How we cite our quotes: Citations follow this format: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #1
But are sailors, frequenters of fiddlers' greens, without vices? No; but less often than with landsmen do their vices, so called, partake of crookedness of heart, seeming less to proceed from viciousness than exuberance of vitality after long constraint; frank manifestations in accordance with natural law. (2.12)
Is a sin that proceeds from "exuberance of vitality after long constraint" less serious than a sin of "viciousness"? How can you distinguish between the two? Consider some of the "sins" in Billy Budd. How would you categorize them?
Quote #2
And here be it submitted that apparently going to corroborate the doctrine of man's Fall, a doctrine now popularly ignored, it is observable that where certain virtues pristine and unadulterate peculiarly characterize anybody in the external uniform of civilization, they will upon scrutiny seem not to be derived from custom or convention, but rather to be out of keeping with these, as if indeed exceptionally transmitted from period prior to Cain's city and citified man. (2.13)
In this passage, the narrator seems to be arguing that virtue has nothing to do with civilization and politeness. Instead, he presents virtue as a more natural state, one that does not have to be cultivated. Is this viewpoint accurate? How does it affect how he portrays events later on in the story?
Quote #3
At least we can promise ourselves that pleasure which is wickedly said to be in sinning, for a literary sin the divergence will be. (4.1)
Here, our narrator apologizes for one of his many digressions. Is there such a thing as "literary sin"? What is the pleasure that one can take in sinning? In having sinned?
Quote #4
Civilization, especially if of the austerer sort, is auspicious to it. It folds itself in the mantle of respectability. It has its certain negative virtues serving as silent auxiliaries. It never allows wine to get within its guard. It is not going too far to say that it is without vices or small sins. There is a phenomenal pride in it that excludes them. It is never mercenary or avaricious. In short, the depravity here meant partakes nothing of the sordid or sensual. It is serious, but free from acerbity. Though no flatterer of mankind it never speaks ill of it. (11.9)
This is the narrator's rather complex description of Claggart's depravity. He suggests that it is not immediately apparent, that it "folds itself in the mantle of respectability." Why is it that some sins need to express themselves and others do not? Is working to hide one's vices itself a vice?
Quote #5
Well, though many an arraigned mortal has in hopes of mitigated penalty pleaded guilty to horrible actions, did ever anybody seriously confess to envy? (12.3)
In this passage, the narrator speculates as to what might motivate Claggart's hatred of Billy – namely, envy. Why is envy an embarrassing sin? What sins are less embarrassing? Are there sins that are not embarrassing at all, sins that people actually take pride in, even though they denounce them?
Quote #6
With no power to annul the elemental evil in him, though readily enough he could hide it; apprehending the good, but powerless to be it; a nature like Claggart's, surcharged with energy as such natures almost invariably are, what recourse is left to it but to recoil upon itself and, like the scorpion for which the Creator alone is responsible, act out to the end the part allotted it. (12.4)
As the narrator presents Claggart in this passage, he can't but help be evil. He is "like the scorpion for which the Creator alone is responsible." If Claggart has no control over his actions, then do they constitute a sin?
Quote #7
As to Claggart, the monomania in him – if that indeed it were – as involuntarily disclosed by starts in the manifestations detailed, yet in general covered over by his self-contained and rational demeanor; this, like a subterranean fire, was eating its way deeper and deeper in him. Something decisive must come of it. (17.10)
This passage is intimately related to the one just above. The narrator again takes a fateful view of things: "Something decisive must come of it." Let's grant the narrator the fact that Claggart has no control over his actions. Might he gain more control if he didn't leave his vices "covered over by his self-contained and rational demeanor"? Don't we need to become familiar with our weaknesses and moral faults in order to master them?
Quote #8
These lights of human intelligence, losing human expression, were gelidly protruding like the alien eyes of certain uncatalogued creatures of the deep. (19.4)
What is the narrator trying to capture by describing Claggart as one of the "uncatalogued creatures of the deep"? Is it possible for eyes to lose human expression? Is the narrator not dehumanizing Claggart by the way he describes him? Trying to make him seem "other," not a part of the moral human family that the narrator imagines exists?
Quote #9
[Billy Budd:] "Could I have used my tongue I would not have struck him. But he foully lied to my face and in presence of my captain, and I had to say something, and I could only say it with a blow, God help me!" (21.14)
Billy's major sin in the novel is killing Claggart. Like Claggart, he seems to have no control over his actions. He says that he "had to say something," and that he "could only say it with a blow." If neither of them had control over their actions, then are they really that different? Is the only difference that Billy's action was motivated whereas Claggart's was not? Didn't Claggart imagine some motivation? Is a motivation less valid if it's imagined?
Quote #10
The face he beheld, for the moment one expressive of the agony of the strong, was to that officer, though a man of fifty, a startling revelation. That the condemned one suffered less than he who mainly had effected the condemnation was apparently indicated by the former's exclamation in the scene soon perforce to be touched upon. (22.4)
Here is our description of Captain Vere after he emerges from telling Billy that he will be executed. Has Captain Vere sinned? Does the phrase "the agony of the strong" seek to place Captain Vere's actions in an overly forgiving light? Try replacing this with "one who has sinned." How do your feelings about Captain Vere change if you do this?