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57bef12
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So seemed it to me, as I stood at her helm, and for long hours silently guided the way of this fire-ship on the sea. Wrapped, for that interval, in darkness myself, I but the better saw the redness, the madness, the ghastliness of others. The continual sight of the fiend shapes before me, capering half in smoke and half in fire, these at last begat kindred visions in my soul, so soon as I began to yield to that unaccountable drowsiness whic..
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Herman Melville |
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7f72aea
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Now envy and antipathy, passions irreconcilable in reason, nevertheless in fact may spring conjoined like Chang and Eng in one birth. Is Envy then such a monster? Well, though many an arraigned mortal has in hopes of mitigated penalty pleaded guilty to horrible actions, did anybody ever seriously confess to envy? Something there is in it universally felt to be more shameful than even felonious crime. And not only does everybody disown it, b..
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rene-girard
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herman melville |
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3030a0c
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Only one sweeter end can readily be recalled--the delicious death of an Ohio honey-hunter, who seeking honey in the crotch of a hollow tree, found such exceeding store of it, that leaning too far over, it sucked him in, so that he died embalmed. How many, think ye, have likewise fallen into Plato's honey head, and sweetly perished there?
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plato
ohio
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Herman Melville |
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122d95d
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To insure the greatest efficiency in the dart, the harpooners of this world must start to their feet from out of idleness, and not from out of toil.
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Herman Melville |
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7e508ec
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Queequeg estaba convencido de que si un hombre estaba decidido a vivir, la enfermedad nunca seria capaz de matarlo y que lo unico que podia acabar con su vida era una ballena, una tempestad o cualquier otra fuerza violenta, destructiva e inmanejable de esa naturaleza.
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Herman Melville |
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8ac7f98
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Oh, Ahab! what shall be grand in thee, it must needs be plucked at from the skies, and dived for in the deep, and featured in the unbodied air!
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Herman Melville |
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b26f129
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And thus, through the courage and great skill in obstetrics of Queequeg, the deliverance, or rather, delivery of Tashtego, was successfully accomplished, in the teeth, too, of the most untoward and apparently hopeless impediments; which is a lesson by no means to be forgotten. Midwifery should be taught in the same course with fencing and boxing, riding and rowing.
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Herman Melville |
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94a356b
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So fare thee well, poor devil of a Sub-Sub, whose commentator I am. Thou belongest to that hopeless, sallow tribe which no wine of this world will ever warm; and for whom even Pale Sherry would be too rosy-strong; but with whom one sometimes loves to sit, and feel poor-devilish, too; and grow convivial upon tears; and say to them bluntly, with full eyes and empty glasses, and in not altogether unpleasant sadness-- Give it up, Sub-Subs! For ..
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Herman Melville |
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ed49ba8
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So soon as I hear that such or such a man gives himself out for a philosopher, I conclude that, like the dyspeptic old woman, he must have "broken his digester."
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Herman Melville |
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c585b52
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For all his old age, and his one arm, and his blind eyes, he must die the death and be murdered, in order to light the gay bridals and other merrymakings of men, and also to illuminate the solemn churches that preach unconditional inoffensiveness by all to all.
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Herman Melville |
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2c27588
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How I snuffed that Tartar air!--how I spurned that turnpike earth!--that common highway all over dented with the marks of slavish heels and hoofs; and turned me to admire the magnanimity of the sea which will permit no records.
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moby-dick
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Herman Melville |
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69e36e1
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loitering under the shady lee of yonder warehouses
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Herman Melville |
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89fe474
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Why did the poor poet of Tennessee, upon suddenly receiving two handfuls of silver, deliberate whether to buy him a coat, which he sadly needed, or invest his money in a pedestrian trip to Rockaway Beach? Why is almost every robust healthy boy with a robust healthy soul in him, at some time or other crazy to go to sea? Why upon your first voyage as a passenger, did you yourself feel such a mystical vibration, when first told that you and yo..
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Herman Melville |
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4039370
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What could be more full of meaning?--for the pulpit is ever this earth's foremost part; all the rest come in its rear; the pulpit leads the world.
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Herman Melville |
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951d714
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I would be as free as air; and I'm down in the whole world's books.
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Herman Melville |
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4f4b106
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There, then, he sat, the sign and symbol of a man without faith, hopelessly holding up hope in the midst of despair.
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Herman Melville |
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37440a2
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if you gobern de shark in you, why den you be angel; for all angel is not'ing more dan de shark well goberned.
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Herman Melville |
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8eabeca
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Oh, horrible vultureism of earth! from which not the mightiest whale is free.
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Herman Melville |
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d01e3dc
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In thoughts of the visions of the night, I saw long rows of angels in paradise, each with his hands in a jar of spermaceti.
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Herman Melville |
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c6cc155
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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.
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Herman Melville |
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89c87e4
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As minhas primeiras emocoes tinham sido a melancolia mais pura e a compaixao mais sincera, mas na mesma proporcao em que o desamparo de Bartleby crescia na minha fantasia, aquela melancolia se transformava em medo, e a compaixao, em repulsa. E tao verdadeiro e ao mesmo tempo tao terrivel o fato de que, ao vermos ou presenciarmos a miseria, os nossos melhores sentimentos sao despertados ate um cer to ponto; mas, em certos casos especiais, na..
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solitude
niilismo
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Herman Melville |
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2cea6c7
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His three boats stove around him, and oars and men both whirling in the eddies; one captain, seizing the line-knife from his broken prow, had dashed at the whale, as an Arkansas duellist at his foe, blindly seeking with a six inch blade to reach the fathom-deep life of the whale. That captain was Ahab. And then it was, that suddenly sweeping his sickle-shaped lower jaw benieath him, Moby Dick had reaped away Ahab's leg.
