Sailor Quotes

• A woman knows the face of the man she loves as a sailor knows the open sea.

  Honore de Balzac

  Love, Men, Sea

  90 Copy quote

• Whenever I find myself growing grim about the mouth; whenever it is a damp, drizzly November in my soul; whenever I find myself involuntarily pausing before coffin warehouses, and bringing up the rear of every funeral I meet; and especially whenever my hypos get such an upper hand of me, that it requires a strong moral principle to prevent me from deliberately stepping into the street, and methodically knocking people's hats off - then, I account it high time to get to sea as soon as I can.

  Herman Melville

  Depression, Strong, Hands

  Herman Melville (2002). “Moby-Dick: A Picture Voyage : an Abridged and Illustrated Edition of the Original Classic”, p.13, Spinner Publications

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• Any damn fool can navigate the world sober. It takes a really good sailor to do it drunk.

  Francis Chichester

  Inspirational, Funny, Drinking

  67 Copy quote

• Out of sight of land the sailor feels safe. It is the beach that worries him.

  Charles Davis

  Inspirational, Funny, Beach

  51 Copy quote

• Sailors, with their built in sense of order, service and discipline, should really be running the world.

  Nicholas Monsarrat

  Inspirational, Funny, Running

  48 Copy quote

• Round the world and home again, that's the sailor's way!

  William Allingham

  Home, World, Way

  William Allingham (1877). “Songs, Ballads, and Stories: Including Many Now First Collected, the Rest Revised and Rearranged”

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• A ship in port is safe, but that's not what ships are built for.

  Grace Hopper

  Inspirational, Life, Motivational

  1987 Address at Trinity College, Washington. Reported in Time, 22 Jun.

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• The wonder is always new that any sane man can be a sailor.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Army, Men, Sailing

  Ralph Waldo Emerson (1872). “Representative men. English traits. Conduct of life”, p.172

  18 Copy quote

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• A sailor's joys are as simple as a child's.

  Bernard Moitessier

  Children, Simple, Sea

  Bernard Moitessier (1995). “The Long Way”, p.13, Sheridan House, Inc.

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• No man will be a sailor who has contrivance enough to get himself into a jail; for being in a ship is being in a jail, with the chance of being drowned... a man in a jail has more room, better food, and commonly better company.

  Samuel Johnson

  Funny, Army, Men

  Quoted in James Boswell, The Life of Samuel Johnson (1791) (entry for 16 Mar. 1759)

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  The pessimist complains about the wind; the optimist expects it to change; the realist adjusts the sails.

  William Arthur Ward

  Inspirational, Inspiring, Leadership

  299 Copy quote

• Being in a ship is being in a jail, with the chance of being drowned.

  Samuel Johnson

  Travel, Jail, Sailing

  Quoted in James Boswell, The Life of Samuel Johnson (1791) (entry for 16 Mar. 1759)

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• The man who has a girl in every port is not a sailor but a wholesaler.

  Evan Esar

  Girl, Men, He Man

  Evan Esar (1961). “Humorous English: a guide to comic usage, jocular speech and writing, and witty grammar”

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• Calm seas never made a good sailor

  Franklin D. Roosevelt

  Sea, Calm, Made

  71 Copy quote

• We are imprisoned in the realm of life, like a sailor on his tiny boat, on an infinite ocean.

  Anna Freud

  Ocean, Tiny, Boat

  59 Copy quote

• It isn't that life ashore is distasteful to me. But life at sea is better.

  Francis Drake

  Inspirational, Funny, Life

  85 Copy quote

• All men will be sailors then
  Until the sea shall free them

  Leonard Cohen

  Men, Sea

  "Suzanne" (song) (1966)

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• He who loves practice without theory is like the sailor who boards ship without a rudder and compass and never knows where he may cast.

  Leonardo da Vinci

  Love, Math, Reality

  16 Copy quote

• Sailors have the cleanest bodies and the filthiest minds.

  Eleanor Roosevelt

  Mind, Navy, Body

  7 Copy quote

• What do you want to be a sailor for? There are greater storms in politics than you will ever find at sea. Piracy, broadsides, blood on the decks. You will find them all in politics.

  David Lloyd George

  Blood, Sea, Storm

  26 Copy quote

• I don't know who named them swells. There's nothing swell about them. They should have named them awfuls.

  Hugo Vihlen

  Should Have, Sailing, Nautical

  45 Copy quote

• There is but a plank between a sailor and eternity.

  Thomas Gibbons

  Sea, Sailing, Nautical

  46 Copy quote

• The Ancient Mariner would not have taken so well if it had been called The Old Sailor.

  Samuel Butler

  Taken, Ancient, English Language

  Samuel Butler (2008). “The Note-books of Samuel Butler: Easyread Comfort Edition”, p.49, ReadHowYouWant.com

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  At sea, I learned how little a person needs, not how much.

  Robin Lee Graham

  Sea, Sailing, Nautical

  156 Copy quote

• My piano is to me what a ship is to the sailor, what a steed is to the Arab. It is the intimate personal depository of everything that stirred wildly in my brain during the most impassioned days of my youth. It was there that all my wishes, all my dreams, all my joys, and all my sorrows lay.

  Franz Liszt

  Dream, Piano, Joy

  Franz Liszt, Charles Suttoni (1989). “An Artist's Journey: Lettres D'un Bachelier Es Musique, 1835-1841”, p.45, University of Chicago Press

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