What is it, what nameless, inscrutable, unearthly thing is it; what cozening, hidden lord and master, and cruel, remorseless emperor commands me; that against all natural loving and longings, I so kee...
To a sensitive being, pity is not seldom pain.
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...
How I snuffed that Tartar air!--how I spurned that turnpike earth!--that common highway all over dented with the marks of slavish heels and hoofs; and turned me to admire the magnanimity of the sea wh...
Let America first praise mediocrity even, in her children, before she praises... the best excellence in the children of any other land.
We cannot live only for ourselves. A thousand fibers connect us with our fellow men; and among those fibers, as sympathetic threads, our actions run as causes, and they come back to us as effects.
Imagine my surprise, nay, my consternation, when without moving from his privacy, Bartleby, in a singular mild, firm voice, replied, I would prefer not to.
All mortal greatness is but disease.
For we all are dreadfully cracked about the head, and sadly need mending..
He who has never failed somewhere, that man can not be great.
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.
Ahab still stood like an anvil, receiving every shock, but without the least quivering of his own.
Friendship at first sight, like love at first sight, is said to be the only truth.
With a philosophical flourish Cato throws himself upon his sword; I quietly take to the ship
The pulpit is ever this earth’s foremost part; all the rest comes in its rear; the pulpit leads the world. From thence it is the storm of God’s quick wrath is first descried, and the bow must bearthe...
Instinct and study, love and hate;Audacity-reverence. These must mate,And fuse with Jacob's heart,To wrestle with the angel -- Art.
Ignorance is the parent of fear ...
And if we obey God, we must disobey ourselves; and it is in disobeying ourselves, wherein the hardness of obeying God consists.
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.
Were I the wind, I'd blow no more on such a wicked, miserable world.