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Take Almost Any Path You Please, And Ten To One It Carries You Down In A Dale, And Leaves You There By A Pool In The Stream. There Is Magic In It. Let The Most Absent-minded Of Men Be Plunged In His Deepest Reveries--stand That Man On His Legs, Set His Feet A-going, And He Will Infallibly Lead You To Water, If Water There Be In All That Region. Should You Ever Be Athirst In The Great American Desert, Try This Experiment, If Your Caravan Happen To Be Supplied With A Metaphysical Professor. Yes, As Every One Knows, Meditation And Water Are Wedded For Ever.

-Herman Melville

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Take Almost Any Path

Herman Melville

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Take Almost Any Path You Please, And Ten To One It Carries You Down In A Dale, And Leaves You There By A Pool In The Stream. There Is Magic In It. Let The Most Absent-minded Of Men Be Plunged In His Deepest Reveries--stand That Man On His Legs, Set His Feet A-going, And He Will Infallibly Lead You To Water, If Water There Be In All That Region. Should You Ever Be Athirst In The Great American Desert, Try This Experiment, If Your Caravan Happen To Be Supplied With A Metaphysical Professor. Yes, As Every One Knows, Meditation And Water Are Wedded For Ever.

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As For Me, I Am Tormented With An Everlasting Itch For Things Remote. I Love To Sail Forbidden Seas, And Land On Barbarous Coasts.

Struck Dead By An Angel Of God! Yet The Angel Must Hang!

The Western Spirit Is, Or Will Yet Be (for No Other Is, Or Can Be) The True American One.

Nature Has Not Implanted Any Power In Man That Was Not Meant To Be Exercised At Times, Though Too Often Our Powers Have Been Abused.

Were Not Meant To Be

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.

There Are Some Enterprises In Which A Careful Disorderliness Is The True Method.

For The Profit Of Travel: In The First Place, You Get Rid Of A Few Prejudices.... The Prejudiced Against Color Finds Several Hundred Millions Of People Of All Shades Of Color, And All Degrees Of Intellect, Rank, And Social Worth, Generals, Judges, Priests, And Kings, And Learns To Give Up His Foolish Prejudice.

Where Does Any Novelist Pick Up Any Character? For The Most Part, In Town, To Be Sure.

One Of The Coolest And Wisest Hours A Man Has, Is Just After He Awakes In The Morning.

Dream Tonight Of Peacock Tails, Diamond Fields And Spouter Whales. Ills Are Many, Blessing Few, But Dreams Tonight Will Shelter You.

Yea, Foolish Mortals, Noah's Flood Is Not Yet Subsided; Two Thirds Of The Fair World It Yet Covers.

Let Us Only Hate Hatred; And Once Give Love A Play, We Will Fall In Love With A Unicorn.

I Would Prefer Not To.

The Consciousness Of Being Deemed Dead, Is Next To The Presumable Unpleasantness Of Being So In Reality. One Feels Like His Own Ghost Unlawfully Tenanting A Defunct Carcass.

There Is No Quality In This World That Is Not What It Is Merely By Contrast. Nothing Exists In Itself.

To Be Called One Thing, Is Oftentimes To Be Another.

I Rejoice In My Spine, As In The Firm Audacious Staff Of That Flag Which I Fling Half Out To The World.

Students Of History Are Horror-struck At The Massacres Of Old; But In The Shambles, Men Are Being Murdered To-day.

The Poor Man Wants Many Things; The Covetous Man, All.

Those Of Us Who Always Abhorred Slavery As An Atheistical Iniquity, Gladly We Join In The Exulting Chorus Of Humanity Over Its Downfall.

To Certain Temperaments, Especially When Previously Agitated By Any Deep Feeling, There Is Perhaps Nothing More Exasperating, Andwhich Sooner Explodes All Self-command, Than The Coarse, Jeering Insolence Of A Porter, Cabman, Or Hack-driver.

Madman! Look Through My Eyes If Thou Hast None Of Thine Own.

