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All Things That God Would Have Us Do Are Hard For Us To Do--remember That--and Hence, He Oftener Commands Us Than Endeavours To Persuade.
-Herman Melville
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All Things That God

Herman Melville
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All Things That God Would Have Us Do Are Hard For Us To Do--remember That--and Hence, He Oftener Commands Us Than Endeavours To Persuade.

Understanding the Quote: "all things that god would have us do are hard for us..."

This quote by Herman Melville reflects deeply on the theme of god. It connects to the universal human journey of purpose, motivation, and reflection. Often categorized under God, Remember, Endeavour, the quote offers insight, emotional clarity, and intellectual inspiration to readers worldwide.

Whether you’re a student exploring new ideas, a leader trying to motivate your team, or someone seeking direction in life — this quote provides value. It resonates because it’s more than words — it’s a bridge between experience and wisdom. It shows how Herman Melville interprets life's core challenges and triumphs.

Lessons From the Quote

This quote teaches resilience and focus. It reminds readers that no matter where they stand in life, reflection and self-awareness lead to growth. Each word has meaning, and when studied, it becomes clear how impactful thoughtful language can be.

About Herman Melville

Herman Melville is celebrated for insightful thoughts on god and remember. Their legacy lives on through writings that guide, comfort, and inspire. Discover more on their profile page.

Actionable Takeaways

  • Reflect on how this quote applies to your current life path.
  • Share the message with someone who needs inspiration.
  • Write your thoughts on this quote in a journal or blog post.
  • Use it as a daily affirmation or reminder.

Closing Thoughts

Quotes like this endure because they capture universal truths. They comfort us in solitude and empower us in groups. Carry this quote forward — live by its wisdom, share its message, and keep its essence alive.

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Topic
God
Remember
Endeavour
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If You Can Get Nothing Better Out Of The World, Get A Good Dinner Out Of It, At Least.
World
Dinner
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Towards Thee I Roll, Thou All-destroying But Unconquering Whale... From Hell's Heart I Stab At Thee.
Heart
Whales
Sea
There Is A Woe That Is Wisdom, A Woe That Is Madness.
Wisdom
Woe
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There Is One Knows Not What Sweet Mystery About This Sea, Whose Gently Awful Stirrings Seem To Speak Of Some Hidden Soul Beneath.
Sweet
Sea
Soul
Books, Gentlemen, Are A Species Of Men, And Introduced To Them You Circulate In The "very Best Society" That This World Can Furnish, Without The Intolerable Infliction Of "dressing" To Go Into It. In Your Shabbiest Coat And Cosiest Slippers You May Socially Chat Even With The Fastidious Earl Of Chesterfield, And Lounging Under A Tree Enjoy The Divinest Intimacy With My Late Lord Of Verulam.
Reading
Book
Men
Woe To Him Who Seeks To Please Rather Than Appall.
Woe
Castaway
Please
But The Might-have-been Is But Boggy Ground To Build Upon.
Might
Might Have Been
Has Beens
I Have No Objection To Any Person's Religion, Be It What It May, So Long As That Person Does Not Kill Or Insult Any Other Person, Because That Other Person Don't Believe It Also. But When A Man's Religion Becomes Really Frantic; When It Is A Positive Torment To Him; And, In Fine, Makes This Earth Of Ours An Uncomfortable Inn To Lodge In; Then I Think It High Time To Take That Individual Aside And Argue The Point With Him.
Believe
Men
Thinking
Beauty Is Like Piety--you Cannot Run And Read It; Tranquility And Constancy, With, Now-a-days, An Easy Chair, Are Needed.
Beauty
Running
Tranquility
What Troops Of Generous Boys In Happiness Thus Bred Saturnians Through Life's Tempe Led, Went From The North And Came From The South, With Golden Mottoes In The Mouth, To Lie Down Midway On A Bloody Bed.
Lying
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If Not Against Us, Nature Is Not For Us.
Nature
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There Is A Wisdom That Is Woe; But There Is A Woe That Is Madness. And There Is A Catskill Eagle In Some Souls That Can Alike Dive Down Into The Blackest Gorges, And Soar Out Of Them Again And Become Invisible In The Sunny Spaces. And Even If He For Ever Flies Within The Gorge, That Gorge Is In The Mountains; So That Even In His Lowest Swoop The Mountain Eagle Is Still Higher Than Other Birds Upon The Plain, Even Though They Soar.
Inspirational
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All Experience Teaches That, Whenever There Is A Great National Establishment, Employing Large Numbers Of Officials, The Public Must Be Reconciled To Support Many Incompetent Men; For Such Is The Favoritism And Nepotism Always Prevailing In The Purlieus Of These Establishments, That Some Incompetent Persons Are Always Admitted, To The Exclusion Of Many Of The Worthy.
Men
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Death Is Only A Launching Into The Region Of The Strange Untried; It Is But The First Salutation To The Possibilities Of The Immense Remote, The Wild, The Watery, The Unshored.
Sympathy
Firsts
Strange
I Am Past Scorching; Not Easily Can’st Thou Scorch A Scar.
Past
Scar
Scorching
How Feeble Is All Language To Describe The Horrors We Inflict Upon These Wretches, Whom We Mason Up In The Cells Of Our Prisons, And Condemn To Perpetual Solitude In The Very Heart Of Our Population.
Heart
Cells
Punishment
The Shadows Of Things Are Greater Than Themselves; And The More Exaggerated The Shadow, The More Unlike The Substance.
