Herman Melville quotes - page 9

It is a strange feeling - no hopelessness is in it, no despair. Content - that is it; and irresponsibility; but without licentious inclination. I speak now of my profoundest sense of being, not of an incidental feeling. (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.

Herman Melville

I have no objection to any person's religion, be it what it may, so long as that person does not kill or insult any other person, because that other person don't believe it also.

Herman Melville

I do not oscillate in Emerson's rainbow, but prefer rather to hang myself in mine own halter than swing in any other man's swing. Yet I think Emerson is more than a brilliant fellow.

Herman Melville

I hold it a verity, that even Shakspeare, was not a frank man to the uttermost. And, indeed, who in this intolerant universe is, or can be? But the Declaration of Independence makes a difference.

Herman Melville

I would to God Shakspeare had lived later, & promenaded in Broadway.

Herman Melville

These men are all cracked right across the brow. And never will the pullers-down be able to cope with the builders-up.

Herman Melville

And perhaps, after all, there is no secret.

Herman Melville

Would that all excellent books were foundlings, without father or mother, that so it might be, we could glorify them, without including their ostensible authors.

Herman Melville

It will be a strange sort of book.

Herman Melville

In me divine magnanimities are spontaneous and instantaneous - catch them while you can. (Herman Melville)

With shouts the torrents down the gorges go, And storms are formed behind the storm we feel.

Herman Melville

I had only glanced at a book of his once in Putnam's store - that was all I knew of him, till I heard him lecture. - To my surprise, I found him quite intelligible, tho' to say truth, they told me that that night he was unusually plain.

Herman Melville

And, frankly, for the sake of the argument, let us call him a fool; - then had I rather be a fool than a wise man. -I love all men who dive.

Herman Melville

I had now been on board the frigate upward of a year, and remained unscourged; the ship was homeward-bound, and in a few weeks, at most, I would be a free man.

Herman Melville

In the light of that martial code whereby it was formally to be judged, innocence and guilt personified in Claggart and Budd in effect changed places.

Herman Melville

There is a certain tragic phase of humanity which, in our opinion, was never more powerfully embodied than by Hawthorne.

Herman Melville

I cannot tell you how thankful I am for your reminding me about the apocrypha here. For the moment, its being such escaped me.

Herman Melville

We incline to think that God cannot explain His own secrets, and that He would like a little information upon certain points Himself. We mortals astonish Him as much as He us.

Herman Melville

Whoever is not in the possession of leisure can hardly be said to possess independence.

Herman Melville

All visible objects, man, are but as pasteboard masks. (Herman Melville)

Familiarity with danger makes a brave man braver, but less daring.

Herman Melville

A sense of unspeakable security is in me this moment, on account of your having understood the book. I have written a wicked book, and feel spotless as the lamb.

Herman Melville

And do not think, my boy, that because I, impulsively broke forth in jubillations over Shakspeare, that, therefore, I am of the number of the snobs who burn their tuns of rancid fat at his shrine. No, I would stand afar off & alone, & burn some pure Palm oil, the product of some overtopping trunk.

Herman Melville

A man of true science... uses but few hard words, and those only when none other will answer his purpose; whereas the smatterer in science... thinks, that by mouthing hard words, he proves that he understands hard things.

Herman Melville

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