But even so, amid the tornadoed Atlantic of my being, do I myself still for ever centrally disport in mute calm; and while ponderous planets of unwan….

The fact is, that among his hunters at least, the whale would by all hands be considered a noble dish, were there not so much of him; but when you co….

In a multitude of acquaintances is less security, than in one faithful friend..

The grand principles of virtue and honor, however they may be distorted by arbitrary codes, are the same the world over: and wherethese principles ar….

We are not a nation, so much as a world; for unless we claim all the world for our sire, like Melchisedec, we are without father or mother..

For, as when the red-cheeked, dancing girls, April and May, trip home to the wintry, misanthropic woods; even the barest, ruggedest, most thunder-clo….

An indiscriminate distrust of human nature is the worst consequence of a miserable condition, whether brought about by innocence or guilt. And though….

Roll on, thou deep and dark blue ocean, roll! Ten thousand blubber-hunters sweep over thee in vain..

Our souls are like those orphans whose unwedded mothers die in bearing them: the secret of our paternity lies in their grave, and we must there to le….

I baptize you not in the name of the father, but in the name of the devil. (Ego baptizo te in nomine patris, sed in nomine diaboli.).

Truth uncompromisingly told will always have its ragged edges..

All truth is profound..

We talk of the Turks, and abhor the cannibals; but may not some of them, go to heaven, before some of us?.

We cannot live only for ourselves. A thousand fibers connect us with our fellow men..

Courage is the most common and vulgar of the virtues..

We may have civilized bodies and yet barbarous souls..

Where does any novelist pick up any character? For the most part, in town, to be sure..

All wars are boyish, and are fought by boys..

There is no quality in this world that is not what it is merely by contrast. Nothing exists in itself..

Are not half our lives spent in reproaches for foregone actions, of the true nature and consequences of which we were wholly ignorant at the time?.

If a well-constituted individual refrains from blazoning aught amiss or calamitous in his family, a nation in the like circumstance may without repro….