Shadow
Substance
Greater
Time Is Made Up Of Various Ages; And Each Thinks Its Own A Novelty.
Thinking
Age
Generations
In Truth, A Mature Man Who Uses Hair Oil, Unless Medicinally, That Man Has Probably Got A Quoggy Spot In Him Somewhere.
Men
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The Sun Hides Not The Ocean, Which Is The Dark Side Of This Earth, And Which Is Two Thirds Of This Earth. So, Therefore, That Mortal Man Who Hath More Of Joy Than Sorrow In Him, That Mortal Man Cannot Be True-- Not True, Or Undeveloped. With Books The Same. The Truest Of All Men Was The Man Of Sorrows, And The Truest Of All Books Is Solomon’s, And Ecclesiastes Is The Fine Hammered Steel Of Woe.
Ocean
Book
Dark
I Will Frankly Confess That After Passing A Few Weeks In The Valley Of The Marquesas, I Formed A Higher Estimate Of Human Nature Than I Had Ever Before Entertained. But, Alas, Since Then I Have Been One Of The Crew Of A Man-of- War, And The Pent-up Wickedness Of Five Hundred Men Has Nearly Overturned All My Previous Theories.
War
Men
Valleys
I Never Fancied Broiling Fowls; - Though Once Broiled, Judiciously Buttered, And Judgmatically Salted And Peppered, There Is No One Who Will Speak More Respectfully, Not To Say Reverentially, Of A Broiled Fowl Than I Will.
Cooking
Fowl
Speak
Ignorance Is The Father Of All Fear.
Father
Ignorance
Amity Itself Can Only Be Maintained By Reciprocal Respect, And True Friends Are Punctilious Equals.
True Friend
Relation
Reciprocal
From Without, No Wonderful Effect Is Wrought Within Ourselves, Unless Some Interior, Responding Wonder Meets It. That The Starry Vault Shall Surcharge The Heart With All Rapturous Marvelings, Is Only Because We Ourselves Are Greater Miracles, And Superber Trophies Than All The Stars In Universal Space.
Stars
Heart
Space
The Only True Infidelity Is For A Live Man To Vote Himself Dead.
Men
Infidelity
Vote
Man, In The Ideal, Is So Noble And So Sparkling, Such A Grand And Glowing Creature, That Over Any Ignominious Blemish In Him All His Fellows Should Run To Throw Their Costliest Robes.
Running
Men
Glowing
Lo! Ye Believers In Gods All Goodness, And In Man All Ill, Lo You! See The Omniscient Gods Oblivious Of Suffering Man; And Man, Though Idiotic, And Knowing Not What He Does, Yet Full Of The Sweet Things Of Love And Gratitude.
Sweet
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Men
The Sailor Is Frankness, The Landsman Is Finesse. Life Is Not A Game With The Sailor, Demanding The Long Head
Games
Long
Sailing
Seat Thyself Sultanically Among The Moons Of Saturn, And Take High Abstracted Man Alone; And He Seems A Wonder, A Grandeur, And A Woe. But From That Same Point, Take Mankind In Mass, And For The Most Part, They Seem A Mob Of Unnecessary Duplicates, Both Contemporary And Hereditary.
Men
Moon
Saturn
It Is Impossible To Talk Or To Write Without Apparently Throwing Oneself Helplessly Open.
Writing
Literature
Impossible
The Drama's Done. Why Then Here Does Any One Step Forth? — Because One Did Survive The Wreck.
Drama
Doe
Done
Contempt Is As Frequently Produced At First Sight As Love.
Love
Sight
Firsts
Surrounded As We Are By The Wants And Woes Of Our Fellow-men, And Yet Given To Follow Our Own Pleasures, Regardless Of Their Pains, Are We Not Like People Sitting Up With A Corpse, And Making Merry In The House Of The Dead?
Pain
Men
People
When We Affect To Condemn Savages, We Should Remember That By Doing So We Asperse Our Own Progenitors; For They Were Savages Also.who Can Swear That Among The Naked British Barbarians Sent To Rome To Be Stared At More Than 1500 Years Ago, The Ancestor Of Bacon Might Not Have Been Found?--why, Among The Very Thugs Of India, Or The Bloody Dyaks Of Borneo, Exists The Germ Of All That Is Intellectually Elevated And Grand. We Are All Of Us--anglo-saxons, Dyaks And Indians--sprung From One Head And Made In One Image.
Thug
Rome
Years
All Round And Round Does The World Lie As In A Sharp-shooter's Ambush, To Pick Off The Beautiful Illusions Of Youth, By The Pitiless Cracking Rifles Of The Realities Of Age.
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I Am A Man Who, From His Youth Upwards, Has Been Filled With A Profound Conviction That The Easiest Way Of Life Is The Best.
Men
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Way
The Man That Has Anything Bountifully Laughable About Him, Be Sure There Is More In That Man Than You Perhaps Think For.
Laughter
Men
Thinking
All The World Over, The Picturesque Yields To The Pocketesque.
Art
Money
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He Who Has Never Failed Somewhere, That Man Can Not Be Great.
Success
Wisdom
Failure
Truth Is In Things, And Not In Words.
Truth Is
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.
Women
Wife
Firsts
All Profound Things, And Emotions Of Things Are Preceded And Attended By Silence.
Profound
Silence
Emotion
Nobody Is So Heartily Despised As A Pusillanimous, Lazy, Good-for-nothing, Land-lubber; A Sailor Has No Bowels Of Compassion For Him.
Compassion
Land
Lazy
What Plays The Mischief With The Truth Is That Men Will Insist Upon The Universal Application Of A Temporary Feeling Or Opinion.