Woe To Him Whom This World Charms From Gospel Duty. Woe To Him Who Seeks To Pour Oil Upon The Waters When God Has Brewed Them Into A Gale. Woe To Him Who Seeks To Please Rather Than To Appal. Woe To Him Whose Good Name Is More To Him Than Goodness. Woe To Him Who, In This World, Courts Not Dishonor! Woe To Him Who Would Not Be True, Even Though To Be False Were Salvation. Yea, Woe To Him Who, As The Great Pilot Paul Has It, While Preaching To Others Is Himself A Castaway.

Is There Some Principal Of Nature Which States That We Never Know The Quality Of What We Have Until It Is Gone?

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.

It Is Hard To Be Finite Upon An Infinite Subject, And All Subjects Are Infinite.

None But A Good Man Is Really A Living Man, And The More Good Any Man Does, The More He Really Lives. All The Rest Is Death, Or Belongs To It.

Zeal Is Not Of Necessity Religion, Neither Is It Always Of The Same Essence With Poetry Or Patriotism.

Ignorance Is The Father Of All Fear.

Faith, Like A Jackal, Feeds Among The Tombs, And Even From These Dead Doubts She Gathers Her Most Vital Hope.

Top-heavy Was The Ship As A Dinnerless Student With All Aristotle In His Head.

There Is Something Wrong About The Man Who Wants Help. There Is Somewhere A Deep Defect, A Want, In Brief, A Need, A Crying Need, Somewhere About That Man.

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.

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.

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.

He Piled Upon The Whale's White Hump The Sum Of All The General Rage And Hate Felt By His Whole Race From Adam Down; And Then, As If His Chest Had Been A Mortar, He Burst His Hot Heart's Shell Upon It.

I Love To Sail Forbidden Seas, And Land On Barbarous Coasts.

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.

We Incline To Think That God Cannot Explain His Own Secrets And That He Would Like A Little Information Upon Certain Points Himself. We Mortals Astonish Him As Much As He Us. But It Is This Being Of The Matter; There Lies The Knot With Which We Choke Ourselves. As Soon As You Say Me, A God, A Nature, So Soon You Jump Off From Your Stool And Hang From The Beam. Yes, That Word Is The Hangman. Take God Out Of The Dictionary, And You Would Have Him In The Street.

Out Of The Trunk, The Branches Grow; Out Of Them, The Twigs. So, In Productive Subjects, Grow The Chapters.

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.

The World's A Ship On Its Voyage Out, And Not A Voyage Complete; And The Pulpit Is Its Prow.

Where Lies The Final Harbor, Whence We Unmoor No More?

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.

We Cannot Live For Ourselves Alone.

Invisible Threads

Serving The Community

God Is Liberal Of Color; So Should Man Be.

All Men Live Enveloped In Whale-lines. All Are Born With Halters Round Their Necks; But It Is Only When Caught In The Swift, Sudden Turn Of Death, That Mortals Realize The Silent, Subtle, Ever-present Perils Of Life. And If You Be A Philosopher, Though Seated In The Whale-boat, You Would Not At Heart Feel One Whit More Of Terror, Than Though Seated Before Your Evening Fire With A Poker, And Not A Harpoon, By Your Side.

Truth Is The Silliest Thing Under The Sun. Try To Get A Living By The Truth And Go To The Soup Societies. Heavens! Let Any Clergyman Try To Preach The Truth From Its Very Stronghold, The Pulpit, And They Would Ride Him Out Of His Church On His Own Pulpit Bannister.

There Is One Knows Not What Sweet Mystery About This Sea, Whose Gently Awful Stirrings Seem To Speak Of Some Hidden Soul Beneath.

In Time Of Peril, Like The Needle To The Loadstone, Obedience, Irrespective Of Rank, Generally Flies To Him Who Is Best Fitted To Command.

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!

Whatever Has Made, Or Does Make, Or May Make Music, Should Be Held Sacred As The Golden Bridle-bit Of The Shah Of Persia's Horse,and The Golden Hammer, With Which His Hoofs Are Shod.

He Who Is Ready To Despair In Solitary Peril, Plucks Up A Heart In The Presence Of Another. In A Plurality Of Comrades Is Much Countenance And Consolation.

At Last The Anchor Was Up, The Sails Were Set, And Off We Glided. It Was A Sharp, Cold Christmas; And As The Short Northern Day Merged Into Night, We Found Ourselves Almost Broad Upon The Wintry Ocean, Whose Freezing Spray Cased Us In Ice, As In Polished Armor.

