Plague Of The Sea Quotes

The Annual Register for 1763 tabulated the casualty list for British sailors in the Seven Years' War with France. Out of 184,899 men raised or rounded up for the war, 133, 708 died from disease, primarily scurvy, while only 1,512 were killed in action. ~ Stephen R. Brown

Witch-sign, they said. Little eddies, like miniature storms breaking the surface of the ocean. Witch-signs rise up in great numbers, last a few minutes, and then disappear. When the whirlpools are gone, all that's left is floating petals. Black sea roses.

Anomalies.

I'm not afraid. A queer chill settles into my bones, and I huddle, pulling my knees closer to my chest. What if Ilven's death really did raise something up out of the waters? But those stories Nala is talking about - they're just … fancies. There's no real truth to them, they're Hob tales. That's what our House crake taught me. Of course, Ilven always did find the old stories fascinating and told me how she secretly wished that they were still real, that there was more to magic than just the scriv-forced power of the Houses.

Oh Ilven. Bound now below the sea, caught in the kelp forests, nibbled at, her hair full of crabs and little ghost shrimp, a ghost herself. I choke on a sadness so sharp that it has sliced me in two. ~ Cat Hellisen

It's hard to tell the difference between sea and sky, between voyager and sea. Between reality and the workings of the heart. ~ Haruki Murakami

of Alcohol - but please, be careful how you tell of them, remember Ovid shivering on the Black Sea shores, wondering how to get back in to one of the Roman villas once again. November ~ MariJo Moore

Everything is melting in nature. We think we see objects, but our eyes are slow and partial. Nature is blooming and withering in long puffy respirations, rising and falling in oceanic wave-motion. A mind that opened itself fully to nature without sentimental preconception would be glutted by nature's coarse materialism, its relentless superfluity. An apple tree laden with fruit: how peaceful, how picturesque. But remove the rosy filter of humanism from our gaze and look again. See nature spuming and frothing, its mad spermatic bubbles endlessly spilling out and smashing in that inhuman round of waste, rot, and carnage. From the jammed glassy cells of sea roe to the feathery spores poured into the air from bursting green pods, nature is a festering hornet's nest of aggression and overkill. This is the chthonian black magic with which we are infected as sexual beings; this is the daemonic identity that Christianity so inadequately defines as original sin and thinks it can cleanse us of. Procreative woman is the most troublesome obstacle to Christianity's claim to catholicity, testified by its wishful doctrines of Immaculate Conception and Virgin Birth. The procreativeness of chthonian nature is an obstacle to all of western metaphysics and to each man in his quest for identity against his mother. Nature is the seething excess of being. ~ Camille Paglia

The sternest-seeming stoic is human after all; and to "burst" with boldness and good-will into "the silent sea" of their souls is often to confer on them the first of obligations. ~ Charlotte Bronte

It was as though she has found refuge inside a shell and the only sound she could hear was the sea of an inimical world. ~ Milan Kundera

Ebbing: disappearing, becoming of the sea. Flowing: returning, rolling on the sands, returned to earth. ~ Yvonne Adhiambo Owuor

Dear Prince, I must leave you, but I will never forget you, and next spring I will bring you back two beautiful jewels in place of those you have given away. The ruby shall be redder than a red rose, and the sapphire shall be as blue as the great sea. ~ Oscar Wilde

To worry is to acknowledge that the world is unpredictable, and there is power in understanding one's own powerlessness at times. But too often worry takes on life of its own. Men are quite prone to this. They'll plague themselves with so many 'what if's and 'if only's that they soon forget to ponder the true possibilities before them. Which inevitably lead to poor decisions. Whatever happens will happen. Sometimes we have say over the future. Sometimes we don't. Either way, worrying alone never accomplishes anything. ~ A. Lee Martinez