Men
Play
Feelings
It Is-or Seems To Be-a Wise Sort Of Thing, To Realise That All That Happens To A Man In This Life Is Only By Way Of Joke, Especially His Misfortunes, If He Have Them. And It Is Also Worth Bearing In Mind, That The Joke Is Passed Round Pretty Liberally & Impartially, So That Not Very Many Are Entitled To Fancy That They In Particular Are Getting The Worst Of It.
Wise
Men
Mind
It Is Hard To Be Finite Upon An Infinite Subject, And All Subjects Are Infinite.
Wisdom
Infinite
Subjects
A Man Of True Science... Thinks, That By Mouthing Hard Words, He Proves That He Understands Hard Things.
Communication
Men
Thinking
Hope Is The Struggle Of The Soul, Breaking Loose From What Is Perishable, And Attesting Her Eternity.
Hope
Struggle
Soul
As A Man-of-war That Sails Through The Sea, So This Earth That Sails Through The Air. We Mortals Are All On Board A Fast-sailing,never-sinking World-frigate, Of Which God Was The Shipwright; And She Is But One Craft In A Milky-way Fleet, Of Which God Is The Lord High Admiral.
War
Men
Air
Zeal Is Not Of Necessity Religion, Neither Is It Always Of The Same Essence With Poetry Or Patriotism.
Essence
Zeal
There Is Something In Us, Somehow, That, In The Most Degraded Condition, We Snatch At A Chance To Deceive Ourselves Into A Fanciedsuperiority To Others, Whom We Suppose Lower In The Scale Than Ourselves.
Race
Class
Chance
I'll Try A Pagan Friend, Thought I, Since Christian Kindness Has Proved But Hollow Courtesy.
Christian
Kindness
Trying
The Profound Calm Which Only Apparently Precedes And Prophesies Of The Storm, Is Perhaps More Awful Than The Storm Itself; For Indeed, The Calm Is But The Wrapper And Envelop Of The Storm, And Contains It In Itself, As The Seemingly Harmless Rifle Holds The Fatal Powder, And The Ball, And The Explosion.
Profound
Storm
Rifles
Twelve O'clock! It Is The Natural Centre, Key-stone, And Very Heart Of The Day. At That Hour, The Sun Has Arrived At The Top Of His Hill; And As He Seems To Hang Poised There A While, Before Coming Down On The Other Side, It Is But Reasonable To Suppose That He Is Then Stopping To Dine; Setting An Eminent Example To All Mankind.
Heart
Keys
Stopping
The American, Who Up To The Present Day, Has Evinced, In Literature, The Largest Brain With The Largest Heart, That Man Is Nathaniel Hawthorne.
Heart
Men
Brain
There Is No Dignity In Wickedness, Whether In Purple Or Rags; And Hell Is A Democracy Of Devils, Where All Are Equals.
Purple
Devil
Democracy
Men There Are, Who Having Quite Done With The World, All Its Merely Worldly Contents Are Become So Far Indifferent, That They Carelittle Of What Mere Worldly Imprudence They May Be Guilty.
Men
World
May
Soldier Or Sailor, The Fighting Man Is But A Fiend; And The Staff And Body-guard Of The Devil Musters Many A Baton.
War
Fighting
Men
Where Lies The Final Harbor, Whence We Unmoor No More? In What Rapt Ether Sails The World, Of Which The Weariest Will Never Weary? Where Is The Foundling’s Father Hidden? Our Souls Are Like Those Orphans Whose Unwedded Mothers Die In Bearing Them: The Secret Of Our Paternity Lies In Their Grave, And We Must There To Learn It.
Mother
Father
Lying
Where Is There Such An One Who Has Not A Thousand Times Been Struck With A Sort Of Infidel Idea, That Whatever Other Worlds God May Be Lord Of, He Is Not The Lord Of This; For Else This World Would Seem To Give The Lie To Him; So Utterly Repugnant Seem Its Ways To The Instinctively Known Ways Of Heaven.
God
Lying
Ideas
How It Is I Know Not; But There Is No Place Like A Bed For Confidential Disclosures Between Friends. Man And Wife, They Say, There Open The Very Bottom Of Their Souls To Each Other; And Some Old Couples Often Lie And Chat Over Old Times Till Nearly Morning. Thus, Then, In Our Hearts' Honeymoon, Lay I And Queequeg - A Cosy, Loving Pair.
Morning
Couple
Lying
There Is Nothing So Slipperily Alluring As Sadness; We Become Sad In The First Place By Having Nothing Stirring To Do; We Continue In It, Because We Have Found A Snug Sofa At Last.
Sad
Lasts
Firsts
Tis No Dishonor When He Who Would Dishonor You, Only Dishonors Himself.
Honor
Dishonor
Flogging
Beware The People Weeping When They Bare The Iron Hand.
Hands
Iron
People
The Easiest Way Of Life Is The Best.
Way
Life Is
See How Elastic Our Prejudices Grow When Once Love Comes To Bend Them.
Prejudice
Grows
Niggards Are Oftentimes Neat.
Niggard
Neat
Neatness
War Being The Greatest Of Evils, All Its Accessories Necessarily Partake Of The Same Character.
War
Character
Evil
To Treat Of Human Actions Is To Deal Wholly With Second Causes.
Deeds
Causes
Action
We Are Not A Nation, So Much As A World; For Unless We Claim All The World For Our Sire, Like Melchisedec, We Are Without Father Or Mother.