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.

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?

But When A Man Suspects Any Wrong It Sometimes Happens That If He Be Already Involved In The Matter He Insensibly Strives To Cover Up His Suspicions Even From Himself. And Much This Way It Was With Me. I Said Nothing And Tried To Think Nothing.

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.

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.

Thou Saw'st The Locked Lovers When Leaping From Their Flaming Ship; Heart To Heart They Sank Beneath The Exulting Wave; True To Each Other, When Heaven Seemed False To Them.

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.

We May Have Civilized Bodies And Yet Barbarous Souls. We Are Blind To The Real Sights Of This World; Deaf To Its Voice; And Dead To Its Death. And Not Till We Know, That One Grief Outweighs Ten Thousand Joys Will We Become What Christianity Is Striving To Make Us.

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.

You Cannot Spill A Drop Of American Blood Without Spilling The Blood Of The Whole World.... We Are Not A Nation, So Much As A World.

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.

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 . . .

For In Tremendous Extremities Human Souls Are Like Drowning Men; Well Enough They Know They Are In Peril; Well Enough They Know The Causes Of That Peril;--nevertheless, The Sea Is The Sea, And These Drowning Men Do Drown.

Some Dying Men Are The Most Tyrannical; And Certainly, Since They Will Shortly Trouble Us So Little For Evermore, The Poor Fellows Ought To Be Indulged.

But As In Landlessness Alone Resides The Highest Truth, Shoreless, Indefinite As God - So Better Is It To Perish In That Howling Infinite, Than Be Ingloriously Dashed Upon The Lee, Even If That Were Safety! For Worm-like, Then, Oh! Who Would Craven Crawl To Land!

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.

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.

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.

A True Military Officer Is In One Particular Like A True Monk. Not With More Self-abnegation Will The Latter Keep His Vows Of Monastic Obedience Than The Former His Vows Of Allegiance To Martial Duty.

The American, Who Up To The Present Day, Has Evinced, In Literature, The Largest Brain With The Largest Heart, That Man Is Nathaniel Hawthorne.

See With What Entire Freedom The Whaleman Takes His Handful Of Lamps-often But Old Bottles And Vials, Though. ... He Burns, Too, The Purest Of Oil. ... It Is Sweet As Early Grass Butter In April. He Goes And Hunts For His Oil, So As To Be Sure Of Its Freshness And Genuineness, Even As The Traveler On The Prairie Hunts Up His Own Supper Of Game.

I Am, As I Am; Whether Hideous, Or Handsome, Depends Upon Who Is Made Judge.

If A Well-constituted Individual Refrains From Blazoning Aught Amiss Or Calamitous In His Family, A Nation In The Like Circumstance May Without Reproach Be Equally Discreet.

Thus It Often Is, That The Constant Friction Of Illiberal Minds Wears Out At Last The Best Resolves Of The More Generous.

Appalling Is The Soul Of A Man! Better Might One Be Pushed Off Into The Material Spaces Beyond The Uttermost Orbit Of Our Sun, Than Once Feel Himself Fairly Afloat In Himself.

All Wars Are Boyish, And Are Fought By Boys.

As In Digging For Precious Metals In The Mines, Much Earthy Rubbish Has First To Be Troublesomely Handled And Thrown Out; So, In Digging In One's Soul For The Fine Gold Of Genius, Much Dullness And Common-place Is First Brought To Light.

The Stillness Of The Calm Is Awful. His Voice Begins To Grow Strange And Portentous. He Feels It In Him Like Something Swallowed Too Big For The Esophagus. It Keeps Up A Sort Of Involuntary Interior Humming In Him, Like A Live Beetle. His Cranium Is A Dome Full Of Reverberations. The Hollows Of His Very Bones Are As Whispering Galleries. He Is Afraid To Speak Loud, Lest He Be Stunned; Like The Man In The Bass Drum.

Praise When Merited Is Not A Boon: Yet To A Generous Nature, Is It Pleasant To Utter It.

Until We Understand That Our Grief Outweighs A Thousand Joys, We Will Never Understand What Christianity Is All About.

