44 
MOBY DICK; OR 
false were salvation! Yea, woe to him who, as the great Pilot Paul 
has it, while preaching to others is himself a castaway !” 
He dropped and fell away from himself for a moment ; then lifting 
his face to them again, showed a deep joy in his eyes, as he cried out 
with a heavenly enthusiasm, — “But oh ! shipmates ! on the starboard 
hand of every woe, there is a sure delight; and higher the top of that 
delight, than the bottom of the woe is deep. Is not the maintruck 
higher than the keelson is low ? Delight is to him — a far, far upward, 
and inward delight — who against the proud gods and commodores of 
this earth, ever stands forth his own inexorable self. Delight is to him 
whose strong arms yet support him, when the ship of this base treach- 
erous world has gone down beneath him. Delight is to him, who gives 
no quarter in the truth, and kills, burns, and destroys all sin though 
he pluck it out from under the robes of Senators and Judges. Delight, 
— top-gallant delight is to him, who acknowledges no law or lord, but 
the Lord his God, and is only a patriot to heaven. Delight is to him, 
whom all the waves of the billows of the seas of the boisterous mob can 
never shake from this sure Keel of the Ages. And eternal delight 
and deliciousness will be his, who coming to lay him down, can say 
with his final breath — O Father ! — chiefly known to me by Thy rod — 
mortal or immortal, here I die. I have striven to be Thine, more than 
to be this world’s, or mine own. Yet this is nothing; I leave eternity 
to Thee; for what is man that he should live out the lifetime of his 
God?” 
He said no more, but slowly waving a benediction covered his face 
with his hands, and so remained kneeling, till all the people had de- 
parted, and he was left alone in the place. 
CHAPTER X 
A BOSOM FRIEND 
Returning to the Spouter-Inn from the Chapel, I found Queequeg 
there quite alone; he having left the Chapel before the benediction 
some time. He was sitting on a bench before the fire, with his feet on 
the stove hearth, and in one hand was holding close up to his face that 
little negro idol of his; peering hard into its face, and with a jack-knife 
