Quotes from Benito Cereno

Herman Melville ·  160 pages

Rating: (5.4K votes)


“But the past is passed; why moralize upon it? Forget it. See, yon bright son has forgotten it all, and the blue sea, and the blue sky; these have turned over new leaves.

Because they have no memory . . . because they are not human.”
― Herman Melville, quote from Benito Cereno


“This slavery breeds ugly passions in man.”
― Herman Melville, quote from Benito Cereno


“The morning was one peculiar to that coast. Everything was mute and calm; everything gray. The sea, though undulated into long roods of swells, seemed fixed, and was sleeked at the surface like waved lead that has cooled and set in the smelter's mould. The sky seemed a gray surtout. Flights of troubled gray fowl, kith and kin with flights of troubled gray vapors among which they were mixed, skimmed low and fitfully over the waters, as swallows over meadows before storms. Shadows present, foreshadowing deeper shadows to come.”
― Herman Melville, quote from Benito Cereno


“the king of kind hearts and polite fellows”
― Herman Melville, quote from Benito Cereno


“His mind swarmed with superstitious suspicions.”
― Herman Melville, quote from Benito Cereno



“images far swifter than these sentences”
― Herman Melville, quote from Benito Cereno


“all was eclipsed in sinister muteness”
― Herman Melville, quote from Benito Cereno


“But, in fact, his reserve might, in some degree, have proceeded from design. If so, then here was evinced the unhealthy climax of that icy though conscientious policy, more or less adopted by all commanders of large ships, which, except in signal emergencies, obliterates alike the manifestation of sway with every trace of sociality; transforming the man into a block, or rather into a loaded cannon, which, until there is call for thunder, has nothing to say. Viewing”
― Herman Melville, quote from Benito Cereno


About the author

Herman Melville
Born place: in New York City, New York, The United States
Born date August 1, 1819
See more on GoodReads

Popular quotes

“Kids are spoiled these days. Tootsie Rolls are gold.

Fuck the rest of the candy. Tootsie rolls are where it's at.”
― Meghan Quinn, quote from The Other Brother


“All landowners who were foolish enough to stick around were shot. Communists see people only in simple categories.”
― Min Jin Lee, quote from Pachinko


“I was always doing that, apologizing for the way I looked as if the world were somehow suffering from it p. 29”
― Ruth Emmie Lang, quote from Beasts of Extraordinary Circumstance


“Are you trying to blackmail me?” she asked.
“Not trying, no. Not yet, at least.” He smiled pleasantly, because he had the sense it would irritate her even more. “But give me time, and I might find something I want from you.”
She let out a derisive laugh. “In your dreams.”
He winked. “Every night, sweetheart.”
― Lisa Maxwell, quote from The Last Magician


“The problem, however, is that I have yet to meet anyone, materialist or otherwise, who was able to dispense with value judgements. On the contrary, the literature of materialism is peculiarly marked by its wholesale profusion of denunciations of all sorts. Starting with Marx and Nietzsche, materialists have never been able to refrain from passing continuous moral judgement on all and sundry, which their whole philosophy might be expected to discourage them from doing.”
― Luc Ferry, quote from A Brief History of Thought: A Philosophical Guide to Living


Interesting books

Resurrection
(13.1K)
Resurrection
by Leo Tolstoy
Rodrick Rules
(107.2K)
Rodrick Rules
by Jeff Kinney
Death with Interruptions
(24.9K)
Death with Interrupt...
by José Saramago
The Program
(35.7K)
The Program
by Suzanne Young
Fatherland
(26.2K)
Fatherland
by Robert Harris
Undeniable
(45.7K)

About BookQuoters

BookQuoters is a community of passionate readers who enjoy sharing the most meaningful, memorable and interesting quotes from great books. As the world communicates more and more via texts, memes and sound bytes, short but profound quotes from books have become more relevant and important. For some of us a quote becomes a mantra, a goal or a philosophy by which we live. For all of us, quotes are a great way to remember a book and to carry with us the author’s best ideas.

We thoughtfully gather quotes from our favorite books, both classic and current, and choose the ones that are most thought-provoking. Each quote represents a book that is interesting, well written and has potential to enhance the reader’s life. We also accept submissions from our visitors and will select the quotes we feel are most appealing to the BookQuoters community.

Founded in 2023, BookQuoters has quickly become a large and vibrant community of people who share an affinity for books. Books are seen by some as a throwback to a previous world; conversely, gleaning the main ideas of a book via a quote or a quick summary is typical of the Information Age but is a habit disdained by some diehard readers. We feel that we have the best of both worlds at BookQuoters; we read books cover-to-cover but offer you some of the highlights. We hope you’ll join us.