I Baptize You Not In The Name Of The Father, But In The Name Of The Devil. (ego Baptizo Te In Nomine Patris, Sed In Nomine Diaboli.)

The Only True Infidelity Is For A Live Man To Vote Himself Dead.

I Know Not All That May Be Coming, But Be It What It Will, I'll Go To It Laughing.

...a Man Of True Science Uses Few Hard Words, And Those Only When None Other Will Answer His Purpose; Where As The Smatterer In Science...thinks That By Mouthing Hard Words He Understands Hard Things.

It Is Upon Record, That Three Centuries Ago The Tongue Of The Right Whale Was Esteemed A Great Delicacy In France, And Commanded Large Prices There.

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.

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.

There Are Times When Even The Most Potent Governor Must Wink At Transgression, In Order To Preserve The Laws Inviolate For The Future.

For There Is No Folly Of The Beast Of The Earth Which Is Not Infinitely Outdone By The Madness Of Men

The Idea Of Jehovah Was Born Here... Out Of The Rude Elements Of The Insignificant Thoughts Thoughts That Are In All Men, They Reared The Transcendent Conception Of A God.

A Thing May Be Incredible And Still Be True; Sometimes It Is Incredible Because It Is True.

Evil Is The Chronic Malady Of The Universe, And Checked In One Place, Breaks Forth In Another.

So, Cutting The Lashing Of The Waterproof Match Keg, After Many Failures Starbuck Contrived To Ignite The Lamp In The Lantern; Then Stretching It On A Waif Pole, Handed It To Queequeg As The Standard-bearer Of This Forlorn Hope. There, Then, He Sat, Holding Up That Imbecile Candle In The Heart Of That Almighty Forlornness. There, Then, He Sat, The Sign And Symbol Of A Man Without Faith, Hopelessly Holding Up Hope In The Midst Of Despair.

The Lightning Flashes Through My Skull; Mine Eyeballs Ache And Ache; My Whole Beaten Brain Seems As Beheaded, And Rolling On Some Stunning Ground.

Father Mapple Paused A Little; Then Kneeling In The Pulpit's Bows, Folded His Large Brown Hands Across His Chest, Uplifted His Closed Eyes, And Offered A Prayer So Deeply Devout That He Seemed Kneeling And Praying At The Bottom Of The Sea.

If Some Books Are Deemed Most Baneful And Their Sale Forbid, How Then With Deadlier Facts, Not Dreams Of Doting Men? Those Whom Books Will Hurt Will Not Be Proof Against Events. Events, Not Books Should Be Forbid.

I Am Sorry To Say We Whites Have A Sad Reputation Among Many Of The Polynesians. The Natives Of These Islands Are Naturally Of A Kindly And Hospitable Temper, But There Has Been Implanted Among Them An Almost Instinctive Hate Of The White Man. They Esteem Us, With Rare Exceptions, Such As Some Of The Missionaries, The Most Barbarous, Treacherous, Irreligious, And Devilish Creatures On The Earth.

A Gentleman Of Typee Can Bring Up A Numerous Family Of Children And Give Them All A Highly Respectable Cannibal Education, With Infinitely Less Toil And Anxiety Than He Expends In The Simple Process Of Striking A Light; Whilst A Poor European Artisan, Who Through The Instrumentality Of A Lucifer Performs The Same Operation In One Second, Is Put To His Wits' End To Provide For His Starving Offspring That Food Which The Children Of A Polynesian Father, Without Troubling Their Parent, Pluck From The Branches Of Every Tree Around Them.

The Food Of Thy Soul Is Light And Space; Feed It Then On Light And Space. But The Food Of Thy Body Is Champagne And Oysters; Feed It Then On Champagne And Oysters; And So Shall It Merit A Joyful Resurrection, If There Is Any To Be.

Where Do Murderers Go, Man! Who's To Doom, When The Judge Himself Is Dragged To The Bar?

Man And Boy, I Have Lived Ever Since I Can Remember.

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.

The Dinner-hour Is The Summer Of The Day: Full Of Sunshine, I Grant; But Not Like The Mellow Autumn Of Supper.

People Seem To Have A Great Love For Names. For To Know A Great Many Names Seems To Look Like Knowing A Good Many Things.

