There are ships sailing to many ports, but not a single one goes where life is not painful.
All is as if the world did cease to exist. The city's monuments go unseen, its past unheard, and its culture slowly fading in the dismal sea.
Only the ship is made of books, its sails thousands of overlapping pages, and the sea it floats upon is dark black ink.
A war of ideas can no more be won without books than a naval war can be won without ships. Books, like ships, have the toughest armor, the longest cruising range, and mount the most powerful guns.
Ships at a distance have every man's wish on board.
Was this the face that launched a thousand ships, and burnt the topless towers of Ileum?
A ship in port is safe, but that's not what ships are built for.
Ships are expendable; the whales are not.