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There is no quality in this world that is not what it is merely by contrast. Nothing exists in itself.
Herman Melville
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Herman Melville
Age: 72 †
Born: 1819
Born: August 1
Died: 1891
Died: September 28
Art Collector
Essayist
Lecturer
Literary Critic
Novelist
Poet
Sailor
Teacher
Writer
Manhattan borough
New York City
Hermann Melville
Herman Melvill
World
Contrast
Exists
Merely
Quality
Reality
Nothing
More quotes by Herman Melville
To produce a mighty book, you must choose a mighty theme.
Herman Melville
We are only what we are not what we would be nor every thing we hope for. We are but a step in a scale, that reaches further above us than below.
Herman Melville
Leviathan is not the biggest fish — I have heard of Krakens.
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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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If you are poor, avoid wine as a costly luxury if you are rich, shun it as a fatal indulgence. Stick to plain water.
Herman Melville
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.
Herman Melville
In their precise tracings-out and subtle causations, the strongest and fieriest emotions of life defy all analytical insight.
Herman Melville
I would prefer not to.
Herman Melville
Lo! ye believers in gods all goodness, and in man all ill, lo you! see the omniscient gods oblivious of suffering man and man, though idiotic, and knowing not what he does, yet full of the sweet things of love and gratitude.
Herman Melville
We may have civilized bodies and yet barbarous souls.
Herman Melville
I could...see in Emerson...that had he lived in those days when the world was made, he might have offered some valuable suggestions.
Herman Melville
Meditation and water are wedded for ever.
Herman Melville
Let faith oust fact let fancy oust memory I look deep down and do believe.
Herman Melville
I am, as I am whether hideous, or handsome, depends upon who is made judge.
Herman Melville
There is nothing so slipperily alluring as sadness we become sad in the first place by having nothing stirring to do we continue in it, because we have found a snug sofa at last.
Herman Melville
Talk not to me of blasphemy, man I'd strike the sun if it insulted me.
Herman Melville
Youth is the time when hearts are large.
Herman Melville
The symmetry of form attainable in pure fiction can not so readily be achieved in a narration essentially having less to do with fable than with fact. Truth uncompromisingly told will always have its ragged edges.
Herman Melville
I am past scorching not easily can’st thou scorch a scar.
Herman Melville
Tis no dishonor when he who would dishonor you, only dishonors himself.
Herman Melville
