The first boat we read of, floated on an ocean, that with Portuguese
vengeance had whelmed a whole world without leaving so much as a widow.
That same ocean rolls now; that same ocean destroyed the wrecked ships
of last year. Yea, foolish mortals, Noah's flood is not yet subsided;
two thirds of the fair world it yet covers.
Wherein differ the sea and the land, that a miracle upon
one is not a miracle upon the other? Preternatural terrors
rested upon the Hebrews, when under the feet of Korah and his
company the live ground opened and swallowed them up for ever;
yet not a modern sun ever sets, but in precisely the same manner
the live sea swallows up ships and crews.
But not only is the sea such a foe to man who is an alien
to it, but it is also a fiend to its own off-spring;
worse than the Persian host who murdered his own guests;
sparing not the creatures which itself hath spawned.
Like a savage tigress that tossing in the jungle overlays her
own cubs, so the sea dashes even the mightiest whales against
the rocks, and leaves them there side by side with the split
wrecks of ships. No mercy, no power but its own controls it.
Panting and snorting like a mad battle steed that has lost
its rider, the masterless ocean overruns the globe.
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