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- extracted_at
- 2026-01-18T02:42:16.577Z
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- 19414
- text
- thou be, thou leapest out of darkness; but I am darkness leaping out of
light, leaping out of thee! The javelins cease; open eyes; see, or not?
There burn the flames! Oh, thou magnanimous! now I do glory in my
genealogy. But thou art but my fiery father; my sweet mother, I know
not. Oh, cruel! what hast thou done with her? There lies my puzzle; but
thine is greater. Thou knowest not how came ye, hence callest thyself
unbegotten; certainly knowest not thy beginning, hence callest thyself
unbegun. I know that of me, which thou knowest not of thyself, oh, thou
omnipotent. There is some unsuffusing thing beyond thee, thou clear
spirit, to whom all thy eternity is but time, all thy creativeness
mechanical. Through thee, thy flaming self, my scorched eyes do dimly
see it. Oh, thou foundling fire, thou hermit immemorial, thou too hast
thy incommunicable riddle, thy unparticipated grief. Here again with
haughty agony, I read my sire. Leap! leap up, and lick the sky! I leap
with thee; I burn with thee; would fain be welded with thee; defyingly
I worship thee!”
“The boat! the boat!” cried Starbuck, “look at thy boat, old man!”
Ahab’s harpoon, the one forged at Perth’s fire, remained firmly lashed
in its conspicuous crotch, so that it projected beyond his whale-boat’s
bow; but the sea that had stove its bottom had caused the loose leather
sheath to drop off; and from the keen steel barb there now came a
levelled flame of pale, forked fire. As the silent harpoon burned there
like a serpent’s tongue, Starbuck grasped Ahab by the arm—“God, God is
against thee, old man; forbear! ’tis an ill voyage! ill begun, ill
continued; let me square the yards, while we may, old man, and make a
fair wind of it homewards, to go on a better voyage than this.”
Overhearing Starbuck, the panic-stricken crew instantly ran to the
braces—though not a sail was left aloft. For the moment all the aghast
mate’s thoughts seemed theirs; they raised a half mutinous cry. But
dashing the rattling lightning links to the deck, and snatching the
burning harpoon, Ahab waved it like a torch among them; swearing to
transfix with it the first sailor that but cast loose a rope’s end.
- title
- Chapter 125