Seamen are the nearest to death and the furthest from God.
—Thomas Fuller, 1732Quotes
The sea receives us in a proper way only when we are without clothes.
—Pliny the Elder, 77Ships at a distance have every man’s wish on board.
—Zora Neale Hurston, 1937It 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.
—The Qur’an, c. 625What will not attract a man’s stare at sea?—a gull, a turtle, a flying fish!
—Richard Burton, 1883All streams run to the sea, but the sea is not full.
—Book of Ecclesiastes, c. 250 BCThe sole business of a seaman onshore who has to go to sea again is to take as much pleasure as he can.
—Leigh Hunt, 1820Ocean. A body of water occupying about two-thirds of a world made for man—who has no gills.
—Ambrose Bierce, 1906Take back your golden fiddles, and we’ll beat to open sea.
—Rudyard Kipling, 1892Being thus arrived in good harbor, and brought safe to land, they fell upon their knees and blessed the God of heaven who had brought them over the vast and furious ocean and delivered them from all the perils and miseries thereof, again to set their feet on the firm and stale earth, their proper element.
—William Bradford, 1630The wonderful sea charmed me from the first.
—Joshua Slocum, 1900Anyone can hold the helm when the sea is calm.
—Publilius Syrus, c. 30 BCWithout a decisive naval force, we can do nothing definitive, and with it, everything honorable and glorious.
—George Washington, 1781