The sea receives us in a proper way only when we are without clothes.

The sole business of a seaman onshore who has to go to sea again is to take as much pleasure as he can.

Why is a ship under sail more poetical than a hog in a high wind? The hog is all nature, the ship is all art.

Of all objects that I have ever seen, there is none which affects my imagination so much as the sea or ocean. A troubled ocean, to a man who sails upon it, is, I think, the biggest object that he can see in motion, and consequently gives his imagination one of the highest kinds of pleasure that can arise from greatness.

The legislator is like the navigator of a ship on the high seas. He can steer the vessel on which he sails, but he cannot alter its construction, raise the wind, or stop the waves from swelling beneath his feet.

He 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.

He that commands the sea is at great liberty and may take as much and as little of the war as he will.

It is He who has subdued the ocean so that you may eat of its fresh fish and bring up from its depth ornaments to wear. Behold the ships plowing their course through it. All this, that you may seek His bounty and render thanks.

Be not the slave of your own past. Plunge into the sublime seas, dive deep, and swim far, so shall you come back with self-respect, with new power, with an advanced experience that shall explain and overlook the old.

I’ve been bathing in the poem / Of star-infused and milky sea / Devouring the azure greens.

Seaward ho! Hang the treasure! It’s the glory of the sea that has turned my head.

And to our age’s drowsy blood / Still shouts the inspiring sea.

The sea hath no king but God alone.