It is better to fail in originality than to succeed in imitation.
HERMAN MELVILLEThere’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.
More Herman Melville Quotes
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An utterly fearless man is a far more dangerous comrade than a coward.
HERMAN MELVILLE -
There are some enterprises in which a careful disorderliness is the true method.
HERMAN MELVILLE -
Whatever my fate, I’ll go to it laughing.
HERMAN MELVILLE -
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.
HERMAN MELVILLE -
I’ll try a pagan friend, thought I, since Christian kindness has proved but hollow courtesy.
HERMAN MELVILLE -
In a multitude of acquaintances is less security, than in one faithful friend.
HERMAN MELVILLE -
If you can get nothing better out of the world, get a good dinner out of it, at least.
HERMAN MELVILLE -
Yet habit – strange thing! what cannot habit accomplish?
HERMAN MELVILLE -
The worst of our evils we blindly inflict upon ourselves; our officers cannot remove them, even if they would.
HERMAN MELVILLE -
Is there some principal of nature which states that we never know the quality of what we have until it is gone?
HERMAN MELVILLE -
I do not think I have any uncharitable prejudice against the rattlesnake, still, I should not like to be one.
HERMAN MELVILLE -
Faith, like a jackal, feeds among the tombs, and even from these dead doubts she gathers her most vital hope.
HERMAN MELVILLE -
I cherish the greatest respect towards everybody’s religious obligations, no matter how comical.
HERMAN MELVILLE -
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.
HERMAN MELVILLE -
Tis no dishonor when he who would dishonor you, only dishonors himself.
HERMAN MELVILLE -
See how elastic our prejudices grow when once love comes to bend them.
HERMAN MELVILLE -
Stay true to the dreams of thy youth.
HERMAN MELVILLE -
Of all the preposterous assumptions of humanity over humanity, nothing exceeds most of the criticisms made on the habits of the poor by the well-housed, well- warmed, and well-fed.
HERMAN MELVILLE -
You know nothing till you know all; which is the reason we never know any thing.
HERMAN MELVILLE -
Nature is nobody’s ally.
HERMAN MELVILLE -
Man is a money-making animal, which propensity too often interferes with his benevolence.
HERMAN MELVILLE -
No philosophers so thoroughly comprehend us as dogs and horses.
HERMAN MELVILLE -
I know not all that may be coming, but be it what it will, I’ll go to it laughing.
HERMAN MELVILLE -
You cannot hide the soul.
HERMAN MELVILLE -
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 -
Hope is the struggle of the soul, breaking loose from what is perishable, and attesting her eternity.
HERMAN MELVILLE