Mother
Father
World
In Some Things, We Americans Leave To Other Countries The Carrying Out Of The Principle That Stands At The Head Of Our Declaration Of Independence.
Country
Independence
Principles
The Friendship Of Fine-hearted, Generous Boys, Nurtured Amid The Romance-engendering Comforts And Elegancies Of Life, Sometimes Transcends The Bounds Of Mere Boyishness, And Revels For A While In The Empyrean Of A Love Which Only Comes Short, By One Degree, Of The Sweetest Sentiment Entertained Between The Sexes.
Love
Friends
Sex
Let Us Speak, Though We Show All Our Faults And Weaknesses, - For It Is A Sign Of Strength To Be Weak, To Know It, And Out With It - Not In A Set Way And Ostentatiously, Though, But Incidentally And Without Premeditation.
Strength
Literature
Way
Erie, And Ontario, And Huron, And Superior, And Michigan Possess An Ocean-like Expansiveness, With Many Of The Ocean's Noblest Traits... They Are Swept By Borean And Dismasting Blasts As Direful As Any That Lash The Salted Wave; They Know What Shipwrecks Are, For Out Of Sight Of Land, However Inland, They Have Drowned Full Many A Midnight Ship With All Its Shrieking Crew.
Ocean
Sight
Land
Forty Years After A Battle It Is Easy For A Non-combatant To Reason About How It Ought To Have Been Fought. It Is Another Thing Personally And Under Fire To Direct The Fighting While Involved In The Obscuring Smoke Of It.
Fighting
Fire
Years
All Wars Are Boyish, And Are Fought By Boys, The Champions And Enthusiasts Of The State: Turbid Ardors And Vain Joys Not Barrenly Abate-- Stimulants To The Power Mature, Preparatives Of Fate.
War
Fate
Boys
The Terrors Of Truth And Dart Of Death To Faith Alike Are Vain.
Faith
Vain
Terror
Though The Ancients Were Ignorant Of The Principles Of Christianity There Were In Them The Germs Of Its Spirit.
Ignorant
Principles
Germs
...in Certain Moods, No Man Can Weigh This World Without Throwing In Something, Somehow Like Original Sin, To Strike The Uneven Balance.
Men
Balance
World
Will You, Or Will You Not, Quit Me? I Now Demanded In A Sudden Passion, Advancing Close To Him. "i Would Prefer Not To Quit You", He Replied, Gently Emphasizing The Not.
Passion
Quitting
Advancing
Evil Is The Chronic Malady Of The Universe, And Checked In One Place, Breaks Forth In Another.
Evil
Break
Malady
We Are Only What We Are; Not What We Would Be; Nor Every Thing We Hope For. We Are But A Step In A Scale, That Reaches Further Above Us Than Below.
Perfection
Humanity
Would Be
All Truth Is Profound.
Truth
Profound
Truth Is
Wag The World How It Will, Leaves Must Be Green In Spring.
Spring
World
Green
It Is Well Known, That The Best Productions Of The Best Human Intellects, Are Generally Regarded By Those Intellects As Mere Immature Freshman Exercises, Wholly Worthless In Themselves, Except As Initiatives For Entering The Great University Of God After Death.
Creativity
Exercise
Immature
When The Inhabitants Of Some Sequestered Island First Descry The "big Canoe" Of The European Rolling Through The Blue Waters Towards Their Shores, They Rush Down To The Beach In Crowds, And With Open Arms Stand Ready To Embrace The Strangers. Fatal Embrace! They Fold To Their Bosoms The Vipers Whose Sting Is Destined To Poison All Their Joys; And The Instinctive Feeling Of Love Within Their Breasts Is Soon Converted Into The Bitterest Hate.
Beach
Betrayal
Hate
At Banquets Surfeit Not, But Fill; Partake, And Retire; And Eat Not Again Till You Crave.
Eating
Banquets
Retiring
Nothing So Aggravates An Earnest Person As A Passive Resistance.
Passive Resistance
Earnest
Persons
We Americans Are The Peculiar, Chosen People - The Israel Of Our Time; We Bear The Ark Of The Liberties Of The World.
Israel
People
Democracy
For As This Appalling Ocean Surrounds The Verdant Land, So In The Soul Of Man There Lies One Insular Tahiti, Full Of Peace And Joy, But Encompassed By All The Horrors Of The Half Known Life.
Lying
Ocean
Men
We Die Of Too Much Life.
Life
Death
Too Much
Why Did The Old Persians Hold The Sea Holy? Why Did The Greeks Give It A Separate Deity, And Own Brother Jove? Surely All This Is Not Without Meaning. And Still Deeper The Meaning Of That Story Of Narcissus, Who Because He Could Not Grasp The Tormenting Mild Image He Saw In The Fountain, Plunged Into It And Was Drowned. But That Same Image, We Ourselves See In All Rivers And Oceans. It Is The Image Of The Ungraspable Phantom Of Life; And This Is The Key To It All.
Brother
Ocean
Keys
The Marquesan Girls Dance All Over; Not Only Do Their Feet Dance, But Their Arms, Hands, Fingers, Ay, Their Very Eyes Seem To Dance In Their Heads.
Girl
Dance
Eye
The Starred And Stately Nights Seemed Haughty Dames In Jewelled Velvets, Nursing At Home In Lonely Pride, The Memory Of Their Absent Conquering Earls, The Golden Helmeted Suns!
Lonely
Stars
Memories
To Be Called One Thing, Is Oftentimes To Be Another.
Literature
One Thing
Of All Human Events, Perhaps, The Publication Of A First Volume Of Verses Is The Most Insignificant; But Though A Matter Of No Moment To The World, It Is Still Of Some Concern To The Author.
