Explore a treasure trove of wisdom and insight from Patrick O'brian through their most impactful and thought-provoking quotes and sayings. Broaden your horizons with their inspiring words and share these beautiful quote pictures from Patrick O'brian with your friends and followers on popular social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, or your personal blog - all free of charge. Delve into our collection of the top 102 Patrick O'brian quotes, handpicked for you to discover and share with others.

Most men find [peace] entirely unlike what they had expected - like love... By Patrick O'brian

I've never set out to seduce my reader. I don't see him at all clearly. By Patrick O'brian

About my books, that's all that I think the public has, in its normal way, to know. My private life is, by definition, private. By Patrick O'brian

Whereas I had not meant anything so illiberal as a national reflexion, of course; only that I hated Papists. By Patrick O'brian

How wonderfully strange,' he thought, 'to be upset by this trifle; yet I am upset. By Patrick O'brian

Come all you thoughtless young men,a warning take by meAnd never leave your happy homesto sail the raging sea. By Patrick O'brian

One lives in the very present moment; lives intently. There is no urge to be doing: being is the highest good. By Patrick O'brian

Stephen had spared no expense in making himself more unhappy, his own position as a rejected lover clearer. By Patrick O'brian

I have 60 years of reading to draw upon: naval memoirs, dispatches, the Naval Chronicles, family letters. By Patrick O'brian

It must be a weary life, being in a permanent state of rage or at least at half-cock. By Patrick O'brian

The Navy speaks in symbols and you may suit what meaning you choose to the words. By Patrick O'brian

Still, the farther hills remained as untouched as the sea; high, remote, arid, dark and sterile, poisoned with the sun. By Patrick O'brian

For a moment Jack felt the strongest inclination to snatch up his little gilt chair and beat the white-faced man down with it ... By Patrick O'brian

The lookout that first sights the cat shall have ten guineas and remission of sins, short of mutiny, sodomy, or damaging the paintwork. By Patrick O'brian

Take a newspaper account of Waterloo or Trafalgar, with all the small advertisements: it seems much more real than reading about it in a history book. By Patrick O'brian

Wondering just how Mr Church thought he had deserved anything short of impalement, Stephen walked into the cabin. By Patrick O'brian

Wallis,' said Maturin, 'I am happy to see you. How is your penis? By Patrick O'brian

For very strangely his officers looked upon Jack Aubrey as a moral figure, in spite of all proofs of the contrary ... By Patrick O'brian

Nelson once said that love of his country served him for a greatcoat. By Patrick O'brian

She is remarkably dry,' he said to Stephen who, preferring to die in the open, had crept up on deck, By Patrick O'brian

You do not mean there is danger of peace?, cried Jack. By Patrick O'brian

Puddings, my dear sir?' cried Graham.Puddings. We trice 'em athwart the starboard gumbrils, when sailing by and large. By Patrick O'brian

You can't be happy if you're not tolerably happy with yourself. The addition of friends adds immeasurably to life. By Patrick O'brian

It has always seemed to me that books are the supreme decorations of a room By Patrick O'brian

After all a book can be represented as a conversation with one's demon. By Patrick O'brian

What's wrong with (Captain) Jack Aubrey?""Everything, since he has a command and I have not. By Patrick O'brian

Lord Nelson's maxim 'Never mind manoeuvres: always go straight at 'em. By Patrick O'brian

Other people's marriages are a perpetual source of amazement. By Patrick O'brian

The function of the novel is the exploration of the human condition. Really, that's what it's all about. By Patrick O'brian

How much better a man feels when he is mixed with halibut and leg of mutton and roebuck By Patrick O'brian

Trollops are capital things in port, but will not do at sea. By Patrick O'brian

The sensation of falling into the past is not unlike that of coming home for the holidays. By Patrick O'brian

Likings arise when one has no earthly reason for liking - the most wildly improbable marriages and uncommon friendship. By Patrick O'brian

Should I feel better if I were to vomit?' asked Jagiello. 'I doubt it,' said Stephen. 'It has done nothing for the Colonel. By Patrick O'brian

I sew his ears on from time to time, sure. By Patrick O'brian

There is a systematic flocci-nauci-nihili-pilification of all other aspects of existence that angers me. By Patrick O'brian

That would be locking the horse after the stable door is gone, a very foolish thing to do. By Patrick O'brian

God,' he thought, 'never let me outlive my wits. By Patrick O'brian

Jack, you've debauched my sloth. By Patrick O'brian

But it did not much care for hunting, and then like so many geldings it spent much of its time mourning for its lost stones: a discontented horse. By Patrick O'brian

Sheep ain't poetical. By Patrick O'brian

I have often observed that extremely violent noise and activity go with good-fellowship and heightened spirits. By Patrick O'brian

Rested, shaved, coffee'd, steaked, you will be a different man. By Patrick O'brian

I have never written for an audience. On the other hand I do not write merely to please myself. By Patrick O'brian

There never was a ship that fought well without she was a happy ship. By Patrick O'brian