Miranda opened her eyes in time to see the sunrise. A wash of violent color, pink and streaks of brilliant orange, the container ships on the horizon suspended between the blaze of the sky and the water aflame, the seascape bleeding into confused visions of Station Eleven, its extravagant sunsets the its indigo sea. The lights of the fleet fading into morning, the ocean burning into sky. ~ Emily St. John Mandel

A printer can do the same thing and much more. He can preserve the Law, but he can also preserve the words of madmen. And in many copies! The printer's art will serve everyone: the faithful and the unfaithful, the righteous and the wicked. And as you know from having read it, 'The wicked are like the tossing sea, for it cannot rest.' God grant that we won't have to regret this new invention. ~ Marek Halter

Music is a thing of the soul-a roselipped shell that murmured of the eternal sea-a strange bird singing the songs of another shore. ~ J.G. Holland

At the Ball

I chanced to see you. Music played,
Vain chatter filled the place.
It seemed as though a veil were laid
Across your secret face.

Your eyes alone were sad; your way
Of speaking ravished me,
As though I heard a far pipe play,
And on the shores the sea.

How welcome was your look of thought,
Your figure tall and slight;
And that clear laugh with sadness fraught
Is in my heart to-night.

And when the noise of day is stilled
Once more they come to me,
Those eyes with so much sadness filled,
That voice, with gaiety.

Down to the depths of sleep I go,
Where dreams uncaptured move.
But do I love you? Who can know?
Yet this, I think, is love. ~ Alexei Tolstoy

… I wonder why she hasn't spread the tale."
"The only reason she would not is if she is ill or the story would somehow reflect badly on herself," replied Lady Badgery. "Otherwise, Portia Troutbridge has never been known to keep a scandal to herself."
"Oh, I do hope she is ill!" exclaimed Truthful. "I mean, only just ill enough to keep the news quiet for a little longer. Is that too dreadful of me?"
"Not at all," announced Lady Badgery. "It is a very reasonable desire. In the case of Portia Troutbridge I myself would wish for something much more severe. Scarlet fever, perhaps. Or the plague. ~ Garth Nix

I am the story teller, charged with the secrets of this world and beyond. I am the calm in the storm, the quiet in the quake and the stillness in the dark. I am the old lady with the pot of water when you are dying of thirst. I am the sapling after the forest fire and the child who survives after pestilence. For those who will listen, hear you the first secret. Love is the sea in which all of nature exists and the greatest love of all is that which is spilled for another. ~ Kaizen Kobe

Siddhartha saw it hurrying, the river, which consisted of him and his loved ones and of all people, he had ever seen, all of these waves and waters were hurrying, suffering, towards goals, many goals, the waterfall, the lake, the rapids, the sea, and all goals were reached, and every goal was followed by a new one, and the water turned into vapour and rose to the sky, turned into rain and poured down from the sky, turned into a source, a stream, a river, headed forward once again, flowed on once again. ~ Hermann Hesse

Oceans need more attention because climate change IS an ocean issue. Our oceans will be the first victim, and sea life will suffer dramatically. Detailed proof is hard in ocean science, but I think we're already seeing big ocean changes caused by climate change, such as starvation of whales, seabirds, and other animals off the coast US west coast. ~ Mark Powell

The beach was a desert of heaps of sea and stones tumbling wildly about, and the sea did what it liked, and what it liked was destruction. ~ Charles Dickens

But hell can endure for only a limited period, and life will begin again one day. History may perhaps have
an end; but our task is not to terminate it but to create it, in the image of what we henceforth know to be
true. Art, at least, teaches us that man cannot be explained by history alone and that he also finds a reason
for his existence in the order of nature. For him, the great god Pan is not dead. His most instinctive act of
rebellion, while it affirms the value and the dignity common to all men, obstinately claims, so as to satisfy
its hunger for unity, an integral part of the reality whose name is beauty. One can reject all history and yet
accept the world of the sea and the stars. The rebels who wish to ignore nature and beauty are condemned
to banish from history everything with which they want to construct the dignity of existence and of labor.
Every great reformer tries to create in history what Shakespeare, Cervantes, Moliere, and Tolstoy knew
how to create: a world always ready to satisfy the hunger for freedom and dignity which every man
carries in his heart. Beauty, no doubt, does not make revolutions. But a day will come when revolutions
will have need of beauty. The procedure of beauty, which is to contest reality while endowing it with
unity, is also the procedure of rebellion. Is it possible eternally to reject injustice without ceasing to
acclaim the nature of man and the beauty of the world ~ Albert Camus

