The sea receives us in a proper way only when we are without clothes.
—Pliny the Elder, 77Quotes
Ocean. A body of water occupying about two-thirds of a world made for man—who has no gills.
—Ambrose Bierce, 1906He 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, 1846We are as near to heaven by sea as by land!
—Humphrey Gilbert, 1583The sole business of a seaman onshore who has to go to sea again is to take as much pleasure as he can.
—Leigh Hunt, 1820All streams run to the sea, but the sea is not full.
—Book of Ecclesiastes, c. 250 BCThe sea hath no king but God alone.
—Dante Gabriel Rossetti, 1881He who commands the sea has command of everything.
—Francis Bacon, c. 1600We are tied to the ocean. And when we go back to the sea—whether it is to sail or to watch it—we are going back whence we came.
—John F. Kennedy, 1962Be 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.
—Ralph Waldo Emerson, 1838Ships at a distance have every man’s wish on board.
—Zora Neale Hurston, 1937Seamen are the nearest to death and the furthest from God.
—Thomas Fuller, 1732The winds and the waves are always on the side of the ablest navigators.
—Edward Gibbon, 1788