What Is An Atheist, But One Who Does Not, Or Will Not, See In The Universe A Ruling Principle Of Love; And What A Misanthrope, But One Who Does Not, Or Will Not, See In Man A Ruling Principle Of Kindness?

Standing Navies, As Well As Standing Armies, Serve To Keep Alive The Spirit Of War Even In The Meek Heart Of Peace. In Its Very Embers And Smoulderings, They Nourish That Fatal Fire, And Half-pay Officers, As The Priests Of Mars, Yet Guard The Temple, Though No God Be There.

Climate Of Egypt In Winter Is The Reign Of Spring Upon Earth, & Summer In The Air, And Tranquility In The Heat.

Nothing So Aggravates An Earnest Person As A Passive Resistance.

Passive Resistance

Love Is Both Creator's And Saviour's Gospel To Mankind; A Volume Bound In Rose-leaves, Clasped With Violets, And By The Beaks Of Humming-birds Printed With Peach-juice On The Leaves Of Lilies.

A Hermitage In The Forest Is The Refuge Of The Narrow-minded Misanthrope; A Hammock On The Ocean Is The Asylum For The Generous Distressed.

The Man's (a Heathen South Sea Islander) A Human Being, Just As I Am; He Has Just As Much Reason To Fear Me, As I Have To Be Afraid Of Him. Better Sleep With A Sober Cannibal Than A Drunken Christian.

...the Silent Reminiscence Of Hardships Departed, Is Sweeter Than The Presence Of Delight.

Nature Is Nobody's Ally.

Surely No Mere Mortal Who Has At All Gone Down Into Himself Will Ever Pretend That His Slightest Thought Or Act Solely Originates In His Own Defined Identity.

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.

Ah, Happiness Courts The Light So We Deem The World Is Gay. But Misery Hides Aloof So We Deem That Misery There Is None.

To Treat Of Human Actions Is To Deal Wholly With Second Causes.

In Our Man-of-war World, Life Comes In At One Gangway And Death Goes Overboard At The Other. Under The Man-of-war Scourge, Cursesmix With Tears; And The Sigh And The Sob Furnish The Bass To The Shrill Octave Of Those Who Laugh To Drown Buried Griefs Of Their Own.

Roll On, Thou Deep And Dark Blue Ocean, Roll! Ten Thousand Blubber-hunters Sweep Over Thee In Vain.

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.

Meditation And Water Are Wedded For Ever.

Think Not, Is My Eleventh Commandment; And Sleep When You Can, Is My Twelfth.

The Path To My Fixed Purpose Is Laid With Iron Rails Whereon My Soul Is Grooved To Run

In This World, Shipmates, Sin That Pays Its Way Can Travel Freely, And Without Passport; Whereas Virtue, If A Pauper, Is Stopped At All Frontiers.

Aye, Aye! And I'll Chase Him Round Good Hope, And Round The Horn, And Round The Norway Maelstrom, And Round Perdition's Flames Before I Give Him Up.

There Is No Life In Thee, Now, Except That Rocking Life Imparted By A Gently Rolling Ship; By Her, Borrowed From The Sea; By The Sea, From The Inscrutable Tides Of God.

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.

In Armies, Navies, Cities, Or Families, In Nature Herself, Nothing More Relaxes Good Order Than Misery.

But I Shall Follow The Endless, Winding Way, — The Flowing River In The Cave Of Man; Careless Whither I Be Led, Reckless Where I Land.

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.

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.

The Pulpit Is Ever This Earth's Foremost Part; All The Rest Comes In Its Rear; The Pulpit Leads The World. From Thence It Is The Storm Of God's Quick Wrath Is First Descried, And The Bow Must Bearthe Earliest Brunt. From Thence It Is The God Of Breezes Fair Or Foul Is First Invokedfor Favorable Winds. Yes, The World's A Ship On Its Passage Out, And Not A Voyage Complete; And The Pulpit Is Its Prow.

It Is Not Down In Any Map; True Places Never Are.

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!

Let America First Praise Mediocrity Even, In Her Children, Before She Praises... The Best Excellence In The Children Of Any Other Land.

Ladies Are Like Creeds; If You Cannot Speak Well Of Them, Say Nothing.

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.

