A fair complexion is unbecoming to a sailor: he ought to be swarthy from the waters of the sea and the rays of the sun.

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.

I must be a mermaid, Rango. I have no fear of depths and a great fear of shallow living.

Without a decisive naval force, we can do nothing definitive, and with it, everything honorable and glorious.

The power which the sea requires in the sailor makes a man of him very fast, and the change of shores and population clears his head of much nonsense of his wigwam.

Ships at a distance have every man’s wish on board.

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.

The wonderful sea charmed me from the first.

But look, our seas are what we make of them, full of fish or not, opaque or transparent, red or black, high or smooth, narrow or bankless—and we are ourselves sea, sand, coral, seaweed, beaches, tides, swimmers, children, waves.

Seamen are the nearest to death and the furthest from God.

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.

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

The breaking of a wave cannot explain the whole sea.