"It is better to fail in originality than to succeed in imitation."

"I know not all that may be coming, but be it what it will, I'll go to it laughing."

"A smile is the chosen vehicle of all ambiguities."

"I do not think I have any uncharitable prejudice against the rattlesnake, still, I should not like to be one."

"Better to sleep with a sober cannibal than a drunk Christian."

"It is not down on any map; true places never are."

"Of all the preposterous assumptions of humanity over humanity, nothing exceeds most of the criticisms made on the habits of the poor by the well-housed, well- warmed, and well-fed."

"As for me, I am tormented with an everlasting itch for things remote. I love to sail forbidden seas, and land on barbarous coasts."

"I try all things, I achieve what I can."

"I would prefer not to."

"Talk not to me of blasphemy, man; I'd strike the sun if it insulted me."

"For there is no folly of the beast of the earth which is not infinitely outdone by the madness of men"

"...and Heaven have mercy on us all - Presbyterians and Pagans alike - for we are all somehow dreadfully cracked about the head, and sadly need mending."

"Call me Ishmael."

"Ignorance is the parent of fear."

"I love to sail forbidden seas, and land on barbarous coasts."

"A man thinks that by mouthing hard words he understands hard things."

"...to the last I grapple with thee; from hell's heart I stab at thee; for hate's sake I spit my last breath at thee."

"Human madness is oftentimes a cunning and most feline thing. When you think it fled, it may have but become transfigured into some still subtler form."

"Think not, is my eleventh commandment; and sleep when you can, is my twelfth."

"It is the easiest thing in the world for a man to look as if he had a great secret in him."

"Truth uncompromisingly told will always have its jagged edges."

"Real strength never impairs beauty or harmony, but it often bestows it, and in everything imposingly beautiful, strength has much to do with the magic."

"To produce a mighty book, you must choose a mighty theme."

"A noble craft, but somehow a most melancholy! All noble things are touched with that."

"I have written a wicked book, and feel spotless as the lamb."

"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 learn it."

"Beneath those stars is a universe of gliding monsters."

"We cannot live for ourselves alone. Our lives are connected by a thousand invisible threads, and along these sympathetic fibers, our actions run as causes and return to us as results."

"Whatever my fate, I'll go to it laughing."

"Top-heavy was the ship as a dinnerless student with all Aristotle in his head."

"Give not thyself up, then, to fire, lest it invert thee, deaden thee, as for the time it did me. There is a wisdom that is woe; but there is a woe that is madness."

"In one word, Queequeg, said I, rather digressively; hell is an idea first born on an undigested apple-dumpling; and since then perpetuated through the hereditary dyspepsias nurtured by Ramadans."

"Truth is in things, and not in words."

"I'll try a pagan friend, thought I, since Christian kindness has proved but hollow courtesy."

"See how elastic our prejudices grow when once love comes to bend them."

"Ah, happiness courts the light so we deem the world is gay. But misery hides aloof so we deem that misery there is none."

"In this world, shipmates, sin that pays its way can travel freely and without a passport; whereas Virtue, if a pauper, is stopped at all frontiers."

"I am madness maddened! That wild madness that's only calm to comprehend itself"

"We cannibals must help these Christians."

"To produce a mighty book, you must choose a mighty theme. No great and enduring volume can ever be written on the flea, though many there be who have tried it."

"The Past is the textbook of tyrants; the Future is the Bible of the Free."

"There is no folly of the beast of the earth which is not infinitely outdone by the madness of man."

"Let faith oust fact; let fancy oust memory; I look deep down and do believe."

"Towards thee I roll, thou all-destroying but unconquering whale; to the last I grapple with thee; from hell's heart I stab at thee; for hate's sake I spit my last breath at thee."

"For God's sake, be economical with your lamps and candles! not a gallon you burn, but at least one drop of man's blood was spilled for it."

"Book! You lie there; the fact is, you books must know your places. You'll do to give us the bare words and facts, but we come in to supply the thoughts."

"Genius is full of trash."

"A whale ship was my Yale College and my Harvard."

"Better sleep with a sober cannibal than a drunken Christian."