It all gave a pleasant illusion of eternity, this quiet sailing under a perfect sky towards a horizon perpetually five miles ahead, never nearer. By Patrick O'brian

aboard ship, and then hard tack, salt-horse, By Patrick O'brian

Do you not find it happens very often, that you are as gay as Garrick at dinner and then by supper-time you wonder why God made the world? By Patrick O'brian

Wittles is up' said Killick By Patrick O'brian

Clap on with both hands, sir - never say die - one more heave and we're home, safe and dry. By Patrick O'brian

No man born of woman has ever understood spoken Portuguese. By Patrick O'brian

Wit is the unexpected copulation of ideas. By Patrick O'brian

He held up two fingers, in case a landman might not fully comprehend so great a number. By Patrick O'brian

I have never yet known a man admit that he was either rich or asleep. By Patrick O'brian

We understood one another better before ever I opened my mouth By Patrick O'brian

I am so happy that you saw your epop. By Patrick O'brian

Sometimes you receive a knock in action: it may be your death-wound or just a scratch By Patrick O'brian

I am opposed to authority, that egg of misery and oppression; I am opposed to it largely for what it does to those who exercise it. By Patrick O'brian

Invincible ignorance could not be enlightened; and By Patrick O'brian

We are always the most violent against those whom we have injured. By Patrick O'brian

If I were a woman I should march out with a flaming torch and a sword; I should emasculate right and left. By Patrick O'brian

The more a victory cost, the more it was esteemed. By Patrick O'brian

Let us drink to the renewed success of Irish arms, and confusion to the Pope. By Patrick O'brian

I very much dislike being interviewed by the kind of journalist who tries to dig into your private life. By Patrick O'brian

Surely man in general is born to be oppressed or solitary, if he is to be fully human; By Patrick O'brian

He was conscientious, he did his duty as he understood it; but he was no seaman. By Patrick O'brian

The back of my hand to guilt. By Patrick O'brian

Never mind manoeuvres, always go at them. By Patrick O'brian

I wonder, James, whether it is not too easy for a rich man to despise money By Patrick O'brian

What was independence but a word? What did any form of government matter? Freedom: to do what? By Patrick O'brian

The newly-minted captain is told to let nothing stop him but to do nothing that would risk his ship or his crew. By Patrick O'brian

Jack, you have debauched my sloth. By Patrick O'brian

poachers and Methodies, of course. Oh, By Patrick O'brian

I know of few men over 50 that seem to me entirely human, virtually none who has long exercised authority. By Patrick O'brian

Although wealth may not bring happiness, the immediate prospect of it provides a wonderfully close imitation. By Patrick O'brian

I slept as the person in Plutarch that ran from Marathon to Athens without a pause would have slept if he had not fallen dead, the creature. By Patrick O'brian

It is a great while since I felt the grind of bone under my saw,' he added, smiling with anticipation. By Patrick O'brian

Gluppit the prawling strangles, there! By Patrick O'brian

Better than a shove in the eye with a dry stick. [- Jack] By Patrick O'brian

Jack had never been a hypocrite until he became a father, and even now it did not come easy. By Patrick O'brian

Jack and Stephen were neither of them human until the first pot of coffee was down, hot and strong. By Patrick O'brian

He that would make a pun would pick a pocket. By Patrick O'brian

It is unjust to provoke a man and then to complain he is a satyr if the provocation succeeds. You By Patrick O'brian

Any innocent pleasure is a real good: there are not so many of them. By Patrick O'brian

There is so much ignorant prejudice against bees in a dining-room. By Patrick O'brian

Virtue should always be colmingled with humor. By Patrick O'brian

Killick was a cross-grained bastard, who supposed that if he sprinkled his discourse with a good many sirs, the words in between did not signify: By Patrick O'brian

The newly-minted captain admits the irony between the gold on his shoulders and the lack of gold in his pockets. By Patrick O'brian

But when a man puts on maturity and invulnerability, it seems that he necessarily becomes indifferent to many things that gave him joy. By Patrick O'brian

Compulsion is the death of friendship. By Patrick O'brian

The author says that when an angry impulse is not immediately expressed, it turns to melancholy. By Patrick O'brian

What are bashed neeps?""Neeps hackit with balmagowry. By Patrick O'brian

Yet whether wisdom can be any more profitably pursued than happiness is a question. By Patrick O'brian

For Captain Aubrey, as for the rest of brute creation, there were only two kinds of birds, the edible and the inedible. By Patrick O'brian

men strike out their permanent characters; or have those characters struck into them By Patrick O'brian

Diana accepted the bait, spat out the hook with contempt, and hurried away to the stables to consult with Thomas, By Patrick O'brian

I've come down from the mountains, with an ass-full of specimens... By Patrick O'brian

On a ship, everything is enclosed: the people are right on top of each other and can't get up and walk away. By Patrick O'brian

A virtuous esculent! By Patrick O'brian

In a day when, if you insulted a man it might cost you your life, you were probably more civil. By Patrick O'brian

was an officer holding out his sword, By Patrick O'brian

all that wretched schoolmastering.' 'On some it acts like a poison, making them unfit for the society of grown men. By Patrick O'brian