Poetry
Events
Literature
There Is Nothing Namable But That Some Men Will, Or Undertake To, Do It For Pay.
Men
Pay
To A Sensitive Being, Pity Is Not Seldom Pain.
Pain
Pity
Sensitive
It Is Better To Fail In Originality Than To Succeed In Imitation.
Inspirational
Life
Motivational
At My Years, And With My Disposition, Or Rather, Constitution, One Gets To Care Less And Less For Everything Except Downright Goodfeeling. Life Is So Short, And So Ridiculous And Irrational (from A Certain Point Of View) That One Knows Not What To Make Of It, Unless--well, Finish The Sentence For Yourself.
Life
Views
Years
I Feel That The Godhead Is Broken Up Like The Bread At The Supper, And That We Are The Pieces. Hence This Infinite Fraternity Of Feeling.
God
Broken
Feelings
It Is With Fiction As With Religion: It Should Present Another World, And Yet One To Which We Feel The Tie.
Ties
Religion
Fiction
Fame Is An Accident; Merit A Thing Absolute.
Merit
Fame
Accidents
Familiarity With Danger Makes A Brave Man Braver, But Less Daring. Thus With Seamen: He Who Goes The Oftenest Round Cape Horn Goes The Most Circumspectly.
Men
Brave
Capes
Let Us Pray That The Great Historic Tragedy Of Our Time May Not Have Been Enacted Without Instructing Our Whole Beloved Country Through Terror And Pity; And May Fulfillment Verify In The End Those Expectations Which Kindle The Bards Of Progress And Humanity.
Country
War
Expectations
Some Years Ago - Never Mind How Long Precisely - Having Little Or No Money In My Purse, And Nothing Particular To Interest Me On Shore, I Thought I Would Sail About A Little And See The Watery Part Of The World.
Inspirational
Funny
Years
There Is All Of The Difference In The World Between Paying And Being Paid.
Differences
Literature
World
Ah, Happiness Courts The Light So We Deem The World Is Gay. But Misery Hides Aloof So We Deem That Misery There Is None.
Gay
Light
World
Let Us Waive That Agitated National Topic, As To Whether Such Multitudes Of Foreign Poor Should Be Landed On Our American Shores;let Us Waive It, With The One Only Thought, That If They Can Get Here, They Have God's Right To Come.
Topics
Poor
Should
Civilization Does Not Engross All The Virtues Of Humanity: She Has Not Even Her Full Share Of Them. They Flourish In Greater Abundance And Attain Greater Strength Among Many Barbarous People. The Hospitality Of The Wild Arab, The Courage Of The North American Indian, And The Faithful Friendships Of Some Of The Polynesian Nations, Far Surpass Any Thing Of A Similar Kind Among The Polished Communities Of Europe.
Europe
Civilization
People
An Indiscriminate Distrust Of Human Nature Is The Worst Consequence Of A Miserable Condition, Whether Brought About By Innocence Or Guilt. And Though Want Of Suspicion More Than Want Of Sense, Sometimes Leads A Man Into Harm; Yet Too Much Suspicion Is As Bad As Too Little Sense.
Men
Guilt
Too Much
Our Souls Belong To Our Bodies, Not Our Bodies To Our Souls.
Soul
Body
There Is No Quality In This World That Is Not What It Is Merely By Contrast. Nothing Exists In Itself.
Reality
Quality
World
We Should, If Possible, Prove A Teacher To Posterity, Instead Of Being The Pupil Of By-gone Generations. More Shall Come After Us Than Have Gone Before; The World Is Not Yet Middle-aged.
Teacher
Generations
Gone
If You Are Poor, Avoid Wine As A Costly Luxury; If You Are Rich, Shun It As A Fatal Indulgence. Stick To Plain Water.
Wine
Luxury
Water
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.
Men
Sea
Fishing
Start Her, Now; Give 'em The Long And Strong Stroke, Tashtego. Start Her, Tash, My Boy-start Her, All; But Keep Cool, Keep Cool-cucumbers Is The Word-easy, Easy-only Start Her Like Grim Death And Grinning Devils, And Raise The Buried Dead Perpendicular Out Of Their Graves, Boys-that's All. Start Her!
Strong
Boys
Sea
Silence Is The Only Voice Of Our God.
Change
Voice
Silence
However Baby Man May Brag Of His Science And Skill, And However Much, In A Flattering Future, That Science And Skill May Augment; Yet For Ever And For Ever, To The Crack Of Doom, The Sea Will Insult And Murder Him, And Pulverize The Stateliest, Stiffest Frigate He Can Make; Nevertheless, By The Continual Repetition Of These Very Impressions, Man Has Lost That Sense Of The Full Awfulness Of The Sea Which Aboriginally Belongs To It.
Baby
Men
Sea
True Places Are Not Found On Maps.
Maps
Found
A Chaplain Is The Minister Of The Prince Of Peace Serving The Host Of The God Of War--mars. As Such, He Is As Incongruous As A Musket Would Be On The Altar At Christmas. Why, Then, Is He There? Because He Indirectly Subserves The Purpose Attested By The Cannon; Because Too He Lends The Sanction Of The Religion Of The Meek To That Which Practically Is The Abrogation Of Everything But Brute Force.
War
Would Be
Purpose
In Time Of Peril, Like The Needle To The Loadstone, Obedience, Irrespective Of Rank, Generally Flies To Him Who Is Best Fitted To Command.