Genius Is Full Of Trash.

The Great God Absolute! The Centre And Circumference Of All Democracy! His Omnipresence, Our Divine Equality!

Towards Thee I Roll, Thou All-destroying But Unconquering Whale... From Hell's Heart I Stab At Thee.

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.

For Though Consciences Are As Unlike As Foreheads, Every Intelligence, Not Including The Scriptural Devils Who "believe And Tremble" Has One.

War Should Be Carried On Like A Monsoon; One Changeless Determination Of Every Particle Towards The One Unalterable Aim.

To Be A Born American Citizen Seems A Guarantee Against Pauperism; And This, Perhaps, Springs From The Virtue Of A Vote.

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.

Better To Sleep With A Sober Cannibal Than A Drunken Christian.

Nature Has Not Implanted Any Power In Man That Was Not Meant To Be Exercised At Times, Though Too Often Our Powers Have Been Abused. The Privilege, Inborn And Inalienable, That Every Man Has Of Dying Himself, And Inflicting Death Upon Another, Was Not Given To Us Without A Purpose. These Are The Last Resources Of An Insulted And Unendurable Existence.

It Is Better To Fail In Originality, Than To Succeed In Imitation. He Who Has Never Failed Somewhere, That Man Can Not Be Great. Failure Is The True Test Of Greatness.

For Small Erections May Be Finished By Their First Architects; Grand Ones, True Ones, Ever Leave The Copestone To Posterity. God Keep Me From Ever Completing Anything. This Whole Book Is But A Draught—nay, But The Draught Of A Draught. Oh, Time, Strength, Cash, And Patience!

What Plays The Mischief With The Truth Is That Men Will Insist Upon The Universal Application Of A Temporary Feeling Or Opinion.

Civilization Has Not Ever Been The Brother Of Equality. Freedom Was Born Among The Wild Eyries In The Mountains; And Barbarous Tribes Have Sheltered Under Her Wings, When The Enlightened People Of The Plain Have Nestled Under Different Pinions.

Give Me A Condor's Quill! Give Me Vesuvius Crater For An Inkstand!

If You Can Get Nothing Better Out Of The World, Get A Good Dinner Out Of It, At Least.

I Do Not Think I Have Any Uncharitable Prejudice Against The Rattlesnake, Still, I Should Not Like To Be One.

Nothing May Help Or Heal While Amor Incensed Remembers Wrong.

In Glades They Meet Skull After Skull Where Pine Cones Lay-the Rusted Gun, Green Shoes Full Of Bones, The Mouldering Coat And Cuddled Up Skeleton; And Scores Of Such. Some Start As In Dreams, And Comrades Lost Bemoan; By The Edge Of Those Wilds Stonewall Had Charged- But The Year And The Man Were Gone.

Thrusted Light Is Worse Than Presented Pistols.

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.

Many Sensible Things Banished From High Life Find An Asylum Among The Mob.

War Being The Greatest Of Evils, All Its Accessories Necessarily Partake Of The Same Character.

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.

Swerve Me? The Path To My Fixed Purpose Is Laid With Iron Rails, Whereon My Soul Is Grooved To Run. Over Unsounded Gorges, Through The Rifled Hearts Of Mountains, Under Torrents' Beds, Unerringly I Rush! Naught's An Obstacle, Naught's An Angle To The Iron Way!

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.

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.

I Will Live And Die By This Testimony: That I Loved A Good Conscience; That I Never Invaded Another Man's Liberty; And That I Preserved My Own.

Ah, Bartleby! Ah, Humanity!

It Is Better To Fail In Originality Than To Succeed In Imitation.

Boy, Take My Advice, And Never Try To Invent Any Thing But--happiness.

No Philosophers So Thoroughly Comprehend Us As Dogs And Horses.

When Among Wild Beasts, If They Menace You, Be A Wild Beast.

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.

The Late John Jacob Astor, A Personage Little Given To Poetic Enthusiasm, Had No Hesitation In Pronouncing My First Grand Point To Be Prudence; My Next, Method. I Do Not Speak It In Vanity, But Simply Record The Fact, That I Was Not Unemployed In My Profession By The Late John Jacob Astor; A Name Which, I Admit, I Love To Repeat, For It Hath A Rounded And Orbicular Sound To It, And Rings Like Unto Bullion. I Will Freely Add, That I Was Not Insensible To The Late John Jacob Astor's Good Opinion.

