Seaward ho! Hang the treasure! It’s the glory of the sea that has turned my head.
—Robert Louis Stevenson, 1883Quotes
The life of a sailor is very unhealthy.
—Francis Galton, 1883The sea yields action to the body, meditation to the mind, the world to the world, all parts thereof to each part, by this art of arts—navigation.
—Samuel Purchas, 1613And to our age’s drowsy blood / Still shouts the inspiring sea.
—James Russell Lowell, 1848The most advanced nations are always those who navigate the most.
—Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1870As to the sea itself, love it you cannot. Why should you? I will never believe again the sea was ever loved by anyone whose life was married to it. It is the creation of omnipotence, which is not of humankind and understandable, and so the springs of its behavior are hidden.
—H.M. Tomlinson, 1912He who travels by sea is nothing but a worm on a piece of wood, a trifle in the midst of a powerful creation. The waters play about with him at will, and no one but God can help him.
—Muhammad as-Saffar, 1846I must be a mermaid, Rango. I have no fear of depths and a great fear of shallow living.
—Anaïs Nin, 1950The sea hath no king but God alone.
—Dante Gabriel Rossetti, 1881All streams run to the sea, but the sea is not full.
—Book of Ecclesiastes, c. 250 BCThe snotgreen sea. The scrotumtightening sea.
—James Joyce, 1922Many, many steeples would have to be stacked one on top of another to reach from the bottom to the surface of the sea. It is down there that the sea folk live.
—Hans Christian Andersen, 1837Take back your golden fiddles, and we’ll beat to open sea.
—Rudyard Kipling, 1892