Obedience
Peril
Command
It Is Plain And Demonstrable, That Much Ale Is Not Good For Yankee, And Operates Differently Upon Them From What It Does Upon A Briton; Ale Must Be Drank In A Fog And A Drizzle.
Yankees
Fog
Doe
Why Is Almost Every Robust Healthy Boy With A Robust Healthy Soul In Him, At Some Time Or Other Crazy To Go To Sea? Why Upon Your First Voyage As A Passenger, Did You Yourself Feel Such A Mystical Vibration, When First Told That You And Your Ship Were Now Out Of Sight Of Land? Why Did The Old Persians Hold The Sea Holy? Why Did The Greeks Give It A Separate Deity, And Own Brother Of Jove? Surely All This Is Not Without Meaning.
Brother
Crazy
Boys
The Great God Absolute! The Centre And Circumference Of All Democracy! His Omnipresence, Our Divine Equality!
God
Democracy
Divine
Dream Tonight Of Peacock Tails, Diamond Fields And Spouter Whales. Ills Are Many, Blessing Few, But Dreams Tonight Will Shelter You.
Dream
Blessing
Whales
If You Begin The Day With A Laugh, You May, Nevertheless, End It With A Sob And A Sigh.
Laughing
May
Pessimism
A Smile Is The Chosen Vehicle Of All Ambiguities.
Happiness
Smile
Laughter
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. (you Perceive I Employ A Capital Initial In The Pronoun Referring To The Deity; Don't You Think There Is A Slight Dash Of Flunkeyism In That Usage?).
Heart
Men
Thinking
In The Operative Opinion Of The World, He Who Is Already Fully Provided With What Is Necessary For Him, That Man Shall Have More;while He Who Is Deplorably Destitute Of The Same, He Shall Have Taken Away From Him Even That Which He Hath. Yet The World Vows It Is A Very Plain, Downright Matter-of-fact, Plodding, Humane Sort Of World.
Taken
Men
World
Hell Is An Idea First Born On An Undigested Apple Dumpling.
Food
Ideas
Apples
A Good Laugh Is A Mighty Good Thing, And Rather Too Scarce A Good Thing; The More's The Pity. So, If Any One Man, In His Own Proper Person, Afford Stuff For A Good Joke To Anybody, Let Him Not Be Backward, But Let Him Cheerfully Allow Himself To Spend And Be Spent In That Way. And The Man That Has Anything Bountifully Laughable About Him, Be Sure There Is More In That Man Than You Perhaps Think For.
Men
Thinking
Laughing
There Are Some Enterprises In Which A Careful Disorderliness Is The True Method.
Order
Literature
Method
Whenever We Discover A Dislike In Us, Toward Any One, We Should Ever Be A Little Suspicious Of Ourselves.
Littles
Should
Suspicious
Love's Secrets, Being Mysteries, Ever Pertain To The Transcendent And The Infinite; And So They Are As Airy Bridges, By Which Ourfurther Shadows Pass Over Into The Regions Of The Golden Mists And Exhalations; Whence All Poetical, Lovely Thoughts Are Engendered, And Drop Into Us, As Though Pearls Should Drop From Rainbows.
Love
Bridges
Rainbow
Both The Ancestry And Posterity Of Grief Go Further Than The Ancestry And Posterity Of Joy.
Grief
Joy
Ancestry
Whenever I Find Myself Growing Grim About The Mouth; Whenever It Is A Damp, Drizzly November In My Soul; Whenever I Find Myself Involuntarily Pausing Before Coffin Warehouses, And Bringing Up The Rear Of Every Funeral I Meet; And Especially Whenever My Hypos Get Such An Upper Hand Of Me, That It Requires A Strong Moral Principle To Prevent Me From Deliberately Stepping Into The Street, And Methodically Knocking People's Hats Off - Then, I Account It High Time To Get To Sea As Soon As I Can.
Depression
Strong
Hands
The Sweetest Joys Of Life Grow In The Very Jaws Of Its Perils.
Joy
Danger
Peril
Out Of The Trunk, The Branches Grow; Out Of Them, The Twigs. So, In Productive Subjects, Grow The Chapters.
Branches
Twigs
Chapters
He Knows Himself, And All That's In Him, Who Knows Adversity.
Knowledge
Adversity
Self
One Of The Coolest And Wisest Hours A Man Has, Is Just After He Awakes In The Morning.
Wisdom
Morning
Men
A Thing May Be Incredible And Still Be True; Sometimes It Is Incredible Because It Is True.
Truth
May
Sometimes
There Are Some Persons In This World, Who, Unable To Give Better Proof Of Being Wise, Take A Strange Delight In Showing What They Think They Have Sagaciously Read In Mankind By Uncharitable Suspicions Of Them.
Wise
Thinking
Giving
Real Strength Never Impairs Beauty Or Harmony, But It Often Bestows It, And In Everything Imposingly Beautiful, Strength Has Much To Do With The Magic.
Inspirational
Strength
Beautiful
I Have Written A Wicked Book, And Feel Spotless As The Lamb.
Book
Wicked
Lambs
In What Rapt Ether Sails The World, Of Which The Weariest Will Never Weary?
World
Sail
Weary
The Urbane Activity With Which A Man Receives Money Is Really Marvelous, Considering That We So Earnestly Believe Money To Be The Root Of All Earthly Ills, And That On No Account Can A Monied Man Enter Heaven. Ah! How Cheerfully We Consign Ourselves To Perdition!
Believe
Men
Roots
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.
