36 
MOBY DICK; OR 
earth’s foremost part; all the rest comes in its rear; the pulpit leads 
the world. From thence it is that the storm of God’s quick wrath 
is first descried, and the how must bear the earliest brunt. From 
thence it is that the God of breezes fair or foul is first invoked for 
favourable winds. Yes, the world’s a ship on its passage out, and not 
a voyage complete ; and the pulpit is its prow. 
CHAPTER IX 
THE SERMON 
Father Mapple rose, and in a mild voice of unassuming authority 
ordered the scattered people to condense. “ Starboard gangway, there I 
side away to larboard — larboard gangway to starboard! Midships! 
midships !” 
There was a low rumbling of heavy sea-boots among the benches, 
and a still slighter shuffling of women’s shoes, and all was quiet again, 
and every eye on the preacher. 
He paused a little; then kneeling in the pulpit’s bows, folded his 
large brown hands across his chest, uplifted his closed eyes, and offered 
a prayer so deeply devout that he seemed kneeling and praying at the 
bottom of the sea. 
This ended, in prolonged solemn tones, like the continual tolling of 
a bell in a ship that is foundering at sea in a fog — in such tones he 
commenced reading the following hymn; but changing his manner to- 
wards the concluding stanzas, burst forth with a pealing exultation 
and joy— 
“The ribs and terrors in the whale, 
Arched over me a dismal gloom, 
While all God’s sunlit waves rolled by, 
And lift me deepening down to doom. 
“I saw the opening maw of hell, 
With endless pains and sorrows there; 
Which none but they that feel can tell — 
Oh, I was plunging to despair. 