The Ancients Of The Ideal Description, Instead Of Trying To Turn Their Impracticable Chimeras, As Does The Modern Dreamer, Into Social And Political Prodigies, Deposited Them In Great Works Of Art, Which Still Live While States And Constitutions Have Perished, Bequeathing To Posterity Not Shameful Defects But Triumphant Successes.

Friendship At First Sight, Like Love At First Sight, Is Said To Be The Only Truth.

The March Of Conquest Through Wild Provinces, May Be The March Of Mind; But Not The March Of Love.

Personal Prudence, Even When Dictated By Quite Other Than Selfish Considerations, Surely Is No Special Virtue In A Military Man; While An Excessive Love Of Glory, Impassioning A Less Burning Impulse, The Honest Sense Of Duty, Is The First.

Traveling Takes The Ink Out Of One's Pen As Well As The Cash Out Of One's Purse.

If You Are Poor, Avoid Wine As A Costly Luxury; If You Are Rich, Shun It As A Fatal Indulgence. Stick To Plain Water.

But The Past Is Passed; Why Moralize Upon It? Forget It. See, Yon Bright Son Has Forgotten It All, And The Blue Sea, And The Blue Sky; These Have Turned Over New Leaves. Because They Have No Memory . . . Because They Are Not Human.

This Divineness Had That In It Which, Though Commanding Worship, At The Same Time Enforced A Certain Nameless Terror.

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.

The Sailor Is Frankness, The Landsman Is Finesse. Life Is Not A Game With The Sailor, Demanding The Long Head--no Intricate Game Of Chess Where Few Moves Are Made In Straight-forwardness And Ends Are Attained By Indirection, An Oblique, Tedious, Barren Game Hardly Worth That Poor Candle Burnt Out In Playing It.

All Of Us Have Monarchs And Sages For Kinsmen; Nay, Angels And Archangels For Cousins; Since In Antediluvian Days, The Sons Of God Did Verily Wed With Our Mothers, The Irresistible Daughters Of Eve. Thus All Generations Are Blended: And Heaven And Earth Of One Kin: The Hierarchies Of Seraphs In The Uttermost Skies; The Thrones And Principalities In The Zodiac; The Shades That Roam Throughout Space; The Nations And Families, Flocks And Folds Of The Earth; One And All, Brothers In Essence-oh, Be We Then Brothers Indeed! All Things Form But One Whole.

They Talk Of The Dignity Of Work. The Dignity Is In Leisure.

That Hour In The Life Of A Man When First The Help Of Humanity Fails Him, And He Learns That In His Obscurity And Indigence Humanity Holds Him A Dog And No Man: That Hour Is A Hard One, But Not The Hardest. There Is Still Another Hour Which Follows, When He Learns That In His Infinite Comparative Minuteness And Abjectness, The Gods Do Likewise Despise Him, And Own Him Not Of Their Clan.

Youth Is Immortal; Tis The Elderly Only Grow Old!

As With Ships, So With Men; He Who Turns His Back To His Foe Gives Him An Advantage.

He Who Goes Oftenest Round Cape Horn Goes The Most Circumspectly.

All The World Over, The Picturesque Yields To The Pocketesque.

A Whale Ship Was My Yale College And My Harvard.

A Man Of True Science... Thinks, That By Mouthing Hard Words, He Proves That He Understands Hard Things.

My Means Are Sane, My Motives And My Object Mad.

The Result Of Civilization, At The Sandwich Islands And Elsewhere, Is Found Productive To The Civilizers, Destructive To The Civilizees. It Is Said To Be Compensation--a Very Philosophical Word; But It Appears To Be Very Much On The Principle Of The Old Game, "you Lose, I Win": Good Philosophy For The Winner.

A Smile Is The Chosen Vehicle Of All Ambiguities.

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.

That Immaculate Manliness We Feel Within Ourselves, So Far Within Us, That It Remains Intact Though All The Outer Character Seem Gone; Bleeds With Keenest Anguish At The Undraped Spectacle Of A Valor-ruined Man.

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