Let us lie down once more by the breathing side
Of Ocean, where our live forefathers sleep
As if the Known Sea still were a month wide
Atlantis howls but is no longer steep! ~ Allen Tate

The story line of Kings is so overcrowded, it's hard to keep track. The narrator complains, there's so much going on, Solomon can't love God "wholeheartedly." This is a crucial word. The new Jerusalem opens up a whole new layer of human problems. We are in a fluid world, full of lush possibilities. Religions, jobs, marriages, all forms of life feel like open questions. In this atmosphere, can anybody be "wholehearted" about anything? Cosmopolitan culture, when it thrives, is scary. But it is also thrilling, and the people love it: "Judah and Israel prospered, as many as the sand on the sea; they ate and drank and were happy. ~ Anonymous

Sonnet to Liberty
NOT that I love thy children, whose dull eyes
See nothing save their own unlovely woe,
Whose minds know nothing, nothing care to know, -
But that the roar of thy Democracies,
Thy reigns of Terror, thy great Anarchies, 5
Mirror my wildest passions like the sea, -
And give my rage a brother - ! Liberty!
For this sake only do thy dissonant cries
Delight my discreet soul, else might all kings
By bloody knout or treacherous cannonades 10
Rob nations of their rights inviolate
And I remain unmoved - and yet, and yet,
These Christs that die upon the barricades,
God knows it I am with them, in some things. ~ Oscar Wilde

The toil of all that be Helps not the primal fault; It rains into the sea, And still the sea is salt. A. E. HOUSMAN MORE POEMS ~ Arthur C. Clarke

Romantic waves beat deep in my chest of playful untouchable thoughts of you... As dreams are the threads I weave with care the path for you to me...the sky above lagoon with lovely lights, soft music, slow dancing... You are the turquoise sea, and I, an azure sky. The sweet caressing story of the day...much steals men's eyes and women's souls amazeth... You feel me like I feel you... The soothing voice with laughter mine sprinkle all over you comforting through the lonely nights when we are the world apart...eternity within your reach... You search your heart when I am away... It's here, it's with me... Your breath coincides with the rhythm of mine. So breathe and let your soul paint vision within... I am with you, and hold you close...with peaceful lullaby... ~ Oksana Rus

To all the ships at sea, and all the ports of call. To my family and to all friends and strangers. This is a message, and a prayer. The message is that my travels taught me a great truth. I already had what everyone is searching for and few ever find. The one person in the world who I was born to love forever. A person, like me, of the outer banks and the blue Atlantic mystery. A person rich in simple treasures. Self-made. Self-taught. A harbor where I am forever home. And no wind, or trouble or even a little death can knock down this house. The prayer is that everyone in the world can know this kind of love and be healed by it. If my prayer is heard, there will be an erasing of all guilt and all regret and an end to all anger. Please, God. Amen. ~ Nicholas Sparks

Weeding the peony hedge I hear the windfalls in the orchard; hear them strike the ground, hear them strike against branches as they fall to the ground. The immemorial smell of apples, old as the sea. Mary makes jelly. Up from the kitchen, up the stairs and into all the rooms comes the smell of apples. ~ John Cheever

It is a long Baptism into the seas of humankind, my daughter. Better immersion and in pain than to live untouched. Yet how will you sustain? ~ Tillie Olsen

That was Leah, before the fade came. Before the sea mist of depression rolled in without much warning and dampened her, softened her so that she had less strength. She had always been sensitive - that was the word he'd heard for her and it was the right word. She saddened at the lobsters that Tom hauled ashore; she bruised, as ripe fruits do ...
Still. There is something in Leah. A flash of metal. A piece of grit in the pearl. ~ Susan Fletcher

