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If there be any thing a man might well pray against, that thing is the responsive gratification of some of the devoutest prayers of his youth.

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
Might
Responsive
Well
Gratification
Thing
Prayers
Men
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Youth
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Wells

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It is the horrible texture of a fabric that should be woven of ships' cables and hawsers. A Polar wind blows through it, and birds of prey hover over it.
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For whatever is truly wondrous and fearful in man, never yet was put into words or books.
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For as this appalling ocean surrounds the verdant land, so in the soul of man there lies one insular Tahiti, full of peace and joy, but encompassed by all the horrors of the half known life.
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We may have civilized bodies and yet barbarous souls. We are blind to the real sights of this world deaf to its voice and dead to its death. And not till we know, that one grief outweighs ten thousand joys will we become what Christianity is striving to make us.
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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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The phantom-host has faded quite, Splendor and Terror gone-- Portent or promise--and gives way To pale, meek Dawn.
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flight from tyranny does not of itself insure a safe asylum, far less a happy home.
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Better be secure under one king, than exposed to violence from twenty millions of monarchs, though oneself be one of them.
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But oh! shipmates! on the starboard hand of every woe, there is a sure delight and higher the top of that delight, than the bottom of the woe is deep.
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The urbane activity with which a man receives money is really marvelous, considering that we so earnestly believe money to be the root of all earthly ills, and that on no account can a monied man enter heaven. Ah! how cheerfully we consign ourselves to perdition!
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We Americans are the peculiar, chosen people - the Israel of our time we bear the ark of the liberties of the world.
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for there is no folly of the beast of the earth which is not infinitely outdone by the madness of men
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All visible objects, man, are but as pasteboard masks. But in each event — in the living act, the undoubted deed — there, some unknown but still reasoning thing puts forth the mouldings of its features from behind the unreasoning mask.
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It is hard to be finite upon an infinite subject, and all subjects are infinite.
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Stay true to the dreams of thy youth.
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As with ships, so with men he who turns his back to his foe gives him an advantage.
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A man can be honest in any sort of skin.
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Dream tonight of peacock tails, Diamond fields and spouter whales. Ills are many, blessing few, But dreams tonight will shelter you.
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Of all human events, perhaps, the publication of a first volume of verses is the most insignificant but though a matter of no moment to the world, it is still of some concern to the author.
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Is there some principal of nature which states that we never know the quality of what we have until it is gone?
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