on civilization

Review of Typee in Graham's Magazine (May 1846):

[Mr. Melville] writes of what he has seen con amore, and at times almost loses his loyalty to civilization and the Anglo-Saxon race.... "The white civilized man," he considers to be entitled, in point of "remorseless cruelty," to the dubious honor of being " the most ferocious animal on the face of the earth."  So far he seems to think sailors and missionaries have carried little to the barbarous nations which have come under his notice, but disease, starvation and death.

"As a philanthropist in general, and a friend to the Polynesians in particular, I hope that these Edens of the South Seas, blessed with fertile soils and peopled with happy natives, many being yet uncontaminated by the contact of civilization, will long remain unspoiled in their simplicity, beauty, and purity. And as for annexation, I beg to offer up an earnest prayer—and I entreat all present and all Christians to join me in it—that the banns of that union should be forbidden until we have found for ourselves a civilization morally, mentally, and physically higher than one which has culminated in almshouses, prisons, and hospitals.'  (Close of Melville's 1859 lecture on "The South Seas," as reconstructed by Merton M. Sealts, Jr. in Melville as Lecturer)

 "Civilization ever advances sword in hand, with poisons, pestilence and crime in her train."

("Scenes Beyond the Western Border," May 1853; and
Scenes and Adventures in the Army)