The late 20th century sea level rise rate lacks any sign of acceleration. Satellite altimetry indicates virtually no changes in the last decade. ~ Nils-Axel Morner

All that I desire in life are three ...
A wilderness: A beach on the sun-drenched sea,
A puff of opium,
And thee. ~ Roman Payne

I find myself at the extremity of a long beach. How gladly does the spirit leap forth, and suddenly enlarge its sense of being to the full extent of the broad, blue, sunny deep! A greeting and a homage to the Sea! I descend over its margin, and dip my hand into the wave that meets me, and bathe my brow. That far-resounding roar is the Ocean's voice of welcome. His salt breath brings a blessing along with it ~ Nathaniel Hawthorne

The roaring seas and many a dark range of mountains lie between us. ~ Homer

I lay down on one of [the rocks] in the fetal position. When I awoke it was after one a.m. and the tide was rising higher. My body was coated in salt and ocean foam. I felt like I was part of the rock and part of the ocean, and I wondered if this was how Sappho felt, even in her deepest desperation, part of the earth, like that desperation and longing or eternal cosmic want was something to be celebrated–something natural–holy even, or at least, not just something to be endured. ~ Melissa Broder (author)

My first wish is to see this plague of mankind, war, banished from the earth. ~ George Washington

...how many of the phrases that came to mind when thinking about his own life, were somehow sea-related. Her interest had ebbed. They were both drowning in their sorrow. He had sunk lower than ever before. The vocabulary of the ocean seemed tailored to loss. ~ Meg Wolitzer

People like to believe that they have several options open to them, but this is only a justification for attempting to avoid their battles. A warrior understands the folly of seeking escapisms, for he knows the world is pervaded by power, which comes at him like the waves of the sea. He either mounts the crest of those waves and surfs them, or he goes down under. ~ Théun Mares

It is a curious situation that the sea, from which life first arose should now be threatened by the activities of one form of that life. But the sea, though changed in a sinister way, will continue to exist; the threat is rather to life itself. ~ Rachel Carson

I would enter the desert alone, to leave in the sand endless footprints only to be obliterated by the wind, to walk the same path each day expecting the same path tomorrow, and perhaps to cease wondering at the bloom and wither of lilies only to linger for death. But no, even in the desert, I would seek a new sanctuary, to contemplate a grain of sand in a sea of dryness ... ~ Leonard Seet

That fellow was like all of us: descended from good people who were stolen from their families and country, sailed over the sea, and forced into slavery. 'We don't let them steal our dignity,' that preacher said. Richard, his name was. He said they cannot steal our honor, our strength, or our love." "True words," I said. "Do you know what he said about this America?" Henry asked. I shook my head. "Remember, lads?" Henry asked his mates. "Join with me. He said, 'This land . . .'" A half dozen voices spoke with Henry, strong black men sharing the preacher's words like a hymn or a prayer. "'Which we have watered with our tears and our blood, is now our mother country.'" The words drifted up to the stars with the sparks from the fire. "We go to war, Missus Isabel," Henry added, "in order to make our mother country, this land, free for everyone. ~ Laurie Halse Anderson

The gospel at Christmas is: Christ has trampled this enemy underfoot at the cross. So for everyone who trusts in him, their sins are cast into the depths of the sea. ~ John Piper

The journey of life is a mental one, which is taking place in the sea of illusion. ~ Neville Goddard

The Sahara was a spectacle as alive as the sea. The tints of the dunes changed according to the time of day and the angle of the light: golden as apricots from far off, when we drove close to them they turned to freshly made butter; behind us they grew pink; from sand to rock, the materials of which the desert was made varied as much as its tints ... ~ Simone De Beauvoir

The mariner will have dominion over the atmosphere and the great deep, over the fish of the sea and the fowls of the air. ~ Mary Baker Eddy