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Hawaii Quotes
Hawaii
by
James A. Michener81,446 ratings, 4.22 average rating, 2,349 reviews
Hawaii Quotes
Showing 1-30 of 71
“It was his opinion that a man had to wait until he was dead to know the meaning of God, unless he happened to have known the sea in his youth.”
― Hawaii
― Hawaii
“This is the greatest evil that grows out of a wrong act. Somebody always remembers it … in an evil way.”
― Hawaii
― Hawaii
“Why is it, Reverend Hale, that we must always laugh at our book, but always revere yours?”
― Hawaii
― Hawaii
“no man leaves where he is and seeks a distant place unless he is in some respect a failure; but having failed in one location and having been ejected, it is possible that in the next he will be a little wiser.”
― Hawaii
― Hawaii
“In later years, it would become fashionable to say of the missionaries, "They came to the islands to do good, and they did right well." Others made jest of the missionary slogan, "They came to a nation in darkness; they left it in light," by pointing out: "Of course they left Hawaii lighter. They stole every goddamned thing that wasn't nailed down.”
― Hawaii
― Hawaii
“Therefore, men of Polynesia and Boston and China and Mount Fuji and the barrios of the Philippines, do not come to these islands empty-handed, or craven in spirit, or afraid to starve. There is no food here. In these islands there is no certainty. Bring your own food, your own gods, your own flowers and fruits and concepts. For if you come without resources to these islands you will perish... On these harsh terms the islands waited.”
― Hawaii
― Hawaii
“The chance emergence of the was nothing. Remember this. But its persistence and patient accumulation of stature were everything. Only by relentless effort did it establish its right to exist.”
― Hawaii
― Hawaii
“I live for the few minutes I can talk with a sensible human being, but every time I do, I feel worse than before.”
― Hawaii
― Hawaii
“wherever a human being goes, there is a challenge. Be the best man you can, and your gods will look with favor upon you.”
― Hawaii
― Hawaii
“In truth, all men are brothers, but as generations pass, it is differences that matter and not similarities.”
― Hawaii
― Hawaii
“But if I turn my back on a supposed communist, how do I know that I am not turning my back on the very concept of liberty that I am seeking to protect? Honest men can always get someone to defend them. But what does justice mean if apparently dishonest men can find no one?”
― Hawaii
― Hawaii
“A man charged with a crime has a right to a lawyer, and when the community is most strongly against him, his right is morally greatest.”
― Hawaii
― Hawaii
“As the men rode they saw for the first time the full grandeur of Hawaii, for they were to work on one of the fairest islands in the Pacific. To the left rose jagged and soaring mountains, clothed in perpetual green. Born millions of years before the other mountains of Hawaii, these had eroded first and now possessed unique forms that pleased the eye. At one point the wind had cut a complete tunnel through the highest mountain; at others the erosion of softer rock had left isolated spires of basalt standing like monitors. To the right unfolded a majestic shore, cut by deep bays and highlighted by a rolling surf that broke endlessly upon dark rocks and brilliant white sand. Each mile disclosed to Kamejiro and his companions some striking new scene. But most memorable of all he saw that day was the red earth. Down millions of years the volcanic eruptions of Kauai had spewed forth layers of iron-rich rocks, and for subsequent millions of years this iron had slowly, imperceptibly disintegrated until it now stood like gigantic piles of scintillating rust, the famous red earth of Kauai. Sometimes a green-clad mountain would show a gaping scar where the side of a cliff had fallen away, disclosing earth as red as new blood. At other times the fields along which the men rode would be an unblemished furnace-red, as if flame had just left it. Again in some deep valley where small amounts of black earth had intruded, the resulting red nearly resembled a brick color. But always the soil was red. It shone in a hundred different hues, but it was loveliest when it stood out against the rich green verdure of the island, for then the two colors complemented each other, and Kauai seemed to merit the name by which it was affectionately known: the Garden Island.”
― Hawaii
― Hawaii
“in 1954 it looked as if a deep schism had been driven down the middle of our community, pitting Japanese against haole, but the Sakagawa boys had the courage to back away from that tempting, perilous course. They reconciled haole and Japanese, and it is to their credit that they did so.”
― Hawaii
― Hawaii
“Sometimes when the Japanese maids, in crisp white uniforms, had withdrawn, a Roosevelt appointee would ask timorously, “These Japanese, can they be trusted?” And The Fort invariably replied, “We’ve had Sumiko for eighteen years, and we’ve never known a better or more loyal maid.”
― Hawaii
― Hawaii
“during the forthcoming even emptier years, she would still be there, a haunting vision of the other half of life, the womanliness, the caretaking symbol, the majestic, lovely, receptive other half.”
― Hawaii
― Hawaii
“the fundamental fact that law directs the ongoing of society. It is rooted in the past, determines the present, and protects the future.”
― Hawaii
― Hawaii
