Only the man who says no is free
HERMAN MELVILLEOnly the man who says no is free
HERMAN MELVILLEThinking is, or ought to be, a coolness and a calmness; and our poor hearts throb, and our poor brains beat too much for that.
HERMAN MELVILLEA whale ship was my Yale College and my Harvard.
HERMAN MELVILLEFame is an accident; merit a thing absolute.
HERMAN MELVILLEI’ll try a pagan friend, thought I, since Christian kindness has proved but hollow courtesy.
HERMAN MELVILLETo know how to grow old is the master work of wisdom, and one of the most difficult chapters in the great art of living.
HERMAN MELVILLEAs for me, I am tormented with an everlasting itch for things remote. I love to sail forbidden seas, and land on barbarous coasts.
HERMAN MELVILLEThere is a savor of life and immortality in substantial fare. Like balloons, we are nothing till filled.
HERMAN MELVILLEHe who has never failed somewhere, that man can not be great.
HERMAN MELVILLETis no dishonor when he who would dishonor you, only dishonors himself.
HERMAN MELVILLEAll 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 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.
HERMAN MELVILLEThey talk of the dignity of work. The dignity is in leisure.
HERMAN MELVILLENature is nobody’s ally.
HERMAN MELVILLEWhat 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?
HERMAN MELVILLEWe cannot live for ourselves alone.
HERMAN MELVILLE