise when merited is not a boon: yet to a generous nature, is it pleasant to utter it. More
- Truth is the silliest thing under the sun. Try to get a living by the Truth—and go to the Soup... More
- The further our civilization advances upon its present lines so much the cheaper sort of thing... More
- Until I was twenty-five, I had no development at all. From my twenty-fifth year I date my life.... More
- The calm, the coolness, the silent grass-growing mood in which a man ought always to... More
- Whoever is not in the possession of leisure can hardly be said to possess independence. They talk... More
- I stand for the heart. To the dogs with the head! I had rather be a fool with a heart, than... More
- I take such men to be inspired. I fancy that this moment Shakespeare in heaven ranks with Gabriel... More
- It is not a piece of fine feminine Spitalfields silk—but is of the horrible texture of a fabric... More
- We that write & print have all our books predestinated—& and for me, I shall write such... More
- At my years, and with my disposition, or rather, constitution, one gets to care less and less for... More
- Bless my soul, Sir, will you Britons not credit that an American can be a gentleman, & have... More
- The two great things yet to be discovered are these—The Art of rejuvenating old age in men,... More
- I love all men who dive. Any fish can swim near the surface, but it takes a great whale to go... More
- Traveling takes the ink out of one’s pen as well as the cash out of one’s purse. More
- Of all human events, perhaps, the publication of a first volume of verses is the most... More
- The god Janus never had two more decidedly different faces than your sea captain. More
- Indolence is heaven’s ally here,
And energy the child of hell:
The Good Man pouring... More
- Found a family, build a state,
The pledged event is still the same:
Matter in end will... More
- Let America first praise mediocrity even, in her children, before she praises ... the best... More
- In this world of lies, Truth is forced to fly like a scared white doe in the woodlands; and only... More
- He who has never failed somewhere, that man can not be great. Failure is the true test of... More
- That Calvinistic sense of Innate Depravity and Original Sin, from whose visitations, in some... More
- Spite of all the Indian-summer sunlight on the hither side of Hawthorne’s soul, the other... More
- It is hard to be finite upon an infinite subject, and all subjects are infinite. More
- The names of all fine authors are fictitious ones, far more so than that of Junius,—simply... More
- There are hardly five critics in America; and several of them are asleep. More
- The American, who up to the present day, has evinced, in Literature, the largest brain with the... More
- It is those deep far-away things in him; those occasional flashings-forth of the intuitive Truth... More
- If Shakespeare has not been equalled, he is sure to be surpassed, and surpassed by an American... More
- That matches are made in heaven, may be, but my wife would have been just the wife for Peter the... More
- All the world over, the picturesque yields to the pocketesque. More
- When among wild beasts, if they menace you, be a wild beast. More
- Intrepid, unprincipled, reckless, predatory, with boundless ambition, civilized in externals but... More
- If you are poor, avoid wine as a costly luxury; if you are rich, shun it as a fatal indulgence.... More
- A hermitage in the forest is the refuge of the narrow-minded misanthrope; a hammock on the ocean... More
- The western spirit is, or will yet be (for no other is, or can be) the true American one. More
- An indiscriminate distrust of human nature is the worst consequence of a miserable condition,... More
- Man, “poor player,” succeeds better in life’s tragedy than comedy. More
- Never joke at funerals, or during business transactions. More
- War should be carried on like a monsoon; one changeless determination of every particle towards... More
- Biography, in its purer form, confined to the ended lives of the true and brave, may be held the... More
- His memory is like wares at the auction—going, going, and anon it will be gone. More
- tea, a decoction that enlarges the spleen and warpest the brain, or lightly floating the spirit... More
- The remnant of Indians thereabout—all but exterminated in their recent and final war with... More
- He is an optician, daily having to do with the microscope, telescope, and other inventions for... More
- Oh Conventionalism, what a ninny, thou art, to be sure. More
- Climate of Egypt in winter is the reign of spring upon earth, & summer in the air, and... More
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