All deep, earnest thinking is but the intrepid effort of the soul to keep the open independence of her sea, while the wildest winds of heaven and earth conspire to cast her on the treacherous, slavish shore.
HERMAN MELVILLEI am, as I am; whether hideous, or handsome, depends upon who is made judge.
More Herman Melville Quotes
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There is no quality in this world that is not what it is merely by contrast. Nothing exists in itself.
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Benevolent desires, after passing a certain point, can not undertake their own fulfillment without incurring the risk of evils beyond those sought to be remedied.
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If you can get nothing better out of the world, get a good dinner out of it, at least.
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The Past is the textbook of tyrants; the Future the Bible of the Free. Those who are solely governed by the Past stand like Lot’s wife, crystallized in the act of looking backward, and forever incapable of looking before.
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A book in a man’s brain is better off than a book bound in calf – at any rate it is safer from criticism.
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A man of true science… thinks, that by mouthing hard words, he proves that he understands hard things.
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A smile is the chosen vehicle of all ambiguities.
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Man is a money-making animal, which propensity too often interferes with his benevolence.
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for there is no folly of the beast of the earth which is not infinitely outdone by the madness of men
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Silence is the only Voice of our God.
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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.
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Better be an old maid, a woman with herself as a husband, than the wife of a fool; and Solomon more than hints that all men are fools; and every wise man knows himself to be one.
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A thing may be incredible and still be true; sometimes it is incredible because it is true.
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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.
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A whale ship was my Yale College and my Harvard.
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Old age is always wakeful; as if, the longer linked with life, the less man has to do with aught that looks like death.
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In a multitude of acquaintances is less security, than in one faithful friend.
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The only true infidelity is for a live man to vote himself dead.
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Tis no dishonor when he who would dishonor you, only dishonors himself.
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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.
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Think not, is my eleventh commandment; and sleep when you can, is my twelfth.
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My body is but the lees of my better being.
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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?
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Fame is an accident; merit a thing absolute.
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Truth is in things, and not in words.
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Honor lies in the mane of a horse.
HERMAN MELVILLE