Quotes from Moby-Dick or, The Whale

Towards thee I roll, thou all-destroying but unconquering whale; 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.

Talk not to me of blasphemy, man; I'd strike the sun if it insulted me.

It is not down on any map; true places never are.

Whenever I find myself growing grim about the mouth; whenever it is a damp, drizzly November in my soul; whenever I find myself involuntarily pausing before coffin warehouses, and bringing up the rear of every funeral I meet; and especially whenever my hypos get such an upper hand of me, that it requires a strong moral principle to prevent me from deliberately stepping into the street, and methodically knocking people's hats off—then, I account it high time to get to sea as soon as I can.

If man will strike, strike through the mask! How can the prisoner reach outside except by thrusting through the wall?

All visible objects, man, are but as pasteboard masks.

All my means are sane, my motive and my object mad.

And the great shroud of the sea rolled on as it rolled five thousand years ago.

It is not down in any map; true places never are.

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!

Ego non baptizo te in nomine patris, sed in nomine diaboli!

Better sleep with a sober cannibal than a drunken Christian.

Who ain't a slave? Tell me that.

Woe to him who seeks to pour oil upon the waters when God has brewed them into a gale!

Delight is to him—a far, far upward, and inward delight—who against the proud gods and commodores of this earth, ever stands forth his own inexorable self.

Ignorance is the parent of fear.

There is no quality in this world that is not what it is merely by contrast.

Meditation and water are wedded for ever.

I know not all that may be coming, but be it what it will, I'll go to it laughing.

It was the devious-cruising Rachel, that in her retracing search after her missing children, only found another orphan.

The drama's done. Why then here does any one step forth?—Because one did survive the wreck.