Heart
Thinking
Brain
The So-called Transcendentalists Are Not The Only People Who Deal In Transcendentals. On The Contrary, We Seem To See That The Utilitarians,--the Every-day World's People Themselves, Far Transcend Those Inferior Transcendentalists By Their Own Incomprehensible Worldly Maxims.
People
World
Transcendentalism
It Is Not The Purpose Of Literature To Purvey News. For News Consult The Almanac De Gotha.
Purpose
News
Literature
Is Ahab, Ahab? Is It I, God, Or Who, That Lifts This Arm? But If The Great Sun Move Not Of Himself; But Is An Errand-boy In Heaven; Nor One Single Star Can Revolve, But By Some Invisible Power; How Then Can This One Small Heart Beat; This One Small Brain Think Thoughts; Unless God Does That Beating, Does That Thinking, Does That Living, And Not I.
Stars
Moving
Heart
Not One Man In Five Cycles, Who Is Wise, Will Expect Appreciative Recognition From His Fellows, Or Any One Of Them.
Wise
Men
Recognition
The Sea Had Jeeringly Kept His Finite Body Up, But Drowned The Infinite Of His Soul.
Sea
Soul
Body
There Is The Grand Truth About Nathaniel Hawthorne. He Says No! In Thunder; But The Devil Himself Cannot Make Him Say Yes. For All Men Who Say Yes, Lie; And All Men Who Say No,why, They Are In The Happy Condition Of Judicious, Unincumbered Travellers In Europe; They Cross The Frontiers Into Eternity With Nothing But A Carpet-bag,that Is To Say, The Ego. Whereas Those Yes-gentry, They Travel With Heaps Of Baggage, And, Damn Them! They Will Never Get Through The Custom House.
Lying
Men
Europe
To The Last, I Grapple With Thee; From Hell's Heart, I Stab At Thee; For Hate's Sake, I Spit My Last Breath At Thee.
Life And Love
Hate
Heart
Beneath Those Stars Is A Universe Of Gliding Monsters.
Stars
Monsters
Gliding
The Earliest Instinct Of The Child, And The Ripest Experience Of Age, Unite In Affirming Simplicity To Be The Truest And Profoundest Part For Man. Likewise This Simplicity Is So Universal And All-containing As A Rule For Human Life, That The Subtlest Bad Man, And The Purest Good Man, As Well As The Profoundest Wise Man, Do All Alike Present It On That Side Which They Socially Turn To The Inquisitive And Unscrupulous World.
Wise
Children
Men
But Even So, Amid The Tornadoed Atlantic Of My Being, Do I Myself Still For Ever Centrally Disport In Mute Calm; And While Ponderous Planets Of Unwaning Woe Revolve Round Me, Deep Down And Deep Inland There I Still Bathe Me In Eternal Mildness Of Joy.
Joy
Down And
Woe
Warmest Climes But Nurse The Cruellest Fangs: The Tiger Of Bengal Crouches In Spiced Groves Of Ceaseless Verdure. Skies The Most Effulgent But Basket The Deadliest Thunders: Gorgeous Cuba Knows Tornadoes That Never Swept Tame Northern Lands.
Land
Sky
Nurse
To Know How To Grow Old Is The Master Work Of Wisdom, And One Of The Most Difficult Chapters In The Great Art Of Living.
Life
Birthday
Time
For, As When The Red-cheeked, Dancing Girls, April And May, Trip Home To The Wintry, Misanthropic Woods; Even The Barest, Ruggedest, Most Thunder-cloven Old Oak Will At Least Send Forth Some Few Green Sprouts, To Welcome Such Glad-hearted Visitants . . .
Girl
Home
Dancing
We Die, Because We Live.
Life
Death
Dies
Cannibalism To A Certain Moderate Extent Is Practised Among Several Of The Primitive Tribes In The Pacific, But It Is Upon The Bodies Of Slain Enemies Alone; And Horrible And Fearful As The Custom Is, Immeasurably As It Is To Be Abhorred And Condemned, Still I Assert That Those Who Indulge In It Are In Other Respects Humane And Virtuous.
Indulge In
Enemy
Cannibalism
And Tell Him To Paint Me A Sign, With-no Suicides Permitted Here, And No Smloing In The Parlor; Might As Well Kill Both Birds At Once.
Suicide
Bird
Might
The Dinner-hour Is The Summer Of The Day: Full Of Sunshine, I Grant; But Not Like The Mellow Autumn Of Supper.
Summer
Sunshine
Autumn
We Cannot Live For Ourselves Alone.
Invisible Threads
Serving The Community
If There Be Any Thing A Man Might Well Pray Against, That Thing Is The Responsive Gratification Of Some Of The Devoutest Prayers Of His Youth.
Prayer
Men
Might
Think Of It. To Go Down To Posterity As A 'man Who Lived Among The Cannibals.'
Men
Thinking
Cannibal
Mystery Is In The Morning, And Mystery In The Night, And The Beauty Of Mystery Is Everywhere; But Still The Plain Truth Remains, That Mouth And Purse Must Be Filled.
Morning
Night
Purses
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?
Ignorant
Half
Action
Are There No Moravians In The Moon, That Not A Missionary Has Yet Visited This Poor Pagan Planet Of Ours, To Civilise Civilisation And Christianise Christendom?
Moon
Missionary
Pagan
Do Not Presume, Well-housed, Well-warmed, And Well-fed, To Criticize The Poor
Poor
Feds
Criticize
But Oh! Shipmates! On The Starboard Hand Of Every Woe, There Is A Sure Delight; And Higher The Top Of That Delight, Than The Bottom Of The Woe Is Deep.
