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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

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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
Days
Might
Made
Emerson
World
Suggestions
Offered
Valuable
Lived
Personality

More quotes by Herman Melville

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It is better to fail in originality than to succeed in imitation.
Herman Melville
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We may have civilized bodies and yet barbarous souls.
Herman Melville
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That mortal man who hath more of joy than sorrow in him, that mortal man cannot be true--not true, or undeveloped.
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Civilization has not ever been the brother of equality. Freedom was born among the wild eyries in the mountains and barbarous tribes have sheltered under her wings, when the enlightened people of the plain have nestled under different pinions.
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Some dying men are the most tyrannical and certainly, since they will shortly trouble us so little for evermore, the poor fellows ought to be indulged.
Herman Melville
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Who in the rainbow can draw the line where the violet tint ends and the orange tint begins? Distinctly we see the difference of the colors, but where exactly does the one first blendingly enter into the other? So with sanity and insanity.
Herman Melville
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To produce a mighty book, you must choose a mighty theme. No great and enduring volume can ever be written on the flea, though many there be that have tried it.
Herman Melville
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Truth is in things, and not in words.
Herman Melville
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Will you, or will you not, quit me? I now demanded in a sudden passion, advancing close to him. I would prefer not to quit you, he replied, gently emphasizing the not.
Herman Melville
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At length I fell asleep, with the volume in my hand and never slept so sound before
Herman Melville
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When beholding the tranquil beauty and brilliancy of the ocean’s skin, one forgets the tiger heart that pants beneath it and would not willingly remember that this velvet paw but conceals a remorseless fang.
Herman Melville
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There is a savor of life and immortality in substantial fare. Like balloons, we are nothing till filled.
Herman Melville
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Let us pray that the great historic tragedy of our time may not have been enacted without instructing our whole beloved country through terror and pity and may fulfillment verify in the end those expectations which kindle the bards of Progress and Humanity.
Herman Melville
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As a man-of-war that sails through the sea, so this earth that sails through the air. We mortals are all on board a fast-sailing,never-sinking world-frigate, of which God was the shipwright and she is but one craft in a Milky-Way fleet, of which God is the Lord High Admiral.
Herman Melville
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Truth is ever incoherent, and when the big hearts strike together, the concussion is a little stunning.
Herman Melville
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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
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I am past scorching not easily can’st thou scorch a scar.
Herman Melville
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Thou wine art the friend of the friendless, though a foe to all.
Herman Melville
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Youth is the time when hearts are large.
Herman Melville
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How feeble is all language to describe the horrors we inflict upon these wretches, whom we mason up in the cells of our prisons, and condemn to perpetual solitude in the very heart of our population.
Herman Melville