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epic
obsession
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Herman Melville |
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7df1ea0
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I'll try a pagan friend, thought I, since Christian kindness has proved but hollow
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Herman Melville |
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2897c7d
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Not so much thy skill, then, O hunter, as the great necessities that strike the victory to thee!
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Herman Melville |
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d3d96af
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What was sad in the world he did not superficially gainsay; what was glad in it he did not cynically slur; and all which was to him personally enjoyable, he gratefully took to his heart.
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Herman Melville |
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3eaaf95
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no more of this blubbering now, we are going a-whaling, and there is plenty of that yet to come.
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Herman Melville |
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f7202a1
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Methinks that what they call my shadow here on earth is my true substance.
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Herman Melville |
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2d7c9f2
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What is it, what nameless, inscrutable, unearthly thing is it; what cozening, hidden lord and master, and cruel, remorseless emperor commands me; that against all natural lovings and longings, I so keep pushing, and crowding, and jamming myself on all the time; recklessly making me ready to do what in my own proper, natural heart, I durst not so much as dare? Is Ahab, Ahab? Is it I, God, or who, that lifts this arm? But if the great sun mov..
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Herman Melville |
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9a360b4
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Let me make a clean breast of it here, and frankly admit that I kept but sorry guard. With the problem of the universe revolving in me, how could I--being left completely to myself at such a thought-engendering altitude--how could I but lightly hold my obligations to observe all whaleships' standing orders, "Keep your weather eye open, and sing out every time."
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Herman Melville |
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ffbf602
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hell is an idea first born on an undigested apple-dumpling; and since then perpetuated through the hereditary dyspepsias nurtured by Ramadans.
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Herman Melville |
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c37acc7
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Is it not curious, that so vast a being as the whale should see the world through so small an eye, and hear the thunder through an ear which is smaller than a hare's? But if his eyes were broad as the lens of Herschel's great telescope; and his ears capacious as the porches of cathedrals; would that make him any longer of sight, or sharper of hearing? Not at all.--Why then do you try to "enlarge" your mind? Subtilize it."
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self-improvement
knowledge
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Herman Melville |
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c50bb88
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Start her, now; give 'em the long and strong stroke, Tashtego. Start her, Tash, my boy--start her, all; but keep cool, keep cool--cucumbers is the word--easy, easy--only start her like grim death and grinning devils, and raise the buried dead perpendicular out of their graves, boys--that's all. Start her!
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moby-dick
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Herman Melville |
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ea39f6b
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But truth is like a thrashing-machine; tender sensibilities must keep out of the way.
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Herman Melville |
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f3cf7a1
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The starred and stately nights seemed haughty dames in jewelled velvets, nursing at home in lonely pride, the memory of their absent conquering Earls, the golden helmeted suns! For sleeping man, 'twas hard to choose between such winsome days and such seducing nights.
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Herman Melville |
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e21feaa
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And if we obey God, we must disobey ourselves; and it is in disobeying ourselves, wherein the hardness of obeying God consists.
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Herman Melville |
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56f37d4
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Se questo mondo fosse un piano infinito e navigando a oriente noi potessimo sempre raggiungere nuove distanze e scoprire cose piu dolci e nuove di tutte le Cicladi o le Isole del Re Salomone, allora il viaggio conterrebbe una promessa. Ma, nell'inseguire quei lontani misteri di cui sogniamo, o nella caccia tormentosa di quel fantasma demoniaco che prima o poi nuota dinanzi a tutti i cuori umani, nella caccia di tali cose intorno a questo gl..
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Herman Melville |
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20cc6db
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All of us have monarchs and sages for kinsmen; nay, angels and archangels for cousins; since in antediluvian days, the sons of God did verily wed with our mothers, the irresistible daughters of Eve. Thus all generations are blended: and heaven and earth of one kin: the hierarchies of seraphs in the uttermost skies; the thrones and principalities in the zodiac; the shades that roam throughout space; the nations and families, flocks and folds..
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Herman Melville |
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22a98f2
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Adverse winds are holding mad Christmas in him, boys.
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Herman Melville |
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133ac41
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Oh, trebly hooped and welded hip of power! Oh, high aspiring, rainbowed jet!--that one strives, this one jettest all in vain! In vain, oh whale, dost thou seek intercedings with yon all-quickening sun, that only calls forth life, but gives it not again. Yet dost thou, darker half, rock me with a prouder, if a darker faith All thy unnamable imminglings float beneath me here; I am buoyed by breaths of once living things, exhaled as air, but w..
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Herman Melville |
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fc5d970
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I wonder, Flask, whether the world is anchored anywhere; if she is, she swings with an uncommon long cable, though.
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Herman Melville |
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ee6048f
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Skuta var topptung som en middagslos student med hodet fullt av Aristoteles.
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Herman Melville |
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c9fdd03
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It needs scarcely to be told, with what feelings, on the eve of a Nantucket voyage, I regarded those marble tablets, and by the murky light of that darkened, doleful day read the fate of the whalemen who had gone before me. Yes, Ishmael, the same fate may be thine. But somehow I grew merry again. Delightful inducements to embark, fine chance for promotion, it seems--aye, a stove boat will make me an immortal by brevet. Yes, there is death i..
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Herman Melville |
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ce67cec
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Many sensible things banished from high life find an asylum among the mob.
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Herman Melville |
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67036db
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You must have plenty of sea-room to tell the truth in.
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Herman Melville |