Hands
Delight
Woe
To Produce A Mighty Book, You Must Choose A Mighty Theme. No Great And Enduring Volume Can Ever Be Written On The Flea, Though Many There Be That Have Tried It.
Book
Writing
Literature
Whatever My Fate, I'll Go To It Laughing.
Fate
Laughing
The Further Our Civilization Advances Upon Its Present Lines So Much The Cheaper Sort Of Thing Does "fame" Become, Especially Of The Literary Sort. This Species Of "fame" A Waggish Acquaintance Says Can Be Manufactured To Order, And Sometimes Is So Manufactured.
Civilization
Order
Literature
Nothing Can Lift The Heart Of Man Like Manhood In A Fellow Man.
Heart
Men
Fellow Man
Truly To Enjoy Bodily Warmth, Some Small Part Of You Must Be Cold, For There Is No Quality In This World That Is Not What It Is Merely By Contrast. Nothing Exists In Itself. If You Flatter Yourself That You Are All Over Comfortable, And Have Been So A Long Time, Then You Cannot Be Said To Be Comfortable Any More.
Long
Quality
World
Say What Some Poets Will, Nature Is Not So Much Her Own Ever-sweet Interpreter, As The Mere Supplier Of That Cunning Alphabet, Whereby Selecting And Combining As He Pleases, Each Man Reads His Own Peculiar Lesson According To His Own Peculiar Mind And Mood.
Sweet
Men
Mind
I Don't Know But A Book In A Man's Brain Is Better Off Than A Book Bound In Calf--at Any Rate It Is Safer From Criticism. And Taking A Book Off The Brain, Is Akin To The Ticklish & Dangerous Business Of Taking An Old Painting Off A Panel--you Have To Scrape Off The Whole Brain In Order To Get At It With Due Safety--& Even Then, The Painting May Not Be Worth The Trouble.
Book
Creativity
Men
For God's Sake, Be Economical With Your Lamps And Candles! Not A Gallon You Burn, But At Least One Drop Of Man's Blood Was Spilled For It.
Men
Blood
Lamps
In Armies, Navies, Cities, Or Families, In Nature Herself, Nothing More Relaxes Good Order Than Misery.
Army
Order
Cities
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.
God
Law
Joy
It Is The Easiest Thing In The World For A Man To Look As If He Had A Great Secret In Him.
Men
Secret
Looks
I Am Madness Maddened! That Wild Madness That's Only Calm To Comprehend Itself
Calm
Madness
Queequeg Was A Native Of Kokovoko, An Island Far Away To The West And South. It Is Not Down In Any Map; True Places Never Are.
Islands
Maps
West
When I Think Of This Life I Have Led; The Desolation Of Solitude It Has Been; The Masoned, Walled-town Of A Captain's Exclusiveness, Which Admits But Small Entrance To Any Sympathy From The Green Country Without - Oh, Weariness! Heaviness! Guinea-coast Slavery Of Solitary Command!
Life
Country
Thinking
That Nameless And Infinitely Delicate Aroma Of Inexpressible Tenderness And Attentiveness Which, In Every Refined And Honorable Attachment, Is Contemporary With The Courtship, And Precedes The Final Banns And The Rite; But Which, Like The Bouquet Of The Costliest German Wines, Too Often Evaporates Upon Pouring Love Out To Drink, In The Disenchanting Glasses Of The Matrimonial Days And Nights.
Love
Marriage
Wine
He Who Goes Oftenest Round Cape Horn Goes The Most Circumspectly.
Capes
Danger
Horns
Did All The Lets And Bars Appear To Every Just Or Larger End, Whence Should Come The Trust And Cheer? Youth Must Its Ignorant Impulse Lend-- Age Finds Place In The Rear. All Wars Are Boyish, And Are Fought By Boys, The Champions And Enthusiasts Of The State
Cheer
War
Boys
I Rejoice In My Spine, As In The Firm Audacious Staff Of That Flag Which I Fling Half Out To The World.
Flags
Half
World
Of All Insults, The Temporary Condescension Of A Master To A Slave Is The Most Outrageous And Galling. That Potentate Who Most Condescends, Mark Him Well; For That Potentate, If Occasion Come, Will Prove Your Uttermost Tyrant.
Tyrants
Insult
Slave
Great Towers Take Time To Construct.
Patience
Persistence
Towers
Were Civilization Itself To Be Estimated By Some Of Its Results, It Would Seem Perhaps Better For What We Call The Barbarous Part Of The World To Remain Unchanged.
Civilization
World
Results
Because No Man Can Ever Feel His Own Identity Aright Except His Eyes Be Closed; As If Darkness Were Indeed The Proper Element Of Our Essences, Though Light Be More Congenial To Our Clayey Part.
Eye
Men
Light
Stripped Of The Cunning Artifices Of The Tailor, And Standing Forth In The Garb Of Eden - What A Sorry Set Of Round-shouldered, Spindle-shanked, Crane-necked Varlets Would Civilized Men Appear!
Sorry
Men
Eden
There Is A Touch Of Divinity Even In Brutes, And A Special Halo About A Horse, That Should Forever Exempt Him From Indignities.
Horse
Forever
Special
Madman! Look Through My Eyes If Thou Hast None Of Thine Own.
Eye
Looks
Madmen
When Beholding The Tranquil Beauty And Brilliancy Of The Ocean’s Skin, One Forgets The Tiger Heart That Pants Beneath It; And Would Not Willingly Remember That This Velvet Paw But Conceals A Remorseless Fang.
Beauty
Ocean
Heart
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