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Though the ancients were ignorant of the principles of Christianity there were in them the germs of its spirit.

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
Ancients
Germs
Ignorant
Christianity
Principles
Though
Spirit

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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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The shadows of things are greater than themselves and the more exaggerated the shadow, the more unlike the substance.
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We die, because we live.
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At length I fell asleep, with the volume in my hand and never slept so sound before
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A smile is the chosen vehicle of all ambiguities.
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Let America first praise mediocrity even, in her children, before she praises... the best excellence in the children of any other land.
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A true military officer is in one particular like a true monk. Not with more self-abnegation will the latter keep his vows of monastic obedience than the former his vows of allegiance to martial duty.
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What man who carries a heavenly soul in him, has not groaned to perceive, that unless he committed a sort of suicide as to the practical things of this world, he never can hope to regulate his earthly conduct by that same heavenly soul?
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The path to my fixed purpose is laid with iron rails whereon my soul is grooved to run
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It is better to fail in originality, than to succeed in imitation. He who has never failed somewhere, that man can not be great. Failure is the true test of greatness.
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Stay true to the dreams of thy youth.
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Ah, Bartleby! Ah, humanity!
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Surrounded as we are by the wants and woes of our fellow-men, and yet given to follow our own pleasures, regardless of their pains, are we not like people sitting up with a corpse, and making merry in the house of the dead?
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There is a savor of life and immortality in substantial fare. Like balloons, we are nothing till filled.
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People think that if a man has undergone any hardship, he should have a reward but for my part, if I have done the hardest possible day's work, and then come to sit down in a corner and eat my supper comfortably -why, then I don't think I deserve any reward for my hard day's work -for am I not now at peace? Is not my supper good?
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It may seem strange that of all men sailors should be tinkering at their last wills and testaments, but there are no people in the world more fond of that diversion.
Herman Melville
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It is better to fail in originality than to succeed in imitation.
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truly to enjoy bodily warmth, some small part of you must be cold, for there is no quality in this world that is not what it is merely by contrast. Nothing exists in itself. If you flatter yourself that you are all over comfortable, and have been so a long time, then you cannot be said to be comfortable any more.
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I will frankly confess that after passing a few weeks in the valley of the Marquesas, I formed a higher estimate of human nature than I had ever before entertained. But, alas, since then I have been one of the crew of a man-of- war, and the pent-up wickedness of five hundred men has nearly overturned all my previous theories.
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All wars are boyish, and are fought by boys, The champions and enthusiasts of the state: Turbid ardors and vain joys Not barrenly abate-- Stimulants to the power mature, Preparatives of fate.
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