The Cruise of the Snark Quotes

“Our friends cannot understand why we make this voyage. They shudder, and moan, and raise their hands. No amount of explanation can make them comprehend that we are moving along the line of least resistance; that it is easier for us to go down to the sea in a small ship than to remain on dry land, just as it is easier for them to remain on dry land than to go down to the sea in the small ship. This state of mind comes of an undue prominence of the ego. They cannot get away from themselves. They cannot come out of themselves long enough to see that their line of least resistance is not necessarily everybody else’s line of least resistance. They make of their own bundle of desires, likes, and dislikes a yardstick wherewith to measure the desires, likes, and dislikes of all creatures. This is unfair. I tell them so. But they cannot get away from their own miserable egos long enough to hear me. They think I am crazy. In return, I am sympathetic. It is a state of mind familiar to me. We are all prone to think there is something wrong with the mental processes of the man who disagrees with us.”
― Jack London, The Cruise of the Snark

“Here am I, a little animal called a man--a bit of vitalized matter, one hundred and sixty-five pounds of meat and blood, nerve, sinew, bones, and brain,--all of it soft and tender, susceptible to hurt, fallible, and frail. I strike a light back-handed blow on the nose of an obstreperous horse, and a bone in my hand is broken. I put my head under the water for five minutes, and I am drowned. I fall twenty feet through the air, and I am smashed. I am a creature of temperature. A few degrees one way, and my fingers and ears and toes blacken and drop off. A few degrees the other way, and my skin blisters and shrivels away from the raw, quivering flesh. A few additional degrees either way, and the life and the light in me go out. A drop of poison injected into my body from a snake, and I cease to move--for ever I cease to move. A splinter of lead from a rifle enters my head, and I am wrapped around in the eternal blackness.

Fallible and frail, a bit of pulsating, jelly-like life--it is all I am. About me are the great natural forces--colossal menaces, Titans of destruction, unsentimental monsters that have less concern for me than I have for the grain of sand I crush under my foot. They have no concern at all for me. They do not know me. They are unconscious, unmerciful, and unmoral. They are the cyclones and tornadoes, lightning flashes and cloud-bursts, tide-rips and tidal waves, undertows and waterspouts, great whirls and sucks and eddies, earthquakes and volcanoes, surfs that thunder on rock-ribbed coasts and seas that leap aboard the largest crafts that float, crushing humans to pulp or licking them off into the sea and to death--and these insensate monsters do not know that tiny sensitive creature, all nerves and weaknesses, whom men call Jack London, and who himself thinks he is all right and quite a superior being.”
― Jack London, The Cruise of the Snark

“The thing I like most of all is personal achievement--not achievement for the world's applause, but achievement for my own delight.”
― Jack London, The Cruise of the Snark

“We are all prone to think there is something wrong with the mental processes of the man who disagrees with us.”
― Jack London, The Cruise of the Snark

“Todos estamos prontos para pensar que há algo de errado no processo mental de quem discorda de nós.”
― Jack London, The Cruise of the Snark

“As I write these lines I lift my eyes and look seaward.  I am on the beach of Waikiki on the island of Oahu.  Far, in the azure sky, the trade-wind clouds drift low over the blue-green turquoise of the deep sea.  Nearer, the sea is emerald and light olive-green.  Then comes the reef, where the water is all slaty purple flecked with red.  Still nearer are brighter greens and tans, lying in alternate stripes and showing where sandbeds lie between the living coral banks.  Through and over and out of these wonderful colours tumbles and thunders a magnificent surf.”
― Jack London, The Cruise of the Snark (Illustrated)

“Here am I, a little animal called a man—a bit of vitalized matter, one hundred and sixty-five pounds of meat and blood, nerve, sinew, bones, and brain,—all of it soft and tender, susceptible to hurt, fallible, and frail. I strike a light back-handed blow on the nose of an obstreperous horse, and a bone in my hand is broken. I put my head under the water for five minutes, and I am drowned. I fall twenty feet through the air, and I am smashed. I am a creature of temperature. A few degrees one way, and my fingers and ears and toes blacken and drop off. A few degrees the other way, and my skin blisters and shrivels away from the raw, quivering flesh. A few additional degrees either way, and the life and the light in me go out. A drop of poison injected into my body from a snake, and I cease to move—for ever I cease to move. A splinter of lead from a rifle enters my head, and I am wrapped around in the eternal blackness.”
― Jack London, The Cruise of the Snark

“Our friends cannot understand why we make this voyage. They shudder, and moan, and raise their hands. No amount of explanation can make them comprehend that we are moving along the line of least resistance; that it is easier for us to go down to the sea in a small ship than to remain on dry land, just as it is easier for them to remain on dry land than to go down to the sea in the small ship.”
― Jack London, The Cruise of the Snark

“Dacă mi-ar fi dat să aleg între a fi obligat să trăiesc în Molokai tot restul vieții, sau în East End-ul Londrei, East Side-ul New Yorkului sau Stockyard-ul Chicago-ului, aş alege Molokai-ul fără să şovăi. Aş prefera un singur an în Molokai pentru cinci ani de viață în oricare din celelalte locuri amintite - haznale ale degradării şi mizeriei umane.”
― Jack London, The Cruise of the Snark

“As palavras finais são: "Eu gosto". Elas vivem sob a filosofia e são gêmeas do coração da vida. Depois que a filosofia despendeu um mês, argumentando de modo ponderado, dizendo ao indivíduo o que ele deve fazer, o indivíduo diz em um instante, "Eu gosto", faz tudo ao contrário e a filosofia se encolhe. É o seu "Eu gosto" que faz o alcoólatra beber e o mártir vestir a camisa de cilício; é o que faz um homem ser farrista, outro ser ermitão; que faz um homem perseguir fama e dinheiro, outro seguir o amor; e outro, ainda, a Deus. E muitas vezes a filosofia é usada pelo homem para explicar o seu "Eu gosto".”
― Jack London, The Cruise of the Snark

“A vida que é vivida é uma vida com sucesso e o sucesso é como o ar que se respira.”
― Jack London, The Cruise of the Snark

“As pessoas não conseguem ver além de si mesmas. Não podem sair de si mesmas tempo suficiente para ver que sua linha de resistência máxima não é, necessariamente, a linha de resistência de todo mundo. Fazem do próprio conjunto de desejos, gostos e desgostos uma escala para medir os desejos, gostos e desgostos de todas as criaturas.”
― Jack London, The Cruise of the Snark