Herman Melville Quotes - Page 20

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It is not the purpose of literature to purvey news. For news consult the Almanac de Gotha.

Herman Melville

Purpose, News, Literature

Herman Melville (1924). “The works of Herman Melville”

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If not against us, nature is not for us.

Herman Melville

Nature, Ifs

Herman Melville (1849). “Mardi: And a Voyage Thither”, p.246

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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!

Herman Melville

Strong, Boys, Sea

Herman Melville (2008). “Moby-Dick”, p.317, Velvet Element Books

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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.

Herman Melville

Men, Thinking, Cover Ups

Herman Melville (2016). “Moby Dick (World Classics, Unabridged)”, p.68, Vij Books India Pvt Ltd

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Where does any novelist pick up any character? For the most part, in town, to be sure.

Herman Melville

Character, Towns, Novelists

Herman Melville (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Herman Melville (Illustrated)”, p.3049, Delphi Classics

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The fact is, that among his hunters at least, the whale would by all hands be considered a noble dish, were there not so much of him; but when you come to sit down before a meat-pie nearly one hundred feet long, it takes away your appetite.

Herman Melville

Hands, Whales, Feet

Herman Melville (2016). “Moby Dick (World Classics, Unabridged)”, p.207, Vij Books India Pvt Ltd

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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.

Herman Melville

Art, Political, Dreamer

Herman Melville (1987). “Piazza Tales and Other Prose Pieces, 1839-1860: Volume Nine, Scholarly Edition”, p.409, Northwestern University Press

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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.

Herman Melville

Book, Creativity, Men

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I have written a wicked book, and feel spotless as the lamb. Ineffable socialities are in me. I would sit down and dine with you and all the gods in old Rome's Pantheon. It is a strange feeling--no hopefulness is in it, no despair. Content--that is it; and irresponsibility; but without licentious inclination.

Herman Melville

Book, Rome, Feelings

Herman Melville (2001). “Tales, Poems, and Other Writings”

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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.

Herman Melville

Whales, Three, Records

Herman Melville (2016). “Herman Melville The Dover Reader”, p.297, Courier Dover Publications

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In metropolitan cases, the love of the most single-eyed lover, almost invariably, is nothing more than the ultimate settling of innumerable wandering glances upon some one specific object.

Herman Melville

Love, Cities, Settling

Herman Melville (2016). “Pierre or The Ambiguities”, p.277, Herman Melville

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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.

Herman Melville

Love, Vanity, Names

Herman Melville (2006). “Bartleby the Scrivener: Easyread Comfort Edition”, p.2, ReadHowYouWant.com

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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!

Herman Melville

Lonely, Stars, Memories

Herman Melville (2008). “Moby-Dick”, p.138, Velvet Element Books

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It is the horrible texture of a fabric that should be woven of ships' cables and hawsers. A Polar wind blows through it, and birds of prey hover over it.

Herman Melville

Blow, Wind, Bird

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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.

Herman Melville

Men, Sea, Soul

Herman Melville (2015). “Pierre or The Ambiguities: Works of Melville”, p.295, 谷月社

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The grand principles of virtue and honor, however they may be distorted by arbitrary codes, are the same the world over: and wherethese principles are concerned, the right or wrong of any action appears the same to the uncultivated as to the enlightened mind.

Herman Melville

Honor, Mind, Principles

Herman Melville (1968). “Typee: A Peep at Polynesian Life”, p.201, Northwestern University Press

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In time of peril, like the needle to the loadstone, obedience, irrespective of rank, generally flies to him who is best fitted to command.

Herman Melville

Obedience, Peril, Command

Herman Melville (1850). “White-jacket: or, The world in a man-of-war”, p.114

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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.

Herman Melville

Eye, Men, Light

Herman Melville (2016). “Moby-Dick: Or, the Whale”, p.69, Cosimo, Inc.

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But when that smoking chowder came in, the mystery was delightfully explained. Oh! sweet friends, hearken to me. It was made of small juicy clams, scarcely bigger than hazel nuts, mixed with pounded ship biscuits and salted pork cut up into little flakes! the whole enriched with butter, and plentifully seasoned with pepper and salt... we dispatched it with great expedition.

Herman Melville

Sweet, Food, Cutting

Herman Melville (2015). “MOBY-DICK (WITH NOTES)(BIOGRAPHY)(ILLUSTRATED): OR, THE WHALE”, p.100, Rastro Digital

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Thus it often is, that the constant friction of illiberal minds wears out at last the best resolves of the more generous.

Herman Melville

Often Is, Mind, Lasts

Herman Melville (2016). “Bartleby, The Scrivener”, p.30, Herman Melville

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Our institutions have a potent digestion, and may in time convert and assimilate to good all elements thrown in, however originally alien.

Herman Melville

Elements, May, Digestion

Herman Melville (2006). “Selected Poems (Melville, Herman)”, p.137, Penguin

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It is often to be observed, that as in digging for precious metals in the mines, much earthly rubbish has first to be troublesomely handled and thrown out ; so, in digging in one s soul for the fine gold of genius, much dulness and common-place is first brought to light. Happy would it be, if the man possessed in himself some receptacle for his own rubbish of this sort: but he is like the occupant of a dwelling, whose refuse cannot be clapped into his own cellar, but must be deposited in the street before his own door, for the public functionaries to take care of.

Herman Melville

Men, Light, Doors

Herman Melville (1852). “Pierre; Or, The Ambiguities”, p.351

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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.

Herman Melville

Sea, Tides, Rolling

Herman Melville (2016). “Moby-Dick: Or, the Whale”, p.151, Cosimo, Inc.

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Were this world an endless pain, and by sailing eastward we could forever reach new distances, and discover sights more sweet and strange than any Cyclades or Islands of King Solomon, then there were promise in the voyage.

Herman Melville

Sweet, Kings, Pain

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Struck dead by an angel of God! Yet the angel must hang!

Herman Melville

Angel

Herman Melville (1962). “Billy Budd, Sailor”, p.98, University of Chicago Press

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Herman Melville

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Born: August 1, 1819
Died: September 28, 1891
Occupation: Novelist
Cite this Page: Citation

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